TV & Radio Highlights
That John Banville play Todtnauberg, which can be heard in the Radio 4 archives was shockingly poor. I thought Banville might have the sensitivity to create something other than a middlebrow confection of clich?s (which is Radio 4's brief). However, Heidegger came across as an insensitive buffoon, while Celan (pronounced throughout as Che-lan; is that correct?) was rather priggish. Whether these portayals were accurate is irrelevant; their writings are not buffoonish or priggish. The average R4 listener - earnestly seeking out each Bookclub dollop of pap - can now rest assured, knowing that difficulty is reducible to chatter and gossip. (UPDATE: The Sharp Side gives a more in-depth account of the play).
Tonight on BBC2 TV, Peter Ackroyd presents The Romantics, a three-part documentary on Blake, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley and Keats. It's followed by snooker.
I thought Ackroyd’s programme was pretty good, as these things go (ie. inevitable over-simplification etc.)
Funny to see Dr Who as Rousseau and Frank Gallagher as Wordsworth though!
If Ackroyd’s programme has brought new readers to these poets, then one can only say that it has done the job.
Did the Holocaust raise our awareness of Jewish literature?
Heidegger to Hannah Arendt:
“Hey there honey cakes, can I dwell in the openness of your unconcealment so that the truth of my being does stand forth in its origin.”