Writing from the margins - and beyond

Abstract

In 1987 José F. A. Oliver published his first poetry volume Auf-Bruch in Germany. His standing as a German-speaking poet from Spanish-Andalusian stock was linked to the Gastarbeiterliteratur, or migrant worker literature in Germany, a literature that writes from the margins of both the literary and economic world of the Federal Republic of Germany. Developments within Oliver's oeuvre over the past twenty years, how ever, indicate a movement away from the literary periphery into main-stream German literature. This article explores these dynamics, using José F. A. Oliver's writings to illustrate this conjecture.