Hölderlin in der Lyrik Gunter Eichs

Abstract

Gunter Eich mentions Holderlin in two poems. Latrine (1945) depicts a dismal wartime situation and evokes contrasting memories of Holderlin's poem Andenken. This poem, one of Holderlin's most mature, expresses a longing for Bordeaux; it contemplates the southern landscape, the ocean, sailors, and states that only the poet's word creates eternal values. Eich's poem, although influenced by the nature-mystical school of the 1930s, reveals a tendency towards modern imagery, a system of chiffres. It sees the poet's word as a stable, although possibly futile, factor in the decay of World War II. Eich's poem is in sharp contrast to the fervent veneration of Holderlin in the twentieth century as expressed very explicitly by Heidegger. The second poem, Neue Postkarte 8, refers to Holderlin's contemplation of the ancient city of Palmyra in Lebensalter and the destruction of Greek civilization. Holderlin's remoteness from the Greek world resembles strangely the alienation of the modern writer in regard to both Holderlin and the antique ruins. Even more than in Latrine, Holderlin's words have become a foreign phenomenon in an indifferent world. Both poems challenge the Holderlin-cult of the twentieth century. Latrine still quotes Holderlin verses; Neue Postkarte 8 uses only a chiffre of futility to refer to Holderlin's poetic world.