English poet Simon Armitage may not have rescued Britain's reputation in Europe entirely last night, but he made a good start. His first words were an apology for his lack of German: "In fact, I apologize for my whole country's lack of German." With his wry humor and thoughtful answers to long and complex questions, Armitage made one thing very clear: he's a damn good Yorkshire cheese.
The tagline for the reading came from W.H. Auden: "A poet’s hope: to be, like some valley cheese, local, but prized elsewhere." Both Armitage and German cheese, er, poet and translator, Jan Wagner, met in Munich's aptly-named Lyrik Kabinett, and talked about slant rhymes and dialects, the interest in poetry in their respective countries, and translating each other's work. Their amiable conversation, moderated by poet, scholar and translator, Heinrich Detering, kicked off the excellent series, Europäische Begegnungen, sponsored by the Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung.
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