Paul Celan: Poet, Survivor, Jew by Felstiner, Mr. John - 1997

New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997. Soft cover. Fine/No Dust Jacket As Issued.

No Flaws or Blemishes but minimal shelf handling; some dust-dulling to edges. 8vo; 9.25 inches tall; 344 pages with chapter notes and an index.. Felstiner tells the poet's story: his birth in 1920 in Romania, the overnight loss of his parents in a Nazi deportation, his experience of forced labor and Soviet occupation during the war, and then his difficult exile in Paris.

Felstiner uncovers Celan's sources in the Bible and Judaic mysticism, his affinities with Kafka, Heine, Holderlin, Rilke and Nelly Sachs, his fascination with Heidegger and Buber, his translations of Shakespeare, Dickinson, Mandelshtram, Apollinaire.

It offers new translations of well-known and little-known poems including a chapter on Celan's famous Deathfugue - plus his speeches, prose fiction and letters. The book also presents photos of the poet and his circle.