Tristan Tzara (16 april 1896 – 24 december 1963)

De Franse dichter, dadaïst en surrealist Tristan Tzara werd op 16 april 1896 in de Roemeense plaats Moinesti geboren als Samuel Rosenstock. Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

Uit: Dadaism (Vertaald door Robert Motherwell)

 

“*There is a literature that does not reach the voracious mass. It is the work of creators, issued from a real necessity in the author, produced for himself. It expresses the knowledge of a supreme egoism, in which laws wither away. Every page must explode, either by profound heavy seriousness, the whirlwind, poetic frenzy, the new, the eternal, the crushing joke, enthusiasm for principles, or by the way in which it is printed. On the one hand a tottering world in flight, betrothed to the glockenspiel of hell, on the other hand: new men. Rough, bouncing, riding on hiccups. Behind them a crippled world and literary quacks with a mania for improvement.

I say unto you: there is no beginning and we do not tremble, we are not sentimental. We are a furious Wind, tearing the dirty linen of clouds and prayers, preparing the great spectacle of disaster, fire, decomposition.* We will put an end to mourning and replace tears by sirens screeching from one continent to another. Pavilions of intense joy and widowers with the sadness of poison. Dada is the signboard of abstraction; advertising and business are also elements of poetry.

I destroy the drawers of the brain and of social organization: spread demoralization wherever I go and cast my hand from heaven to hell, my eyes from hell to heaven, restore the fecund wheel of a universal circus to objective forces and the imagination of every individual.

Philosophy is the question: from which side shall we look at life, God, the idea or other phenomena. Everything one looks at is false. I do not consider the relative result more important than the choice between cake and cherries after dinner. The system of quickly looking at the other side of a thing in order to impose your opinion indirectly is called dialectics, in other words, haggling over the spirit of fried potatoes while dancing method around it. If I cry out:

Ideal, ideal, ideal,

·  Knowledge, knowledge, knowledge,

·  Boomboom, boomboom, boomboom,

I have given a pretty faithful version of progress, law, morality and all other fine qualities that various highly intelligent men have discussed in so manv books, only to conclude that after all everyone dances to his own personal boomboom, and that the writer is entitled to his boomboom: the satisfaction of pathological curiosity; a private bell for inexplicable needs; a bath; pecuniary difficulties; a stomach with repercussions in life; the authority of the mystic wand formulated as the bouquet of a phantom orchestra made up of silent fiddle bows greased with philtres made of chicken manure.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Engelse schrijver Kingsley Amis werd geboren op 16 april 1922 in Londen. Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

Uit: ONE FAT ENGLISHMAN

 

“Roger began eating. There was a roll-basket on the table near him, its contents hidden by a napkin. Underneath this were lengths of hot Italian bread soaked in garlic butter. He decided he would not eat this, and then suddenly found he had started to. His decision to eat only one piece went the same way. By the time the Southern fried chicken arrived from the gloved hand of the Negroe mad it was plain to him that he might as well be hung for a fat-tailed sheep as a lamb. With the chicken there were turnips, spring onions - and corn on the cob with more butter. A razor-blade embedded in a wooden handle for sclicing the cobs and a paint-brush affair for spreading the melted butter on them were passed from hand to hand. Roger used both instruments a lot.
While Ernst and Parteger, who was sitting opposite, filled him in on what terrible courses of study were available at Budweiser (College), Roger concentrated on his food. It was the least he could do for something that was bringing his coronary nearer at such a clip, that was already, he sensed, sidling irremovably into his paunch and his neck and his bosom. Let it. As he was waiting for his helping of blueberry pancakes with fresh cream and Wisconsin cheddar, the thought of dieting brushed feebly at his mind like an old remorse. He was aware that just eating a little of what he did no fancy would sooner or later do him good in the sexual chase. This idea had been brought sharply into focus at a fellow-publisher's party the previous year. Somebody's secretary had told him that what he wanted was all right with her on the understanding that he brought his block and tackle along. Five days later, sipping a half-cup of sugarless and milkless tea to round off a luncheon of a lightly boiled egg with no salt, a decarbohydrated roll resembling fluff in plastic, and a small apple, he had made up his mind for ever that, if it came to it, he could easily settle down to a regime of banquets and self-abuse. He sent his palte up now for a second helping of pancakes and put three chocolate mints into his mouth to tide him over. Outside every fat man there was an even fatter man trying to close in.
With the Gaelic coffee, surmounted by half an inch or so of chilled cream, he felt his survival till breakfast guaranteed and ceremoniously produced for him by Joe."

