The Wandering Radiance: Selected Poems of Hilde Domin (translated by Mark S. Burrows) – Book Launch

Join translator Mark S. Burrows at the Maine Jewish Museum for a fascinating discussion of the recently published The Wandering Radiance: Selected Poems of Hilde Domin. Domin is among the most beloved and widely recognized writers of post-war Germany, though until now she has been relatively unknown among English readers.

Because of her Jewish identity, Domin and her husband fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s, spending 22 years living in exile, the last 14 in the Dominican Republic (because of which she adopted the surname “Domin”). The couple returned to Germany in 1954 — among the few German-Jewish artists and intellectuals to do so — after which Domin rose to nearly unprecedented fame and acclaim.

Burrows’ artful translation gives English readers first-time access to Domin’s exploration of a life in postwar exile (“All my ships/have forgotten about harbors/and my feet the way”) and how poetry carried her through it in “the not-world//stretched out/between//word and word.” Domin reminds us never to give up, and that a way forward is worthy of lyricism, recognition and dignity.