Lothar Baier

Lothar Baier ( born May 16, 1942 in Karlsruhe, † July 11, 2004 - according to another source: July 10, 2004 - Montreal, Canada ) was a German writer, literary critic and translator.

Life and work

Lothar Baier studied German literature, philosophy and sociology. In addition to longer stays in France, England, the U.S. and Canada, he lived mostly in Frankfurt am Main.

In the years 1962/1963 Baier counted alongside Gerd Hemmerich, Jochen Meyer, Wolf Wondratschek and Heinz Ludwig Arnold on the editorial board of the first issue of the literary magazine text kritik.

In his work Baier employed since the 1970s especially critical with the aftermath and the processing of National Socialism and to the Francophone culture. At his death he was also in France, " still one of the most famous German intellectuals ". Baier has published numerous articles in reputable journals - including the Mercury, the course book and TransAtlantik, in later years, in the hornet's nest - worked for radio - especially for the Germany radio - and regularly published articles in daily and weekly newspapers, initially for the literature of the FAZ, later for the Frankfurter Rundschau, the taz, the Süddeutsche Zeitung, but also Le Monde diplomatique. He was thirty years of employee time. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, he worked especially for the Friday. Since 1984, he wrote for the Swiss weekly newspaper WoZ. From 1997 to 2003 he was editor there, and since January 1998 responsible for the company department, which was then considered a lot. As part of the relaunch of the newspaper he resigned from the editorial, because the page was deleted supervised by him.

Baier translated Jules Verne, Jean -Paul Sartre (whose literary works he published in the English version), Paul Nizan, André Breton and Georges Simenon from French into German.

Since the 1980s, he published his essayistic work in book form, starting with the French band states, which appeared in 1982 in the European publishing house, in which he dealt with the French society in the transition to the presidency of François Mitterrand. Some considered it to be "the most important book." From the German perspective dominated at this time when looking to France the postmodern philosophers, but also the rise of the New Right to Le Pen A critical conclusion of the Mitterrand era, he pulled in his book company France. A factory tour, which was published in 1988 by Verlag Klaus Wagenbach.

For the taz pursued Baier 1987 the process about Klaus Barbie in Lyon. As the only German journalist, he reported for eight weeks on each day of the trial, from the first meeting until the sentencing.

His book about the persecution of the Cathars (1984) and his narrative -year period ( 1985) show how far curious were his interests.

In 1995 Baier stepped out of the West German PEN from.

Since 1992, Baier held visiting professorships at the University of Montreal true, where he moved three years before his death, after he had been increasingly marginalized in the literary industry, because he accompanied the tendencies due to the merger of the two German states critical. With the assistance of the then Friday co-editor Christoph Hein, he published in 1993 in Berlin Aufbau Verlag a tape with time-critical work at that time ( the disowned utopia ).

Baier retired in Montreal by committed suicide due to depression, in which he was ill for a long time and were repeatedly been particularly difficult during the summer. He was found on 11 July 2004 in his apartment.

Awards

  • Jean Amery Prize for essay writing - 1982
  • Johann Heinrich Merck Prize for literary criticism and essay of the German Academy for Language and Literature - 1989
  • Heinrich Mann Prize of the Academy of the Arts ( Berlin) - 1994
  • Del'Ordre Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture - 1996
  • Gerrit Engelke Prize of the City of Hannover - 2003

Writings

  • About Ror Wolf. (Eds.) Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, ​​1972.
  • The great heresy. Persecution and extermination of the Cathars by religion and science. Wagenbach, Berlin 1984, ISBN 3-8031-2108-6.
  • French states. Reports and essays. European publishing house, Frankfurt 1982 When: Paperback:. Revised and enlarged edition. Fischer Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 1985, ISBN 3-596-24337-8.
  • Year period. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1985.
  • Company France. A factory tour. Wagenbach, Berlin 1988, ISBN 3-8031-2155-8.
  • Equal sign. Pamphlets on deviation and identity. Wagenbach, Berlin 1985.
  • Un anglais né de la dernière guerre. essai. Calmann - Lévy, Paris 1989.
  • People without time. Essay on the piece fatherland. Wagenbach, Berlin 1990.
  • Signs and wonders. Reviews and essays. Ed. Tiamat, Berlin 1990.
  • Christoph Hein. Text, data, images. Edited Luchterhand, Frankfurt am Main 1990.
  • The disowned utopia. Time-critical texts. Building, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-7466-0206-8.
  • Ostwestpassagen. Cultural change - Language times. Antje Kunstmann, Munich 1995.
  • No time. 18 experiments on the acceleration. Antje Kunstmann, Munich 2000.
  • Lothar Baier, Pierre Filion (Ed.): Anders -writing America. An Anthology of Literature from Quebec from 1945 to 2000. Wunderhorn, Heidelberg 2000, ISBN 3-88423-164-2.
  • What is literature? Antje Kunstmann, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-88897-284-1.
Merkur (magazine) Deutschlandfunk der Freitag Postmodernism Neue Rechte Jean-Marie Le Pen Major depressive disorder Gerrit-Engelke-Preis Daniela Dahn Name Authority File
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