Underlying Rhythm: On Translation, Communication, and Literary Languages. Essays in Honor of Burton Pike

This volume explores the importance of scholarly and literary communities, the challenges of translation and difference, and the search for the ineffable in art. It is a collection of interviews, translations, scholarly essays, and tributes in honor of Burton Pike (1930–2022), a renowned translator of Robert Musil, Rilke, Goethe, Gerhard Meier, and others, as well as a scholar of literary Modernism and the image of the city. He was also an extraordinary teacher, mentor, and inspiration to a generation. The pieces are mostly written by former students, colleagues, and admiring friends, but the book also includes two interviews with Pike, along with Pike’s own previously unpublished lecture on Thomas Mann’s last novel, Confessions of Felix Krull, Confidence Man.

Peter Constantine is Professor of Translation Studies at the University of Connecticut.

Robert Cowan is Professor of English at Kingsborough Community College, CUNY.

Henry N. Gifford is a freelance copy editor and writer.

Genese Grill is a Musil scholar, translator, essayist, and former student of Burton Pike.

James Keller is Adjunct Assistant Professor of German at Pasadena City College in California, a translator, and former student of Burton Pike.