Gerhard Falkner [ Germany ]

Gerhard Falkner was born in Schwabach, near Nuremberg, in 1951. He worked as a bookseller in London and Nuremberg and published his early poems in magazines and art-books. His first collection of poetry »so beginnen am körper die tage« (1981; t: in this way the days begin on the body) was surprisingly different to mainstream poetry in the 1980s, its formal expression vibrating with the correspondance between powerfully captured timeliness and classic modernity. In his subsequent collections »der atem unter der erde« (1984; t: the breath beneath the ground) and »wemut« (1989; t: melankoly) this dialogue with tradition develops steadily into a confrontation with the contemporary world, which he portrays as jarring, thoroughly exploited and linguistically flat. As if in resistance to this he uses an abundance of forms and allusions in his work. He interfuses pathos and irony as a reaction to finding nothing to admire but banality instead, which he deals with – in an act of heroism – by producing art. Falkner announced »wemut« to be his last poetic work. Subsequently, he lived for a year in the USA and Mexico.

In fragments and reflections which were published in 1993 entitled »Über den Unwert des Gedichts« (t: On Poetry’s Lack of Value), Falkner polemically bemoans the lack of poetic appreciation. The lyrical essay »Die Jammergestalt des Poeten« (t: The Poet as Miserable Figure), which was also published in Joachim Sartorius’ »Minima Poetica« (1999), is a tirade against the »literature business«, in which admittedly Falkner himself is also imprisoned. Nineteen years after its first appearance, his earliest volume of poetry was republished in a second edition, proving the timelessness of his verse. By this time Falkner had broken his resolution and continued to write poetry. He published, amongst others, »X-te Person Einzahl« (t: Xth Person Singular), »Gegensprechstadt – ground zero« (t: Counter Speaking City – ground zero) and »Hölderlin Reparatur« (2008; t: Hölderlin Repair). At the centre of a dense net of reference stands the Romantic »poet of poets,« bringing the significance of poetry into focus and attacking alongside modern impositions. In 2009 Falkner was awarded the Peter Huchel Prize for the collection. Giving their reasons, the jury praised the author’s »possibilities of sublime writing in a time of a damaged linguistic sphere«.

In his short novel »Bruno« (2008) Falkner combines an author’s failed search for self-identity with the bizarre story of the »nuisance bear« made famous in the German and international media. Falkner has also published two dramas and an opera libretto. He translates American poetry and detective fiction and has published anthologies on contemporary American literature and new Hungarian poetry. In addition to scholarships which have enabled him to travel to Rome, Amsterdam and San Francisco amongst other places, he has also been awarded numerous prizes, such as the August-Graf-von-Platen Literature Prize 2009, the Bavarian State Prize for Literature, the Schiller Prize and the Kranichstein Literature Prize. The author lives in Berlin and in Weigendorf, Bavaria.

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