Peter Hacks

[Mirabell]

Peter Hacks has just published two awesome, if somewhat odd, books.
One, a fat, heavy monster, Die Ma?gaben der Kunst, his collected essays. The other a short book-length essay on the Romantics, attacking them (correnctly) for being precursors of fascism and (crazily) for being English, anti-revolutionary spies.

Hacks is one of the weirdest, most complicated figures of 20th century German literature. His amazing poetry and drama seems always a step short of complete brilliance, especially when compared to writers like the M?llers or Huchel. But on the other hand, they always make for intriguing reading. Politically, he's one of the guys that make Eric throw a hissy fit. He's been a cadre writer. Not a hack like the infamous Kuba, tho, Hacks is a very good writer, yet an apologist for the regime. For communist writers this is a balancing act, and writers like M?ller, Morgner or Wolf fell on the 'right side' of it. Hacks didn't and a life as an establishment fat cat has marred his work.

Here's the wiki

Peter Hacks (21 March 1928 – 28 August 2003) was a German playwright, author, and essayist.
Hacks was born in Breslau (Wrocław), Lower Silesia. Displaced by World War II, Hacks settled in Munich in 1947, where he made acquaintance with Thomas Mann and Bertolt Brecht. Hacks then followed Brecht to East Berlin in 1955, where the two collaborated closely.
Although Hacks initially faced disapproval from the literary watchdogs of the GDR, his success on the world stage—most notably with "Ein Gespr?ch im Hause Stein ?ber den abwesenden Herrn von Goethe" (A Discussion in the Stein Home about the Absent Mr. Goethe)--led to his literary acceptance within the party leadership.
Hacks supported the East German government's 1976 expatriation of the singer Wolf Biermann.
He won the Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis.

Peter Hacks - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Liam]

essay on the Romantics, attacking them (correnctly) for being precursors of fascism

Can you name some, please? Who are the major poets that the essay focuses on?

Politically, he's one of the guys that make Eric throw a hissy fit.

Eric doesn't throw fits. That would be you and me, darling. What Eric usually does is he writes cool, calm, collected and utterly cogent little paragraphs espousing his views. Politics aside, I wish I could express myself quite as succinctly, and in such a precise, distilled style.

No offense, but Hacks sounds like a hack. Talk about paranoid Leftist lit-scholars. Perhaps Gilgamesh was a precursor to Hitler? Piffle.

[Mirabell]

No, the fascism/romanticism thing is actually pretty well established in german literary studies (not that there aren't dissenting voices), it's the genre per se, all Romantic writers are part of that thing, without, nota bene, being fascist themselves. Brentano, Arnim, Eichendorff...

A good read if you're interested in the topic are Rudolf Borchardt's essays and speeches which trace that idea pretty well.


As for 'hack', since he's primarily a playwright and poet, his often somewhat outlandish and strident opinions don't really take away from his writing. He's often a stiff, somewhat classically oriented writer, you might actually like his work.

[Liam]

OK. For a second there, I thought you were talking about the English Romantics.

[Mirabell]

Depressingly, none of his plays have been translated into English yet.


ALso, I checking this, I saw that apparently, Hacks has written a significant amount of children's books.

[Liam]

Hacks has written a significant amount of children's books.

Quickly, send a PM to Waalkwriter!