Johannes Bobrowski

Johannes Bobrowski was born in 1917 in Tilsit, East Prussia, the son of a German railwayman. He was studying art history in Berlin when he was conscripted at the outbreak of war in 1939. He began to write poetry on the Eastern Front in 1941, and was a prisoner of war in Russia from then until 1949, when he returned to Germany. He lived in East Berlin and worked as a reader for the publishing house Union Verlag until his death in 1965. Ruth and Matthew Mead have translated the work of several...See more

Johannes Bobrowski was born in 1917 in Tilsit, East Prussia, the son of a German railwayman. He was studying art history in Berlin when he was conscripted at the outbreak of war in 1939. He began to write poetry on the Eastern Front in 1941, and was a prisoner of war in Russia from then until 1949, when he returned to Germany. He lived in East Berlin and worked as a reader for the publishing house Union Verlag until his death in 1965. Ruth and Matthew Mead have translated the work of several German poets, including Horst Bienek - who shared a Penguin Modern European Poets selection with Bobrowski in 1971 - and Heinz Winfried Sabais ('The People and the Stones', Anvil, 1983.) Matthew Mead's collections of poetry are 'Identities' (1967), 'The Administration of Things' (1970), 'The Midday Muse' (1979) and 'Walking Out of the World' (2004). See less