Lantern dreams

Roberta Bergmann & Wolfgang Borchert
Lantern dreams
Poems by Wolfgang Borchert

The moon is a liar. (paraphrased)

The moon paints a grotesque pattern on the wall.
Grotesque?
A light square,
merely curved,
crossed by a number of fine
dark grey lines.
A fishing net?
A spider’s web?
But oh, my lashes tremble hard
when I raise my eyes
to the window.
It is barred.

Wolfgang Borchert is one of the best known representatives of German “Trümmerliteratur” (literally: “rubble literature”).
His lyrical work tells about his home city of Hamburg, dark evenings and nights, of love, frenzy and farewells. To read the poems is like roaming the city, torn between melancholy and a hunger for life.

Wolfang Borchert’s texts have accompanied the illustrator Roberta Bergmann ever since she was a young girl. To honor his lyrical work, she has created free and experimental illustrations that visually extend the story, thus moving it closer into the livid lantern light.

Roberta Bergmann: “Borchert’s life and work have fascinated me ever since I was a child. It has been a long-time dream of me to illustrate his poems. I used blue and black carbon paper, brushes, nibs, China ink and very few artist’s water colours to create close to 170 drawings which I later edited digitally. As a book designer, I wanted to provide sufficient space for every poem. This is why most of the 37 poems and aphorisms develop over several pages into small picture stories. The book’s typography – handwriting and typewriter script – is based on the style of Borchert’s time.”

Look inside