Katalog der Indica
Der orientalistische Nachlass Friedrich Rückerts in der Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Münster
Katalog der Indica
edited by Volker M. Tschannerl
Schriften der Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Münster, 24, ISSN 0934-3288
Harald Fischer Verlag, Erlangen
cloth-bound, sewn, 129 pages, 2009
ISBN 978-3-89131-515-6
EUR 78.– (incl. VAT)
Friedrich Rückerts Orientalia in the University and State Library of Münster
Friedrich Rückert the poet, a selection of whose «Kindertodtenlieder» were set to music by Gustav Mahler in 1911, involved himself, as a scholar and translator, with more than forty languages. His main interest as a philologist and translator was the poetry of the classical oriental literary languages: Indian, Arabic, and Persian. Through his translations, e.g. of the Quran, he influenced the transmission and reception of oriental literature in Germany up till the present.
Despite numerous editions, Rückerts translations from these languages are still a long way from being completely published. His scholarly and poetic papers therefore have a special significance. A large part of the orientalia have been in the possession of the University and State Library of Münster since 1922.
Catalog of the Indica
From the 1820s up till his death Friedrich Rückert occupied himself intensely and continuously with studies of the old Indian languages and poetry.
As opposed to his contemporary academic competitors he did not translate the original texts at his disposal into Latin but chose instead the consequent translation into German. Idiosyncratic, but always exchanging ideas with the leading philologists of his times, he ventured with his sharp analytical intellect and extraordinary poetical talent to translate the literary monuments of a distant age that were so foreign to him.
A unique witness to these more than four decades of philological and poetic occupation with the old India world of thought and literature are the 9000 sheets (about 17000 written pages) of Rückerts in the University and State Library of Münster.
In the introduction of the catalog Volker M. Tschannerl sketches the current state of research on the Münster Indica holdings and then proceeds to an exact description of these holdings. The editor draws special attention to those up till now completely unpublished translations as well as the pitifully few, error strewn editions of the Rückert translations amongst the Münster papers.
The volume closes with an extensive bibliography of Friedrich Rückerts Indica and the secondary literature up to 2007 and a short preview of the desired future edition of selected Indica from the Münster papers in the Schweinfurt Historical Critical Edition of Rückerts Work.