 

 

 

 

 

De Franse dichter en schrijver Anatole France werd geboren in Parijs op 16 april 1844. Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

 

Les arbres

 

Ô vous qui, dans la paix et la grâce fleuris,
Animez et les champs et vos forêts natales,
Enfants silencieux des races végétales,
Beaux arbres, de rosée et de soleil nourris,

La Volupté par qui toute race animée
Est conçue et se dresse à la clarté du jour,
La mère aux flancs divins de qui sortit l'Amour,
Exhale aussi sur vous son haleine embaumée.

Fils des fleurs, vous naissez comme nous du Désir,
Et le Désir, aux jours sacrés des fleurs écloses,
Sait rassembler votre âme éparse dans les choses,
Votre âme qui se cherche et ne se peut saisir.

Et, tout enveloppés dans la sourde matière
Au limon paternel retenus par les pieds,
Vers la vie aspirant, vous la multipliez,
Sans achever de naître en votre vie entière.

 

 

 

 

 

De Duitse schrijfster en dichteres Sarah Kirsch (eig. Ingrid Hella Irmelinde Kirsch) werd geboren op 16 april 1935 in Limlingerode.Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

 

Eine Schlehe im Mund
komme ich übers Feld

 

Eine Schlehe im Mund komme ich übers Feld
sie rollt auf der Zunge stößt Zähne an wenn ich geh
mein Kopf eine Schelle klappert und macht
einen traurigen Mund
                             meiner mit einer Schelle
deiner Sand schon und Kieselstein
ich drüber du drunter
Ebereschen blutrot samtrot liegts auf dem Weg
Drosseln freßt freßt
den Herbst lang euch Vogelfett an

 

 

 

 

Unglück läßt grüßen

 

Seit er fort ist fallen Palmen
um gehen Bomben los, ich bin
Von Moskitos verbeult oder schneide
Mir halbe Finger ab, es kommt noch
Schnee im August

 

 

 

 

 

Ich bin sehr sanft

 

Ich bin sehr sanft nenn
mich Kamille
meine Finger sind zärtlich baun
Kirchen in deiner Hand meine Nägel
Flügelschuppen von Engeln liebkosen ich bin
der Sommer der Herbst selbst der Winter im Frühling
möchte ich bei dir sein du
zeigst mir das Land wir gehn
von See zu See da braucht es
ein langes glückliches Leben
die Fische sind zwei
die Vögel baun Nester wir
stehn auf demselben Blatt

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Ierse dichter, musicus en komiek Spike Milligan werd geboren op 16 april 1918 in Ahmednagar in Indië. Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

 

A Silly Poem

 

Said Hamlet to Ophelia,
I'll draw a sketch of thee,
What kind of pencil shall I use?
2B or not 2B?

 

 

Eurolove

 

I cannot
and I will not
No, I cannot love you less
Like the flower to the butterfly
The corsage to the dress

She turns my love to dust
my destination empty
my beliefs scattered: Diaspora!

Who set this course - and why?
Now my wings beat -
without purpose
Yet they speed...

 

 

 

Indian Boyhood

 

What happened to the boy I was?
Why did he run away?
And leave me old and thinking, like
There'd been no yesterday?
What happened then?
Was I that boy?
Who laughed and swam in the bund*
I there no going back?
No recompense?
Is there nothing?
No refund?

