LIECHTENSTEIN

 

READ

One of the fun things about writing this blog has been the hunt for books from every country. I wouldn’t have expected to have so much trouble finding a book from the tiny European country of Liechtenstein, where there was no shortage of authors. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anything that had been translated into English.

Luckily, Lillian and Henriette, who write the Stories of the World blog, came to my rescue. They had discovered a book of poetry, Of Things, written by Michael Donhauser and translated by Nick Hoff and Andrew Joron. After they wrote about it for their blog, they kindly sent it along to me. Many thanks, Lillian and Henriette!

I have to say, though, that poetry just isn’t my thing, and these poems in particular really did not appeal to me. The theme that binds all the poems in this book is nature, which seems like a lovely topic for a book of poetry. But the fourteen-page poem about a manure pile that appeared early in the book was not the type of nature-writing I was expecting. I kept hoping it was a metaphor for something else, and there were occasional metaphorical bits in the poem, but mostly, it truly was a poem about an actual manure pile. Long passages from Johann Heinrich Zedler’s Great Complete Universal Lexicon were thrown in here and there, which seemed rather un-poetry-like to me.

There were things I could relate to in a few of the other poems. In “The Marsh Marigold,” for example, the poet describes the beauty of a marsh and meadow – “Yellow-topped with buttercups. White-topped with meadow chervil.” – and laments that it will be built over with apartment complexes. And in “The Larch Forest,” he speaks briefly of love: “The names of flowers as proofs of love. ‘There is no such thing as love, only proof of love.’” Donhauser’s poem, “The Gravel,” (and yes, it’s a thirteen-page poem about actual gravel), contains a political reference – “The crushing of the resistance movement in China colors the gravel.” It also has a nice passage, more prosaic than poetic, about time spent as a child at his grandmother’s home in Eschen.

With more and more readers looking to read books from other countries, I hope that in the not-too-distant future, there will be more options available in translation from Liechtenstein. 

COOK

If the book I read for Liechtenstein was a disappointment, the dish I made for this blog post was decidedly not. I searched the Internet for a suitable recipe and found a wonderful dish on the International Cuisine website called Liechtensteiner Pfannkuchen, which apparently translates as pancakes with compote and berries. Basically, it’s crepes layered with raspberry preserves and topped with berries. I veganized the recipe by using oat milk and Bob’s Red Mill egg replacer, and it was delicious. The website says it’s a dessert, but I had it for breakfast, and then I had seconds. Does anyone know how to say “yum” in Liechtensteiner?

GIVE

Finding an organization for my donation wasn’t easy. There were no projects listed for Liechtenstein on the GlobalGiving website, and it took a long time for my Internet search to turn up anything. Finally, I found the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Switzerland & Liechtenstein. As with Make-A-Wish organizations everywhere, the purpose of this organization is to grant “the most heartfelt wishes of children aged between 3 and 18 living with a serious medical condition to give them Hope, Strength and Joy.”

Some of the wishes they’ve granted have been: “Getting tips from Roger Federer, panning for gold, flying over the Alps in a helicopter, seeing the sea for the first time, meeting a celebrity hero, being a Chef for a day, or meeting a Nobel physicist at Cern.”

More information about the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Switzerland & Liechtenstein is available at Make-A-Wish Foundation of Switzerland & Liechtenstein: MAW (makeawish.ch).

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