Within the vast reception history of Martin Heidegger's philosophical thought poets, novelists, and playwrights have occupied a central place. This collection of essays opens up new perspectives by tracing the manifold, often surprising ways in which Heideggerian concepts, motifs, and concerns have been taken up in literary and poetic writing since the middle of the 20th century. In their contributions, scholars from the Americas, Asia, and Europe explore intellectual constellations between Heidegger and selected literary figures such as John Ashbery, Julia de Burgos, Paul Celan, Elfriede Jelinek, and Velimir Khlebnikov. The volume unveils the immense creativity that crystallizes in these poetic and literary traces and disseminations of Heidegger's thinking. Hence, it points to new and fruitful ways to critically intervene in current philosophical and literary debates.
Florian Grosser teaches in the Visual & Critical Studies Program at California College of the Arts, San Francisco and in the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests lie in 20th century continental philosophy, political and social philosophy, and aesthetics. He is the author of the monographs Revolution denken. Heidegger und das Politische 1919-1969 (Munich: C.H. Beck, 2011; 2nd edition 2020) and Theorien der Revolution (Hamburg: Junius, 2013; revised 2nd edition 2018). Nassima Sahraoui is a researcher based in Germany. Her areas of research are political theory, history of philosophy, and the intersections between literature and philosophy. She is the author of Dynamis. Eine materialistische Philosophie der Differenz (2021) and is preparing another monograph on Forms of Resistance.
Variations on a Theme of "Poetic Thinking": An Introduction Florian Grosser and Nassima Sahraoui PART I: IN-BETWEEN PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE Text, Exegesis, and Salvation 1 Heidegger and the Critics Julia Ireland 2 Heidegger as Introduction to Talmud Elad Lapidot 3 Reactionary Nostalgia: Badiou, Heidegger, and the Poets Luca di Blasi 4 In the Outhouse of Being: What Satires Tell Us About Heidegger's Philosophy Dieter Thoma Displacing the House of Being 5 "Beth-that is the House": Paul Celan's Hebrew Dwelling Simone Stirner 6 Meridians of Truth: From Heidegger's Geography of Being to Celan's Topology of Language Nassima Sahraoui 7 Handke's Doubt: Slow Homecoming in Conversation with Heidegger Florian Grosser PART II: LITERARY RECEPTION POLITICS BETWEEN EAST AND WEST Hoelderlin and the Poetics of the States 8 "The Right to Be": Stevens and Heidegger on Thinking and Poetizing Frederick Dolan 9 "Victory Is an Illusion of Philosophers and Fools": Heidegger, Faulkner, and the Ruination of the Proper Benjamin Brewer 10 "The Gods are never quite forgotten": John Ashbery's Heidegger Luke Carson 11 Heidegger's Mistress? Meditations on Dasein in David Markson's Wittgenstein's Mistress Tim Personn Crossing the Boundaries of the Other: History, Time, and Silence 12 The Impossible Death of Julia de Burgos: Reading "!Dadme mi numero!" at the Limits of Da-sein Ronald Mendoza-de Jesus 13 Lezama Lima and the Resurrection of the Image (An Ontological Enigma) Mauricio Gonzalez 14 The Boundary of Ontological Time and its Crossing: ShuzoKuki's Analysis of Japanese Poetry as an Unrealized Dialogue with Heidegger Yohei Kageyama 15 Heidegger and Russian Revolutionary Nonsense Jeff Love Index
Heidegger in the Literary World shows us that we might do well in taking Heidegger's cue and treating literature and poetry with the same care and, indeed, reverence he pays to Trakl, Rilke, and again, most of all, to Hoelderlin. The editors invoke Jacques Derrida to define the ethics or politics of reading at work in the volume, but they could equally well have stayed with Heidegger to outline such principles of reading. That is, the aspiration to reach that height of critique which Heidegger called Auseinandersetzung. * German Studies Review *