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Ierse (toneel)schrijver en dichter John Millington Synge werd geboren op 16 april 1871 in Rathfarnham.Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

In Kerry

 

WE heard the thrushes by the shore and sea,

And saw the golden star's nativity,

Then round we went the lane by Thomas Flynn,

Across the church where bones lie out and in;

And there I asked beneath a lonely cloud

Of strange delight, with one bird singing loud,

What change you'd wrought in graveyard, rock and sea,

This new wild paradise to wake for me. . . .

Yet knew no more than knew those merry sins

Had built this stack of thigh-bones, jaws and shins.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Russische dichter en schrijver Konstantin Vaginov werd geboren op 16 april 1899 in Sint Petersburg. Zie ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

Uit: Satyr Chorus

 

“For some time now, Petersburg has been shaded for me in a greenish color, glimmering and glinting, a ghastly color, phosphorescent. Snaky and snickering, a greenish flame quivers on buildings, on faces, and in souls. A flame will flicker--and it's not Pyotr Petrovich before you, but a gluey reptile. A flame will shoot up--and you yourself are worse than a reptile. And it isn't people walking down the streets: you glance under a hat--it's the head of a snake; you peer at an old lady--a toad squats, bloating its stomach. And there are young people, each with a particular dream: an engineer just has to hear Hawaiian music, a student--for a bit more effect, to hang himself, a schoolboy--to father a child, to prove his virility. You find yourself in a store--a former general stands at the counter and wears a drilled smile; you go into a museum--the guide knows he's lying, and continues to lie. I don't like Petersburg. My dream is over.

 

 Prologue

 

PRODUCED BY AN AUTHOR WHO HAS APPEARED 

IN THE MIDDLE OF A BOOK

 

   Now, there is no Petersburg. There is Leningrad. But Leningrad doesn't concern us--the author is a coffin-maker by profession, not a master of the cradle business. Show him a little coffin--he'll give it a knock and find out what material it's made of, how long ago, by which master, and even recall the parents of the deceased. As you can see right now, the author's preparing a little coffin for the twenty-seven years of his life. He's terribly busy. But don't think he's preparing the coffin with some kind of purpose, he simply has that sort of passion. He picks up his nose--there's the whiff of a corpse; so, then, it needs a coffin. And he loves his deceased ones, and walks behind them even while they're alive, and shakes their little hands, and starts talking, and casually stocks up on boards, shops for nails, and gets hold of some lace when there's a chance.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zie voor onderstaande schrijvers ook mijn blog van 16 april 2007.

 

De Nederlandse dichter en etser Jan Luyken werd geboren in Amsterdam op 16 april 1649.

 

De Duitse schrijver Eberhard Panitz werd geboren op 16 april 1932 in Dresden.

 

Jeffrey Archer (Londen, 15 april 1940)

De Britse schrijver Jeffrey (Howard) Archer, Baron Archer of Weston-super-Mare, werd geboren op 15 april 1940 in Londen. Archer bezocht de Wellington School in Somerset en het Brasenose College in Oxford. In 1969 zat hij als lid van de conservatioeve partij in het House of Commons. Zijn eerste verhaal Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less verscheen in 1974 en was meteen een succes. Vervolgens verschenen de thriller Shall We Tell the President?, de bestseller Kane and Abel, en het vervolg erop The Prodigal Daughter. Tijdens de verkiezingen voor het burgemeesterschap van Londen werd hij begin 2000 wegens meineed aangeklaagd en tot enkele jaren gevangenisstraf veroordeeld. Tegenwoordig woont Archer in Lambeth (Londen) en in Grantchester bij Cambridge, in een huis, The Old Vicarage, dat beroemd werd door een gedicht van Rupert Brook.

 

Uit: A Prisoner of Birth

 

““Yes,” said Beth.

She tried to look surprised, but wasn’t all that convincing as she had already decided that they were going to be married when they were at secondary school. However, she was amazed when Danny fell on one knee in the middle of the crowded restaurant.

“Yes,” Beth repeated, hoping he’d stand up before everyone in the room stopped eating and turned to stare at them. But he didn’t budge. Danny remained on one knee, and like a conjurer, produced a tiny box from nowhere. He opened it to reveal a simple gold band boasting a single diamond that was far larger than Beth had expected—although her brother had already told her that Danny had spent two months’ wages on the ring.

