Morgue and Other Poems

[1][2] Published in 500 copies in March 1912, in the series lyrisches Flugblatt from Berlin's A. R. Meyer Verlag, Morgue and Other Poems was the debut book of Benn, a 25-year-old medicine student.

[3] It was widely discussed by literary critics upon publication and has continued to inspire a large amount of analysis.

Its cold, eerie atmosphere and descriptions of sickness and decay have led to comparisons to Les Fleurs du mal by Charles Baudelaire.

Richard M. Meyer [de] connected its imagery to Pieter Bruegel's depictions of Hell.

For the 100th anniversary in 2012, Klett-Cotta Verlag [de] published an edition with original illustrations by Georg Baselitz.