Paul Celan

The Profile

Paul Celan (1920–1970), born in Cernăuți (Czernowitz), was a Romanian-born, German-language poet of Jewish descent, a Holocaust survivor and author of widely known poems such as "Todesfuge". He lived in France and died in Paris in 1970.

Wrote primarily in German. Major collections include Mohn und Gedächtnis (1952), Sprachgitter (1959), Fadensonnen (1968), Atemwende (1967) and Lichtzwang (1970). Central themes: memory, trauma, language, and the limits of expression.

Two reader reviews on DeBaser reflect admiration and struggling devotion to Paul Celan's German-language poetry. Themes include memory, trauma, language, and the effort to grasp his compressed diction. Reviewers quote and reference several major collections.