The River Told Me

PLAN-OST-1

Here is a little known terrible Heidegger quote from 1943, to be found in his “Elucidations of Hölderlin’s Poetry”. He ist talking about the German soldiers fighting in the East and dying in Stalingrad:

“… are not the sons of the homeland, who though far distant from its soil, still gaze into the gaiety of the homeland shining toward them, and devote and sacrifice their life for the still reserved find, are not these sons of the homeland the poet’s closest kin?“
(Elucidations, p. 48)

“Ihr Leben verwenden … und im Opfergang verschwenden”. It can hardly get worse.

I gave a talk focussing on Heidegger’s treatment of Hölderlin’s hymn “Der Ister” in Brno, Czech Republic. Here are the slides and the audio recording.

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