Paul Celan

Paul Celan (/ˈsɛlæn/; German: [ˈtseːlaːn]; born Paul Antschel; 23 November 1920 – c. 20 April 1970) was a German-speaking Romanian poet, Holocaust survivor, and literary translator. He adopted his pen name (an anagram of the Romanian spelling Ancel) following the war and resided in France from 1949, becoming a naturalized French citizen in 1955.

Celan is regarded as one of the most important figures in German-language literature of the post-World War II era and a poet whose verse has gained an immortal place in the literary pantheon. Celan’s poetry, with its many radical poetic and linguistic innovations, is characterized by a complicated and cryptic style that deviates from poetic conventions.