Bernhard Böschenstein

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Bernhard Böschenstein (born August 2, 1931 in Bern ; † January 18, 2019 in Chêne-Bougeries ; resident in Bern and Stein am Rhein ) was a Swiss literary scholar . He taught from 1964 to 1998 as a professor of German and comparative literature at the University of Geneva . He has made a name for himself above all as an eminent connoisseur of demanding lyrical traditions from Holderlin to symbolism to Celan and as a mediator and translator of modern French poetry.

Life

Böschenstein spent his childhood in Berlin and Paris , where his father, the Swiss journalist Hermann Böschenstein (1905–1997), worked as a political correspondent. From 1950 he studied German , French and Greek literature in Paris , Cologne and Zurich . In 1958 he did his doctorate with Emil Staiger with a dissertation on Hölderlin's Rhine anthem . From 1958 to 1964 he was assistant to Walther Killy at the Free University of Berlin and in Göttingen . In 1964 he was a visiting scholar and lecturer at Harvard University . From 1964 he taught as an associate professor , from 1965 as a full professor of modern German literary history in Geneva. From 1994 he also read in comparative literature. In 1998 he retired. Böschenstein was co-editor of the Hölderlin yearbook from 1967 to 2004. He was visiting professor at the Universities of Lausanne, Basel, Zurich, Friborg, Cornell, Princeton, Heidelberg, Pisa and at the ETH Zurich . He was a member of numerous international learned and literary societies, including the Academia Europaea in London . In 1975 he was awarded the Goethe Medal by the Goethe Institute .

Böschenstein was married to the literary scholar Renate Böschenstein-Schäfer (1933–2003). The writer Christine Trüb is his sister.

He was personally known and friends with numerous scholars and writers, u. a. with Friedrich Dürrenmatt , Peter Szondi , Paul Celan and Theodor W. Adorno .

Böschenstein's godfather was the Bern art historian Wilhelm Stein , an ardent admirer of Stefan Georges . Böschenstein himself later advocated research into George's work and the George Circle .

His estate is in the Swiss Literary Archives in Bern. His private library was transferred to Slovakia in 2019, where a Bernhard and Renate Böschenstein library was set up at the German Institute of the University of Prešov .

Research priorities

Hölderlin (poems after 1800, relationship to Greek tragedy, reception in the 20th century); 20th century poetry (George, Hofmannsthal , Rilke , Trakl , Celan); Franco-German literary relations (Rousseau, Symbolism).

Works

Monographs

  • Holderlin's rhine anthem. Zurich / Freiburg i. Br .: Atlantis 1959, 2nd edition 1968.
  • Concordance on Hölderlin's poems after 1800. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht 1964.
  • Studies in the Poetry of the Absolute. Zurich / Freiburg i. Br .: Atlantis 1968.
  • Lighthouses. From Hölderlin to Celan, effect and comparison. Frankfurt a. M .: Insel 1977, 2nd edition 1982.
  • «Fruit of the thunderstorm». On Holderlin's Dionysus as the god of revolution. Frankfurt a. M .: Insel 1989.
  • From morning to evening. Filiations of poetry from Holderlin to Celan. Munich: Fink 2006.
  • The explosive power of miniature - on the short prose of Robert Walser , Kafkas, Musils, with an antithetical opening to Thomas Mann. Hildesheim / Zurich / New York: Olms 2013 (German texts and studies, vol. 91).

Editing

  • (Ed.): Hölderlin vu de France. Tübingen: Gunter Narr 1987.
  • Goethe: The natural daughter. Frankfurt a. M .: Insel 1990.
  • (Ed.): French poetry. Fourth volume: From Apollinaire to the present. Munich: Beck 1990, 2nd edition 2001.
  • (Ed.): Hommage à Musil. Geneva Colloquium on the 50th anniversary of Robert Musil's death . Musiliana Volume 1, Bern: Peter Lang 1995.
  • (Ed.): Ingeborg Bachmann and Paul Celan. Poetic correspondence. Frankfurt a. M .: Suhrkamp 1997.
  • (Ed.): Paul Celan: The Meridian. Final draft - drafts - materials. Tübingen edition, Frankfurt a. M .: Suhrkamp 1999.
  • (Ed.): Stefan George: Work and effect since the Seventh Ring. Tübingen: Niemeyer 2001.
  • (Ed.): Scientists in the George Circle. The world of the poet and the profession of science . Berlin / New York: de Gruyter 2005.

Translations (selection)

Audio CD

  • Friedrich Hölderlin: Poems - read and explained by Bernhard Böschenstein. Amsterdam: Castrum Peregrini Press 2007, 2nd edition, Tübingen: Hölderlin Society 2010.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ List of award winners on the Goethe-Institut website ( Memento from May 13, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ↑ See Bernhard Böschenstein: Dürrenmatt's relationship to poems. Memories and interpretations. In: Bookmarks. Semiotics in space and time. Edited by H. Herwig, I. Wirtz, St. B. Würffel. Tübingen / Basel: Francke 1999, pp. 441-448.
  3. ↑ See Peter Szondi: Letters. Edited by Christoph König and Thomas Sparr, Frankfurt a. M. 1993.
  4. ↑ See Bernhard Böschenstein: Conversations and courses with Paul Celan. In: Giuseppe Bevilacqua, Bernhard Böschenstein: Paul Celan: two speeches. Marbach am Neckar: German Schiller Society 1990.
  5. ↑ See the film Pourquoi des poètes en un temps de dénuement? Trois approches de Hölderlin by Bernard Böschenstein . Realization Stéphane Rousseau. DVD, Corseaux 2009: http://vimeo.com/60489216
  6. ↑ See Michael Landmann: Figures around Stefan George. Second volume . Amsterdam, Bonn: Castrum Peregrini Press, 1988, p. 72.
  7. ↑ Dominik Müller: The great gift of scholars . In: Passim - Bulletin of the Swiss Literary Archives . No. 25 , 2020, p. 20-21 .
  8. ^ Roman Luckscheiter: Geniuses among themselves. Bernhard Böschenstein measures the map of poetry , FAZ , October 4, 2006 (review of From morning to evening )
personal data
SURNAME Böschenstein, Bernhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss literary scholar
DATE OF BIRTH August 2, 1931
PLACE OF BIRTH Bern
DATE OF DEATH 18th January 2019
Place of death Chêne-Bougeries