The Star-Die Above the Fountain: When Celan Met Heidegger

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Seasons go by. A few. One day, Paul Celan tells me he has written to Heidegger.

— I’ve much read Heidegger. I’ve much annotated his books. I just wrote him. I don’t expect a reply.

A few weeks later:

— I’m going to Germany. I’m going to meet Heidegger. I hope he’ll hear me.

Later:

— In Todtnauberg there is a fountain crowned with a starry die, and I thought about our conversation. Do you remember our starry pavement?

— Yes.

— Well, I saw it again at Heidegger’s, I met him in his forest full of paths that go nowhere.

— Paths that go nowhere…

— Paths that go nowhere… according to Heidegger… right…

(…)

— I had illusions. I hoped to be able to convince Heidegger. I wanted him to talk to me. I wanted to forgive. I waited for this: that he find words to trigger my clemency. But he maintained his position. Germany is strange… another pavement… indivisible.

— And yet divided.

— The division is invisible… I deeply believe this… And this comes out in Heidegger’s work and maybe in his thought… an invisible division whose vocabulary escapes… Germany altogether. Of what is this division made? How to heal it? Prayer? Waiting?

Perplexed silence. He goes on:

— I’ve written a poem over there that I’ll show you. The occasion of the meeting was a poem that is vegetal, that is, neither open nor closed, having only language for opening and closure. It contains prayer, waiting.

— You say the division is invisible because it is everywhere.

— Yes, the division has made fissures in every meter, every individual down into his words.

(…)

— (…) I‘ve always thought the poem should cross out the world. You know engravers are supposed to cross out the plates once the edition is printed. Yes, the poem should cross out the world. The poem is a diagonal that crosses out the world just as syntax is the diagonal of the poem. Next time, I’ll bring you “Todtnauberg.”

—Jean Daive, Under The Dome: Walks With Paul Celan, Paris: POL, 1996, trans. Rosmarie Waldrop.

—Paul Celan, “Todtnauberg”, tr. Pierre Joris

(Source: msodradek)