Summer-Dream-Prelude to Hannah Arendt

Hannah Arendt often emphasized that poetry always played a major role in her life. In fact, the work of the philosopher and political theorist is interspersed with works about famous authors (including Rahel Varnhagen, Lessing, Heine, Kafka, Brecht and Broch). She was good friends with important writers and also wrote poetry herself.

History is made “durable” in poetry; a well-told story has a wider and deeper impact than any philosophical reflection. Drawing on her own poems and selected examples from her literary-critical essays, the lecture aims to trace the significance of literature and art in Hannah Arendt's thinking.

Irmela von der Lühe, Professor (ret.) of Modern German Literature at the FU Berlin and (since October 2013) Senior Advisor at the Selma Stern Center for Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg.

Her research focuses on German-Jewish literary and cultural history, the literature of exile and the Shoah, the literary history of female authorship and the Thomas Mann family.

She is also the author of the 25-page epilogue to the book "Hannah Arendt: Ich selbst, auch ich tanze: Die Gedichte" Piper Verlag, 2015.