Abstract

The paper argues that materiality, performativity, and corporeality constitute the core of Ernst Jandl’s poetics and manifest his unwavering trust in the expressive capabilities of poetic language. This reading of Jandl’s work takes issue with its dominant interpretation as an instance of linguistic skepticism. In a broader sense, the paper aims to show the need to reevaluate the character of post–World War II experimental poetry as affirmative rather than as a symptom of language’s disintegration.

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