Heinz Piontek

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Heinz Piontek (born November 15, 1925 in Kreuzburg , Upper Silesia Province ; † October 26, 2003 in Rotthalmünster near Passau ) was a German writer .

Life

Heinz Piontek came from an Upper Silesian farming family. He told of his childhood and youth in Kreuzburg in his autobiographical novel Time of my Life . In 1943 he had to drop out of school and take part in the Second World War as a soldier in the Wehrmacht . In 1945 he was taken prisoner by the Americans in Bavaria ; after his release he lived for some time in Waldmünchen , worked at times as a worker in a quarry in the Upper Palatinate and as a construction worker in Munich . In his second commemorative novel, The Hour of the Survivors , Piontek reported on these years in great detail. In 1947 he moved to Lauingen , where he took his Abitur and married Gisela Dallmann in 1951. He then studied for three semesters German at the Philosophy and Theology College Dillingen . In 1955 Piontek moved to Dillingen, then to Munich in 1961. Since the currency reform (1948) he lived from his literary work.

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Piontek began his writing career in 1946 with an article for Die Neue Zeitung ; he was soon followed by poems and stories. Piontek also made a name for himself as a literary critic (for example for the magazine Welt und Wort) and essayist. After the first two volumes of poetry were published in 1956, his poetry was extensively recognized by Hans Egon Holthusen .

The label “natural lyricist” (in the Loerke and Lehmann successor), which was made early on, is incorrect in this exclusivity, because alongside poems of natural magic there are elegies and romances, but from the beginning there are also “poems of the times” that refuse any bold engagement, mostly in the Form of narrative poem, e.g. Die Verstreuten , Der Untergang der Scharnhorst (both in Wassermarken , 1957) and Um 1800 , a modern poem about the time of the German Classics (in plain language , 1966) , which have become very well known due to the issue of expulsion . Piontek also processed religious motifs early on; they then reached a climax in cycles on ancient Jewish prophets ( Helldunkel , 1987). In his lyrical late work, the cyclical poem Oderabwärts deserves particular attention, which “tells” the course of the river from the source to the mouth (in Neue Umlaufbahn 1999).

Over the years Piontek's poetry rose, the rhyme receded and an increasing laconicity determined his often meditative verses. The express commitment to beauty, e.g. B. in the poem Sprachtabus (1981) (... Yes, I say / that we don't have to fear the beautiful: // the honey, the apple, the swan - // ...), solved incomprehension in the criticism , even malice. For Piontek, however, beauty does not mean the aesthetic trimmings of reality, but, in the sense of the Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats , the truth of the work of art. As early as 1981, Richard Exner characterized the poet Heinz Piontek and the unmistakable nature of his verses in a detailed essay on German poetry from 1945-1975. : “He's not a fashionable poet. He is a modern poet, to be equated in rank with Eich and Celan, who of course are fundamentally different. His poetics can be summed up in the title of his last essay volume [1978] with the three human conditions and intentions, with dreams, wakefulness and resistance, to which the equally fundamental results easily and convincingly rhyme: openness, clarity and finally security, that Pascalsche Certitude ”(p. 197).

The narrator Piontek initially focused on the short story , which he called "graphics in prose" in an essay. Piontek proved to be well versed in many narrative techniques: narrative condensation of segments of reality and atmospheric visualization of situations; exciting narrated actions and inner monologues ; but always a high level of accuracy in describing what is visible and tangible. It was only later that Piontek found larger narrative forms. The marriage, generation and city novel The Middle Years - the first of three Munich novels - attracted particular attention due to its visualization of the Scholl siblings , Alexander Schmorell and Professor Kurt Hubers .

In the increasingly politicized literary business of the 1960s and 1970s, Piontek came more and more into criticism. It culminated in the awarding of the Georg Büchner Prize to what the frequently repeated objection was called, a representative of “pure poetry”, a lack of social commitment and escapism, although insufficient testing was carried out to determine whether these labels were right. Marked as an “outsider”, Piontek withdrew more and more from the literary business, which he had already targeted in his second Munich novel Dichterleben (1976).

