Unter der Sonne / Under the Sun: Deutsche und englishe Lyrik by David Radavich is published by Deutscher Lyrik Verlag, Aachen, Germany, 2021. ISBN 978-3-8422-4780-2. Available through Amazon.com or from the author.
About the Book:
This dual-language lyric collection features David Radavich’s German poems with English translations, along with four English poems translated by leading German scholars and writers. The first of three sections focuses on Stuttgart and Southwest Germany, where the author taught as a visiting Fulbright professor. The second section explores literature and history, while the third concentrates on travel to new realms. Radavich exhibits a kinship with German writers such as Friedrich Hölderlin, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Hilde Domin, whom he knew personally. This new collection represents a signal departure from his earlier work—into another language, another lyric sensibility, and a dual perspective that opens readers to a literary tradition beyond American shores.
Goodreads Review by George Hovis:
“A wonderful collection of meditations inspired by travel, history, nature. The ‘unending wars’ of past ages, recorded in architecture, statuary, threaten to erupt into the present, but the speaker’s focus bends back and back to birdsong, sunlight, all the sources of our lyric joy. The dual-language renderings make these poems all the more satisfying. I have long been a fan of Radavich’s travel poetry, and the German compositions take me even further on the journey with him.”
Goodreads Review by Wes Payton:
“Under the Sun features poetry with themes of history and geography. In some ways it’s a departure from Mr. Radavich’s domestic poetry, but it certainly retains the same sense inquisitiveness of his other works, reminding us how fortunate we all are to be participants on this grand stage.”
About the Author:
David Radavich’s earliest poetry collection, Slain Species, was published in London in 1980. Following By the Way: Poetry Over the Years (1998) and Greatest Hits (2000), he published a pair of epics, America Bound (2007) and America Abroad (2019), as well as Canonicals: Love’s Hours (2009), Middle-East Mezze (2011), and The Countries We Live In (2014). Also an accomplished playwright, Radavich has had over twenty-five plays performed across the U.S, including six Off-Off-Broadway, and in Europe. His scholarly and informal essays have been published widely. He has served as president of the Thomas Wolfe Society, Charlotte Writers’ Club, and North Carolina Poetry Society and currently administers the Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series.