Dr Brian Willems 
Hopkins and Heidegger [PDF ebook] 

Hopkins and Heidegger is a new exploration of Gerard Manley Hopkins» poetics through the work of Martin Heidegger. More radically, Brian Willems argues that the work of Hopkins does no less than propose solutions to a number of hitherto unresolved questions regarding Heidegger»s later writings, vitalizing the concepts of both writers beyond their local contexts. Willems examines a number of cross-sections between the poetry and thought of Hopkins and the philosophy of Heidegger. While neither writer ever directly addressed the other»s work — Hopkins died the year Heidegger was born, 1899, and Heidegger never turns his thoughts on poetry to the Victorians — a number of similarities between the two have been noted but never fleshed out. Willems» readings of these cross-sections are centred on Hopkins» concepts of »inscape» and »instress» and around Heidegger»s reading of both appropriation (
Ereignis) and the fourfold (
das Geviert).

This study will be of interest to scholars and postgraduates in both Victorian literature and Continental philosophy.