Poems and stories by Heinz Piontek have been translated into over 24 languages ​​and selected samples of his work have been in numerous anthologies and reading books at home and abroad since the 1950s. Piontek's editorial work is also important. In addition to a series of prose and poetry anthologies, he edited the literary yearbook Ensemble from 1969 to 1979 and from 1980 to 1986 published the series Münchner Edition, which he founded.

The extensive literary estate of Piontek is kept in the Manuscripts and Old Prints Department of the Bavarian State Library. The Heinz Piontek Museum in Lauingen an der Donau houses documents, letters and photos on origins and biography, first editions and personal copies of his work, Heinz Piontek's special collection of contemporary poetry from 1945-2000, drawings and watercolors, sound documents as well as press reviews and reviews of the writer's work. The Lauinger Piontek Archive (LPA) with collections of letters and numerous photo documents as well as a special collection of dedicatory and personal copies from the poet's possession is the lender.

Heinz Piontek was a member

Awards

In 1985 he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit 1st Class and in 1992 the Bavarian Order of Merit .

Streets and memorial plaques

  • On September 16, 2008, a memorial plaque was unveiled in Kluczbork at the house where the writer was born, 13 Byczyńska Street.
  • The city of Lauingen honored him on July 25, 2019 with Heinz-Piontek-Straße in the "Lauingen West" building area (see: Yearbook of the Historical Association Dillingen ad Donau 119th / 20th year 2018/2019, p. 315-318)

Works

Work editions:

  • Works in six volumes. Munich
    • 1. Early in September. 1982
    • 2. The Munich novels. 1981
    • 3. Fire in the wind. 1985
    • 4. Colored shadows. 1984
    • 5. Beauty: partisan. 1983
    • 6. Time of my life. 1985
  • Selection of works, Würzburg
    • 1. Indian summer. 1990
    • 2. Stop for a hand. 1990
  • Heinz Piontek: 'I listen deeply to the silent'. Early poetry and prose. Edited by Anton Hirner and Hartwig Wiedow with a foreword by Harald Gröhler . Wolff Verlag, Schmalkalden 2011, ISBN 978-3-941461-05-5 .
  • Heinz Piontek. (= Poetry album. 326). Selection of poetry by Gerhard C. Krischker , graphic by Heinz Piontek. Märkischer Verlag, Wilhelmshorst 2016, ISBN 978-3-943708-26-4 .
  • Heinz Piontek: Poems . Selected by Reinhard Kiefer and with a text by Gerhard Neumann . (= Poetry paperback. 120). Rimbaud Verlag, Aachen 2019, ISBN 978-3-89086-322-1 .


First editions

  • The ford. Esslingen 1952.
  • The plume of smoke. Esslingen 1953.
  • Before your eyes. Esslingen 1955.
  • Watermarks. Esslingen 1957.
  • Letter, wand. Esslingen 1959.
  • Trees in the wind. Brother and brother. Hamburg 1961.
  • With a crane feather. Stuttgart 1962.
  • White panther. Stuttgart 1962.
  • Chestnuts from the fire. Stuttgart 1963.
  • Wind directions. Stuttgart 1963.
  • The stopover. Hamburg 1963.
  • Marginal phenomena. Darmstadt 1965.
  • Plain text. Hamburg 1966.
  • The middle years. Hamburg 1967.
  • Outdoor shots. Baden-Baden 1968.
  • Declarations of love in prose. Hamburg 1969.
  • Men who write poetry. Hamburg 1970.
  • The stories. Munich [u. a.] 1971.
  • Dead or alive. Hamburg 1971.
  • Create clarity. Karlsruhe 1972.
  • Bright days elsewhere. Munich [u. a.] 1973.
  • Collected poems. Hamburg 1975
  • Life with words. Percha (on Lake Starnberg) [u. a.] 1975.
  • Poet life . Hamburg 1976.
  • The time of the other interpretation. Darmstadt 1976.
  • Bridge the silence. Gütersloh 1977.
  • Winter days, summer nights. Munich [u. a.] 1977.
  • Dark Chamber Game. Percha on Lake Starnberg [u. a.] 1978.
  • Dream, watch, resist. Munich 1978.
  • How music made its way. Hamburg 1978.
  • The craft of reading. Munich 1979.
  • Jutta's nephew. Munich 1979.
  • Pre-war period. Munich 1980.
  • What won't let me go Munich 1981.
  • Apparitions. Weilheim 1983.
  • Time of my life. Munich 1984.
  • Before the wind changed Waldbrunn 1985.
  • Chiaroscuro. Freiburg im Breisgau u. a. 1987.
  • Hour of the survivors. Wuerzburg 1989.
  • Morning watch. Wuerzburg 1991.
  • According to Markus. Wuerzburg 1991.
  • Goethe on the move in Silesia: almost a novel. Bergstadtverlag Korn, Würzburg 1993, ISBN 3-87057-173-X .
  • with Mario Schosser: Dialogue. Hauzenberg 1993.
  • New orbit. Wuerzburg 1998.

