#40 Jan Wagner, poet & translator
'...perhaps a glass of Etna Rosso, while nibbling on nothing but my ballpen'
Jan Wagner was born in 1971 in Hamburg and has lived in Berlin since 1995. Poet, essayist, and translator of Anglo-American poetry (Charles Simic, James Tate, Margaret Atwood, Ted Hughes, Dylan Thomas, Simon Armitage, Matthew Sweeney, Robin Robertson, Jo Shapcott, Sujata Bhatt, and many others), he has published eight poetry collections since 2001, most recently Steine & Erden (“Stones & Earths”, 2023). Regentonnenvariationen (“Rain Barrel Variations”), his sixth collection, won the Award of the Leipzig Bookfair in 2015, the first ever poet to receive it. Wagner’s poetry has been translated into forty languages: a selection in English (Self-Portrait With a Swarm of Bees, translated by Iain Galbraith) was published in 2015 by Arc, UK. Wagner has received various scholarships and awards, among them the Anna-Seghers-Award (2004), the Friedrich-Hölderlin-Award (2011), the Zhongkun International Poetry Prize (China, 2017), the Georg-Büchner-Prize (2017), the Prix Max Jacob (France, 2020) and the PONT international literary prize for intercultural cooperation (Slovenia, 2021). He is a member of the German Academy of Language and Literature.
Where do you write?
Poetry: while sitting in an armchair with the weight and size of a Fiat Uno, essays and translations mostly at my desk.
What can we always find on your desk?
A little rubber donkey. Right next to it: chaos, minor or major. And a family of carefully bred dust bunnies.
Morning writer or late-night words?
After several attempts at morning sessions (which seem both tempting and healthy) I have come to accept that my writing time begins with dawn and darkness.
Coffee, tea, nibbles?
Coffee and water, perhaps a glass of Etna Rosso, while nibbling on nothing but my ballpen.
What's your most tempting distraction?
A woman called Maritta. If she happens not to be in our mutual flat: The "Great Book of Italian Cooking".
What's that we hear on the speakers?
Nothing, most likely. Occasionally, however, there may be some Bach or Schubert.
Have you got any pre-writing rituals?
Staring blankly and open-mouthed at something, or rather: at anything. A somewhat unsettling sight, I am told.
Perfect bookshop to hide on a rainy day?
In Berlin: "Autorenbuchhandlung" on Savignyplatz. I am not in Tübingen all too often, but should I ever forget my umbrella while being there: "Lyrikhandlung am Hölderlinturm". It hardly ever rains in Hamburg, of course, but if it does, I'd persevere in Samtleben's Bookshop in Literaturhaus close to the Alster.
What's your most treasured book?
All the books signed by friends or admired poets. And perhaps the tattered and worked through paperback copy of "Ulysses" that I dragged with me during my first trip to Ireland many years ago.
Favourite word in the English language?
Ah, shall it be bumblebee or belly button? Hillbilly or honeycomb? Juggernaut or jellyfish? Bickering, peckishness, snickersnee? What could be tinier and more charming than "wee"? So many enchanting words. If I cannot opt for a glorious linguistical feature like the tag question instead (I cannot, can I?), then perhaps I'll choose the measured "Well..." at the beginning of a speaker's utterance that immediately, too, conjures the depth, gloom, mystery and chill of that other, the echoing well.
Dream writing location?
A cottage on the Irish coast, maybe in West Cork or Galway.
Three writers (dead or alive) to have dinner with?
Those would have to be Matthew Sweeney, Charles Simic, and Mathias Énard - obviously, men with great taste, an intimate knowledge of different cuisines, and an inexhaustible supply of wondrous stories to accompany many exquisite courses.
One poem that has changed your life:
Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" or "Fern Hill", read by himself.