THE FOLLOWING BOOK makes use of three different editions of Hölderlin’s writings—the Grosse Stuttgarter Ausgabe (GSA), the Frankfurter Ausgabe (FA), and the Sämtliche Werke, Briefe, und Dokumente (SW), which presents Hölderlin's writings in a chronological order. While relying mainly on the FA when citing the various versions of Hyperion as well as the poetological writings, I use the GSA for lyric poetry (where Sattler's refusal to present the “pure word” of the poet, while eminently justified, opens up a philological can of worms that would distract too much from the argument), and the SW for Hölderlin's correspondence.

There are several English versions of Hyperion available, and most of his lyric poetry, as well as The Death of Empedocles, many letters, and nearly all the theoretical fragments, have also been translated. Nevertheless, I’ve decided to rely on my own translations, not because I think these are superior to what is available—fine poets have tried their hand at Hölderlin, and I am not a poet at all—but on account of the importance, given the nature of this book, of terminological consistency and precision.

Foreign-language works are introduced with their original title together with the translated title in parentheses, and, for modern works, the date of publication or—in the case of Hölderlin's own writings as well as other posthumously published works—of composition. The translated titles of Hölderlin's poetry are for the most part consistent with the Penguin edition (Selected Poems and Fragments) edited by Jeremy Adler and published in 1998, while the chronology is based on Sattler’s Sämtliche Werke, Briefe, und Dokumente (see SW 1:249–75). I’ve included the original German for all lyric poetry but not usually for Hölderlin’s prose writings or other sources, since this would have added too much to the heft of an already rather hefty volume.

For all other works, including those written in Greek and Latin, the reader may assume the translation is my own unless either 1) another translator is given or 2) only the translation, and not the original, is listed in the bibliography.