Description

Suleman Taufiq is a German-Syrian author and is known as a poet and storyteller, culture journalist, editor and translator of Arabic and German literature. His poetry is a bridge between two cultures - which can not be so foreign. It is a special mixture of German and foreign elements that enrich each other and thereby create something new. "I don't live in two worlds, I am two worlds," says Taufiq.

Suleman Taufiq writes poetry that transcends the experience of being at home in two different worlds. One world is the country to which he emigrated in 1971. Suleman Taufiq came to Germany at the time, studied philosophy and comparative studies, and now works as a culture journalist, author and translator in Aachen. But he never put the luggage in the attic that he brought with him from his home countries of Lebanon and Syria.

In his new poems, which have been lovingly edited by Bremer Sujet-Verlag under the title "I tame hope", his socialization in an old culture, which has also been shaped by European influences for a long time, always resonates. All of this is coupled with the rich feelings of those who leave the country of their birth because they are curious about other countries and people.

"They killed/my language/snatched/from/from/the life/and buried it/in the desert/where it came from” says “My Language”. Suleman Taufiq constructs unadorned poems, often marked by melancholy, which possess the clear beauty of glass. He consciously sees himself as a wanderer between his two worlds, the other, the new is his theme, a summarizing chapter of the volume is even titled "I am the stranger". Jasmin Tank has contributed suitable illustrations to these little treasures, which are characterized by thoughtfulness.

Reviews and press:

Weser courier:

"Suleman Taufiq constructs unadorned poems, often marked by melancholy, that possess the clear beauty of glass.” Iris Hetscher more

Introduction by Inge Buck at the book premiere of "I Tame Hope":

The first thing that struck me during my first phone conversation with Suleman Taufiq was that he laughs a lot. Suleman Taufiq is a German-Syrian author, a wanderer between worlds, literary genres, cultures and languages.

He writes: poetry and essays, stories and novels, he translates Arabic works into German and German poets into Arabic, he produces radio features and music programs for radio. And last but not least, he writes poems and stories for children.

That being said: I have no riches, my riches are them language. And the writing. And he says: I'm old-fashioned, I still write by hand.

Born 1953 in Beirut, in Lebanon - as the eldest child of a family of eleven - grew up in Damascus in Syria, he came 1971 at the age of 18 to Germany. He came of his own free will. He studied comparative literature and philosophy at the University of Aachen. And already in 1978 he published his first volume of poetry entitled "We're strangers, we're strangers" in German language.

1980  he was co-founder and co-editor of the literary series Edition Südwind-Gastarbeiterdeutsch im Bremer Verlag Edition CON. 1983 he received the Literature Prize of the City of Aachen. He has lived there since 1986 as a freelance writer and publicist.

Those were the literary beginnings. Meanwhile, Suleman has Taufiq 32 books published. Last2016 the short stories „Cafe Dunya. A day in Damascus' in Edition Orient, Berlin. And this year now in the Bremer Sujet Verlag the volume of poems "I tame hope“, which is being presented here today as a book premiere.

"I tame hope”: an unusual, intriguing, contradictory title. And so, in the book of poems, under the chapter “Hope” one can also read about fear and doubt, about insomnia and loneliness.

When I first got my hands on the poetic volume of Suleman Taufiq, I thought at first that these are the poems of a Syrian author who has just fled his country, so close are the experiences of old country and new country, of emigration and arrival.

Right at the beginning the reader is drawn into the maelstrom of a long poem entitled “death alone knows the silence“, which speaks of the fear of the sea and of the crossing, of boats and of refugees who do not arrive, because "between damascus and athens/ the thread of death is short."

 Although the poems are thematically divided into individual chapters, feelings, memories and images from Syria run through the book - like a basic tone or color. the land of scents,/ of poetry and mystery".

 But this country is no longer my country". The war changed it. "war burns/ love/ and tenderness./ the sun refuses/ to visit the land./ hearts are bricks.”

 How does Suleman Taufiq manage to write poetry about the war in Syria? In contrast to current news and war reports, his texts convey a different message, and the poems also provide insights into the psychological destruction of the people caused by the war.

On the other side is Europe "the land of logos,/ of ideologies,/ of loneliness,/ of disenchantment/ and of freedom."

In impressions and miniatures, the author has put together street scenes and images of women, encounters and love affairs, moments and seasons like a mosaic to create a picture from “the cold of the north” and endowed them with curiosity for the foreign.

In the chapter " i am the stranger“ Suleman Taufiq takes up the motif of his very first volume of poetry. While for the stranger home is now just memory, stranger is life. A life that connects with the word, with the search for words, with the condensation of words, with the poem.

In a very personal afterword to his volume of poetry, Suleman Taufiq writes: I write in German. I find it interesting not to write in my mother tongue. Arabic is my childhood language, full of taboos and teachings - so the German language is freedom for me. Arabic is poetic, metaphorical, German has a certain abstraction, the compound words in German can be condensed as an author. In addition, German is my everyday language, my wife and my children are German. In my dreams I often speak in German. Recently even with my mother, I'm shocked.

With her poetic book design, the illustrator Jasmin Tank takes up the motif of hope again. On the cover of the book of poems "I tame hope" a delicate palm grows out of a dark rock wall.