Interview: Mark Terrill

Following our review of An Unchanging Blue: Selected Poems 1962-1975, a new collection of poems from the late German poet Rolf Dieter Brinkmann (1940-1975), we caught up with the man behind the translation, Mark Terrill.

The Prague Post: How did you discover Brinkmann, and what initially drew you into his work?

Mark Terrill: In 1994, a small book about Brinkmann came out here in Germany, a collection of essays and reminiscences, which prompted a full-page article in Die Woche, a newspaper that no longer exists. There were some excerpts of his poetry, and I was immediately taken by how atypically German it was. It seemed so fresh and timeless, although Brinkmann had already been dead for almost 20 years. I immediately went out and bought everything available that he'd written.

TPP: You've published several smaller collections of Brinkmann's work. How did this selected volume come about?

MT: The first collection of my translations of Brinkman, Like a Pilot, was a full-length collection published by Sulphur River Literary Review Press in 2001. In the interim, several chapbooks and broadsides of my Brinkmann translations have appeared, as well, and in 2005, a new expanded edition of Brinkmann's last collection of poems, Westwärts 1 & 2 appeared, which contained many previously unpublished poems, which I also began to translate. Eventually it was time to gather all those translations into a single collection, which is when I approached Parlor Press/Free Verse Editions, who were very enthusiastic about the project.

TPP: What do you think Brinkmann has to say to us now, so long after his death?

MT: Bum rush the academy.

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Stephan Delbos can be reached at
sdelbos@praguepost.com