Selected poems

  • Clouds (they are birds, albatrosses, with slow wings)
  • Black Forest serpentines (the gravel curves cut into the moist flesh of the fir)
  • The street guards' meal (they chew calmly in the shade of the tar barrel)

Editing

  • From the bottom of my heart Stuttgart 1959.
  • New German narrative poems. Stuttgart 1964. (New edition Munich 1980)
  • Moments on the way. Hamburg 1968.
  • with Clemens Graf Podewils : Ensemble. Munich, born 1.1969 - 10.1979.
  • German poems since 1960. Stuttgart 1972.
  • Yes my angel. Munich 1981.
  • Love, sorrow and time and eternity. Hamburg 1981.
  • Munich Edition, 1980–1985; u. a .:

Translations

The translation, especially of poems, has accompanied Piontek's lyrical work from the start. The focus is on English Romanticism and early modernism, on John Keats , Gerard Manley Hopkins , William Butler Yeats , Wystan Hugh Auden , but also on poems by Giuseppe Ungaretti , Rafael Alberti and the Serb Miodrag Pavlović . A adaptation of Wallace Stevens ' Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird can be found in his last volume of poetry, Neue Umlaufbahn . Commentary poetological reflections accompany his endeavors for “correctness, accuracy, beauty”. A testimony to the “fundamental non-closure of poetry transfers” are, according to his own testimony in the afterword, his transfers of the poems by John Keats, which have been published many times since 1960 and have been repeatedly improved. The following book is available:

  • John Keats: On a Greek urn. Poems in English and German. Transferred and with an afterword by Heinz Piontek. (= island pocket book. 2216). Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main u. a. 1999, ISBN 3-458-33916-7 .
  • Joseph Conrad : shadow line. (= island pocket book. 2534). from the English by Heinz Piontek. Insel Verlag, Frankfurt u. a. 1999, ISBN 3-458-34234-6 .

Exhibition catalogs

  • Heinz Piontek: watercolors, gouaches, drawings, collages. Munich 2001.

