Uprooted, like millions of others, during the course of the World War, and interned in a labour camp, after the war Celan fled, first to Bucharest, and thence to Vienna, before settling in Paris in 1948. Since his death Celan s reputation has continued to grow, and his work has received the attention of some of the foremost philosophers and critics of the postwar period, including Hans Georg Gadamer, Jacques Derrida, Werner Hamacher, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and George Steiner. The event is being held on the date of Celan s birth November 23, on what would have been his eightieth birthday. The reading will be followed by a wine reception given by the Institute of English Studies. Organised jointly by the Contemporary Poetics Research Centre , Birkbeck College, and the English Department of Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, University of London.
Poems make toward something . . .