Christian Enzensberger

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Christian Enzensberger (born 24 December 1931) is a German author from Nuremberg and a translator of literature from English to German.

Enzensberger is one of the more enigmatic figures in German letters. Younger brother of the literary celebrity and political figure Hans Magnus Enzensberger, he has maintained a relatively low media profile throughout his career, in spite of being embroiled in one of the more interesting literary scandals of early 70s Germany.

From 1969 until 1982, Enzensberger held a post as Professor of English Literature at the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich. He is today chiefly known in Germany for his 1963 translation of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Alice through the Looking Glass.

In 1970 Enzensberger became the only author ever to refuse the Bremer Literaturpreis, offered in the wake of the publication of Größerer Versuch über den Schmutz (translated by Sandra Morris and published by Calder & Boyars in 1972 as Smut: An Anatomy of Dirt). The book generated a furore when it was first published in Germany, not least due to its linking of personal cleanliness with totalitarianism. Smut is an experimental work in which dirt is described scientifically, personally and peversely by a panopoly of narrative voices, including fragments from the anthropologist Mary Douglas alongside writers from Samuel Beckett through William S. Burroughs to Jean Genet. It has since then fallen into neglect and, in spite of a resurgence of interest in what, for want of a better term, could be called Rubbish Theory remains unfortunately out of print in both English and German.

[edit] Published works (selection)

• Größerer Versuch über den Schmutz. 1968
• Smut: An Anatomy of Dirt. 1972 (translated by Sandra Morris)
• Brief an Herbert Marcuse. Akzente. Issue 1, Volume 25. February 1978
• Was ist was. 1988

[edit] Translations (selection)

• Von Hopkins bis Dylan Thomas. Englische Gedichte und deutsche Prosaübertragungen. Gemeinsam mit Ursula Clemen, Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1961
• George D. Painter: Marcel Proust. Teil 1. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1962
• Giorgos Seferis: Poesie. Gedichte. Griechisch und deutsch. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1962, 4. Auflage 2005 ISBN 3-518-01962-7
• Lewis Carroll: Alice im Wunderland. Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1963, TB ISBN 3-458-31742-2
• Lewis Carroll: Alice hinter den Spiegeln. Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1963, TB ISBN 3-458-31797-X
• Edith Sitwell: Gedichte. Englisch und deutsch. Übersetzt von Christian Enzensberger, Erich Fried und Werner Vordtriede, Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1964
• Ogden Nash: I’m a Stranger Here Myself. Selected Poems - Ich bin leider hier auch fremd. Ausgewählte Gedichte. Nachdichtungen von Christian Enzensberger, Walter Mehring und Ulrich Sonnemann, Rowohlt Verlag, Reinbek 1969
• Edward Bond: Trauer zu früh. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1969
• Edward Bond: Lear. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1972
• T. S. Eliot: Gesammelte Gedichte 1909-1962. Zweisprachige Ausgabe. Aus dem Englischen von Christian Enzensberger u. a., Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1972, TB 2002 ISBN 3-518-38067-2
• Edward Bond: Bingo. Szenen von Geld und Tod. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1975
• Ian McEwan: Der Zementgarten. Aus dem Englischen von einer studentischen Arbeitsgruppe unter Leitung von Christian Enzensberger, Diogenes Verlag, Zürich 1980, TB ISBN 3-257-20648-8
• Samuel Beckett: Mehr Prügel als Flügel. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1989, TB ISBN 3-518-39183-6

[edit] Secondary literature (selection)

• Review of Größerer Versuch über den Schmutz by Wolfgang Hildesheimer published in Der Spiegel, issue 1, 1969 page 96 under the headline Sauber ist nicht Schön