literature

  • Hans Egon Holthusen: Five young lyric poets. In: yes and no. New critical attempts. Munich 1954.
  • Richard Exner : Heinz Piontek. In: Die deutsche Lyrik 1945–1975. Between message and game. Edited by Klaus Weissenberger. August Bagel, Düsseldorf 1981, ISBN 3-513-02145-3 , pp. 186-197.
  • Nikolaus Gussone (Red.): Heinz Piontek. Roots and work of a poet from Upper Silesia. Laumann, Dülmen 1985, ISBN 3-87466-083-4 .
  • Heinz Piontek on his 75th birthday. (= Literature in Bavaria . Special issue). Munich 2000.
  • Martin Hollender: Bibliography Heinz Piontek . Aisthesis, Bielefeld 2000, ISBN 3-89528-255-3 , (authoritative bibliography of works and secondary literature from 1951 to 1999).
  • Robert Buczek: Autobiographical aspects in the novels "Time of my life and" hour of survivors "by Heinz Piontek. Frankfurt am Main et al. 2004.
  • Ludwig Steinherr : "The universe is a narrow door". For the 75th birthday of Heinz Piontek. In: Voices of the Time . Freiburg 2000, issue 11, pp. 773-783.
  • Harald Hartung : No guarantee for a better day. On the death of the poet Heinz Piontek. In: FAZ. No. 251, October 29, 2003.
  • Anton Hirner, Klaus Hille: Heinz Piontek: life and work. Lauingen - Dillingen 1947–1961. A documentation. (= Yearbook of the Historical Association Dilingen. Supplement 1). With contributions by Erich Pawlu and Hartwig Wiedow. Historical Association Dillingen, 2009.
  • Martin Hollender: Away from all fashions. The Munich poet Heinz Piontek and his estate in the Bavarian State Library. In: library magazine . Messages from the Berlin and Munich State Libraries. No. 3, 2010, pp. 45-48. (PDF)
  • Renata Schumann : The lost city. The image of Upper Silesia in the work of Heinz Piontek. In: Frank-Lothar Kroll (Hrsg.): Flight and expulsion in literature after 1945 . Gebrüder Mann Verlag, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-7861-1968-6 , pp. 67-86.
  • Hanna Klessinger: Commitment to poetry: Hans Egon Holthusen , Karl Krolow , Heinz Piontek and the literature policy of the Merkur magazine in the years 1947 to 1956 . Wallstein-Verlag, Göttingen 2011, ISBN 978-3-8353-0874-9 .
  • Rafał Biskup (Ed.): Silesia - Grenzliterarisch. Studies on German-Polish cultural transfer processes . Leipziger Universitätsverlag, Leipzig 2015. About Heinz Piontek:
    • Paweł Zimniak: Province between participation and distance. Pp. 265-272.
    • Ewa Jarosz-Sienkiewicz: New Orbit. To condense the expression in Heinz Piontek. Pp. 273-287.
    • Hartwig Wiedow: Heinz Piontek: Oderabwärts III. Pp. 289-298.
    • Anton Hirner: Heinz Piontek - German writer of Silesian origin. Pp. 29-301.
  • Hartwig Wiedow: Heinz Piontek in Donauried: Post-war home and beginnings of a writer. In: Yearbook of the historical association Dillingen ad Donau. 116/117. Volume, 2015/16, Dillingen 2017, pp. 265–290.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ For the scope of the estate, see: Martin Hollender: Abseits aller Moden. The Munich poet Heinz Piontek and his estate in the Bavarian State Library. In: library magazine. Messages from the Berlin and Munich State Libraries. No. 3, 2010, pp. 45-47.
  2. ↑ Flyer for the opening of the Heinz Piontek Museum on November 15, 2013, Dillingen 2013.
  3. ^ Anton Hirner, Klaus Hille: Heinz Piontek: Life and Work. Lauingen - Dillingen 1947–1961. A documentation. With contributions by Erich Pawlu and Hartwig Wiedow. Historischer Verein Dillingen, 2009, ISSN  0073-2699 , pp. 10-11.
  4. ↑ The above three poems are from: Hans Bender (Ed.): Gegenpiel. German poetry since 1945. Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 1962, DNB 450351858 .
  5. ^ Poems from foreign languages. In: Piontek: Early in September. 1982, pp. 339-433.
  6. ↑ for example Hopkins in new transmissions . In: Piontek: The craft of reading. 1979, pp. 125-136.
personal data
SURNAME Piontek, Heinz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer
DATE OF BIRTH November 15, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Kreuzburg , Upper Silesia Province , Prussia , Weimar Republic
DATE OF DEATH October 26, 2003
Place of death Rotthalmünster near Passau , Bavaria , Federal Republic of Germany