Virtual Typography

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Job:01212 Title: Basics typography (AVA)

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Fisches Nachtgesang – Christian Morgenstern

Morgenstern lived at the turn of the nineteenth century

(1871–1914) in Germany. With most of his literary work

intended as a comical comment on high literature,

Morgenstern was, strictly speaking, not a concrete poet.

In retrospect, however, his work is very interesting in

relation to concrete poetry. For example, Morgenstern’s

Fisches Nachtgesang (1905) went beyond both the

semantically and syntactically challenging approach of

visual and concrete poetry. Can a poem that does not

convey any linguistic components actually be considered

a poem? Like the digital codes of software applications,

Fisches Nachtgesang is pure syntax. There is no meaning

beyond structure, yet in this particular case the structure

itself still communicates a sense of irony. Where the level

of abstraction is taken to such extremes that typographic

signs can hardly be identifi ed as such, we should speak

of poetic expression rather than of poetry.

Job:01212 Title: Basics typography (AVA)

2nd Proof Page:33

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