An ‘and yet’ is inherent in hope. It defies even absolute disaster. The star of hope is a neighbour of the unlucky star (Latin: des-astrum). Without the negativity of disaster and the defiant attitude of ‘and yet’, there is only the banality of optimism. In Ingeborg Bachmann, the negativity of hope is condensed into an ‘and yet’. Language and poetry, in particular, represent this ‘and yet’. As long as poets speak, there remains hope in the world:
