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The writer Otto Fritz Jickeli (1888-1960) turned to events of the 19th century in his unpublished story Die Kosakenbraut. The revolution of 1848 /49 forms the chronological axis for the events in the description, with their befor and after. The episodes do not lack the unusual moments that occur in times of revolutionary upheaval. As is well known, the Imperial Austrian troops were supported in their fight against Hungarian revolutionaries by the Tsarist Russian army, and the armies of the insurgents finally succumbed to this military alliance of the great powers. The changing fortunes of war, the events effecting private life are vividly presented, also with the help of a spontaneous love affair between a Cossack commander of the Russian army and a Transylvanian woman who, under problematic circumstances, becomes the „Cossack bride” and mother of a half-Cossack. It is both fluent and stimulating reading about the customs and moral concepts of the time, aprose work that testifies to the author’s expertise and also to this sense of humour.
The author, attracted to the Romanian poetry written during the inter-war period, tried to translate into German some of the poems wirtten by Ion Pillat and Ion Barbu. From this pursuit he could learn a lot, not only thanks to his inclination towards the original text, by interpreting it from a semantic point of view, but also by searching the lexical equivalents established in the target-language. In the magazine, there are introduced poets that belong to the younger generation and so, he managed to approach their licirical creations more as a translator, especially those written by Nichita Stănescu and Ioan Alexandru. At the same time, the author narrates some of his experiences regarding the folklore poetry, his steps concerning the translation of the ballads written originally by Transylvanian Saxons in the literary German. Moreover, he does not fail to outline the realization of a short edition from the piece of work, created in Latin by the Transylvanian humanist Christian Schesäus, the poem Istoria Anei Kendi, translated with the help of a few contributors in Romanian, Hungarian and German.
The Chair of German Philology at the University of Sibiu delivered literary-historical studies on themes of the German Literature in Romania for several years. Together with the Forschungszentrum für Sozialwissenschaften (Research Centre for Social Studies), together with the local agency of the Romanian Academy Bucharest, denominated the Institute for Social and Humanistic Researches and together with other Chairs of the country there have been envisaged and performed community projects.
The contributor gives information on such projects on the basis of his knowledge of the involved staff, from the overview of agreements, methods and balances.
The bibliography of the present volume has been composed by the writer, essayist, literary historian and translator Joachim Wittstock.
The Romanian poet and essayist Ion Pillat (1891-1945) ranks among the relatively often translated writers of his generation (authors who were active during the interwar period). His works have kept the attention of the German readership several times: Two volumes by Ion Pillat, which appeared in 1943 and 1976 (containing translations by Konrad Richter and Bernhard Capesius, respectively by Wolf von Aichelburg), as well as varied publications in anthologies and other publications have contributed to the spread of his work in Germany and Austria. The author offers an overview of the existing translations and, in the end, refers to his own attempts at translating Ion Pillat’s poetry into German.
The writer Emil Witting (1880-1952), known by German readers through the descriptions of the forests and pastures of the Carpathian Mountains, author of extensive relations dedicated to the bear (Frate Nicolae) and to deer (Scrimerul), conceives a novel dedicated to a painter connected to the Szekler’s world. Imre Nagy (1893-1976) served as a model for the main character. From this unfinished writing, three fragments were published. These have recently been translated into Hungarian, printed in Miercurea Ciuc in an illustrated edition containing Imre Nagy’s paintings and graphic works.
Gerda Mieß (born in Bistrita in 1896, dies in Cisnădie in 1954), is know for her verses published in periodicals and anthologies as well as for only collection of her poems (by Dr. Stefan Sienerth in 1987 in Kriterion Verlag Bucharest published). People interested in the history of literature knew that she had also written a novel in her youth, which, howeser, never came to the public during her lifetime or afterwards. Her descendants (the Herbert-László family) hade the manuscript prose work translated into computer script and took steps to publish the novel. It offers an insight into the mentality and behavior of the time around 1910, into the school system of the time and the problems of that time and the problems of women (education and employment of women).
This succint introduction to Radu Vancu, the young poet and university lecturer invited to the reading organized by the Department of German Studies as part of its annual scientific conference, offers some biographical and exegetical points of reference for the author’s literary and professional evolution. For instance, there is the apprenticeship (rather a “friendshipin-love”) with the venerated master: the poet, gifted translator and man of culture Mircea Ivãnescu, whom he praises in his doctoral thesis as ”the poet of absolute discretion”. Then there is his editing activity at the “Transilvania” Cultural Journal, a publication of original critical and essayistic writings. His forceful, resourceful and sensitive lyrical work shows two dominant themes: on the one hand, the traumatising early loss of his father, and on the other hand, the birth and growing-up of his son Sebastian, for whom the poet builds, with endless affection and humour, a magical livresque universe, populated by fabulous creatures.
The fulfillment of a century since the birth of writer and philologist Georg Scherg (1917-2002) is a good opportunity to recall his life and work. Born in Brasov, Scherg arrived in Sibiu only accidentally. Only later in his life he stated here for a longer time. He was appointed Head of the German Department at the recently established University of History and Philology in Sibiu in 1970. For two decades, until 1990, he had a fruitful activity, both as a teacher and as a prolific author and laborious translator of Romanian literature. He participates in research projects and symposiums of philological literary history, his efforts in this field being rewarded by his appointment as doctor honoris causa of the University „Lucian Blaga“ (1997). He was also involved in Sibiu’s literary life, leading for a long period of time a circle of artists attracted to
the poetic creation.