Perfect in Their Art: Poems on Boxing from Homer to Ali Book

A beautifully produced book. The cover shows a reproduction of a detail from Max Beckmann's painting Lido (1924). The painting is almost prophetic. The female standing sports a 1920s hat which could so easily be made of tin and the shadow around her nose and mouth more than hint of a moustache.

David Constantine's introduction, German Expressionist Poetry - Premises and Context is useful and interesting. The poets included are: Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), Else Lasker-Schueller (1869-1945), August Stramm (1874-1915), Ernst Stadler (1883-1914), Max Beckmann (1884-1950), Hugo Ball (1886-1927), Gottfried Benn (1886-1956), Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980), Georg Trakl (1887-1914), Jakob van Hoddis (1887-1942), Georg Heym (1887-1912), Kurt Schwitters (1887-1948), Hans Arp (1887-1966), Egon Schiele (1890-1918), Ivan Goll (1891-1950), Anton Schnack (1892-1970).

Afterword by David Miller and Stephen Watts.
Illustrations by Franz Marc 1913, Wassily Kandinsky 1913, Erich Heckel 1914, 1917, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff 1914, 1923, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner 1924, 1913, Hans Arp 1916, Max Beckmann 1923, Emil Nolde 1912, Kathe Kollwitz 1920.

Poems are generally from 1910-1930 with a little either side.

I knew nothing of German Expressionist Poets. Now I want to know much, much more. I found the majority of the ones included here stunning in their impact, so memorable and so worth quoting:

Else Lasker-Schueller from Hagar and Ishmael:

"The sun, implacable, scorched the land,
The desert's yellow hide where Hagar fell
And with white negro teeth bit the sand". (Trans. Rosemarie Winthrop)

Again from To Giselheer the King:

"Want to be buried
In the clouds,
Wherever the sun grows". (Trans. Esther Kinsky)

And from The Blue Piano:

"It's been in the dark of the cellar door
since the world became so cruel".

August Stramm from Encounter:

"Your walking smiles across to me
and
rends my heart". (Trans. Patrick Bridgwater)

And from his War Instinct:

"Eyes flash
Your look cracks
Hot
Streams the bleeding over me
And
Drenches
Runnels of sea". (Trans. Will Stone and Anthony Vivis)

Ernst Stadler from On Crossing the Rhine Bridge at Cologne by Night:

"Skeletons of grey housefronts are laid bare,"…(Trans. Michael Hamburger)

and from his Children in Front of a London Eating-House for the Poor:

"Their clothes smelled of scolding and starving, of light-shy rooms and of the cellar".(Trans Jeremy Adler)

Hugo Ball from Cimio:

"On your shadow, Cimio, small devils tumble
Like clicking fish emptied from a bucket onto dry land". (Trans. Erdmute Wenzel White)

Gottfried Benn from Underground Train:
"Dark: now there is life under her clothes:
All white animal, let loose and voiceless scent". (Trans. R. J. Kavanagh)

Georg Trakl from Eastern Front:

"Thorny wilderness girdles the town about.
From bloody doorsteps the moon
Chases terrified women.
Wild wolves have poured through the gates". (Trans. Christopher Middleton)

I must leave it at that and show real discipline as I've left my favourites for you to read for yourself…

4.5* rounded up because of the excitement they brought into my life.