When Danny finally got off his knee, he took her by surprise again. He immediately began to tap a number on his mobile. Beth knew only too well who would be on the other end of the line.

“She said yes!” Danny announced triumphantly. Beth smiled as she held the diamond under the light and took a closer look. “Why don’t you join us?” Danny added before she could stop him. “Great, let’s meet at that wine bar off the Fulham Road—the one we went to after the Chelsea game last year. See you there, mate.”

Beth didn’t protest; after all, Bernie was not only her brother, but Danny’s oldest friend, and he’d probably already asked him to be his best man.

Danny turned off his phone and asked a passing waiter for the bill. The maître d’ bustled across.

“It’s on the house,” he said, giving them a warm smile.

It was to be a night of surprises.

When Beth and Danny strolled into the Dunlop Arms, they found Bernie seated at a corner table with a bottle of champagne and three glasses by his side.

“Fantastic news,” he said even before they had sat down.

“Thanks, mate,” said Danny, shaking hands with his friend.

“I’ve already phoned Mum and Dad,” said Bernie as he popped the cork and filled the three champagne glasses. “They didn’t seem all that surprised, but then it was the worst-kept secret in Bow.”

“Don’t tell me they’ll be joining us as well,” said Beth.

“Not a chance,” said Bernie raising his glass. “You’ve only got me this time. To long life and West Ham winning the cup.”

“Well, at least one of those is possible,” said Danny.

 

 

 

De Duitse dichter en tekenaar Wilhelm Busch werd geboren in Wiedensahl op 15 april 1832. Zie ook mijn blog van 15 april 2007.

 

 

Schein und Sein

 

Mein Kind, es sind allhier die Dinge,
    Gleichwohl, ob große, ob geringe,
Im wesentlichen so verpackt,
    Daß man sie nicht wie Nüsse knackt.

Wie wolltest du dich unterwinden,
    Kurzweg die Menschen zu ergründen.
Du kennst sie nur von außenwärts.
    Du siehst die Weste, nicht das Herz.

 

 

 

Doppelte Freude

 

Ein Herr warf einem Bettelmann
    Fünf Groschen in den Felber.
Das tat dem andern wohl, und dann
    Tat es auch wohl ihm selber.

 

Der eine, weil er gar so gut,
    Kann sich von Herzen loben;
Der andre trinkt sich frischen Mut
    Und fühlt sich auch gehoben.

 

 

 

Zwei Jungfern

 

Zwei Jungfern gibt es in Dorf und Stadt,
    Sie leben beständig im Kriege,
Die Wahrheit, die niemand gerne hat,
    Und die scharmante Lüge.

Vor jener, weil sie stolz und prüd
    Und voll moralischer Nücken,

Sucht jeder, der sie nur kommen sieht,
    Sich schleunigst wegzudrücken.

Die andre, obwohl ihr nicht zu traun,
    Wird täglich beliebter und kecker,
Und wenn wir sie von hinten beschaun,
    So hat sie einen Höcker.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Amerikaanse schrijver Henry James werd geboren in New York op 15 april 1843. Zie ook mijn blog van 15 april 2007.

 

Uit: Washington Square

 

“During a portion of the first half of the present century, and more particularly during the latter part of it, there flourished and practiced in the city of New York a physician who enjoyed perhaps an exceptional share of the consideration which, in the United States, has always been bestowed upon distinguished members of the medical profession. This profession in America has constantly been held in honor, and more successfully than elsewhere has put forward a claim to the epithet of 'liberal.' In a country in which, to play a social part, you must either earn your income or make believe that you earn it, the healing art has appeared in a high degree to combine two recognized sources of credit. It belongs to the realm of the practical, which in the United States is a great recommendation; and it is touched by the light of science--a merit appreciated in a community in which the love of knowledge has not always been accompanied by leisure and opportunity.

It was an element in Doctor Sloper's reputation that his learning and his skill were very evenly balanced; he was what you might call a scholarly doctor, and yet there was nothing abstract in his remedies--he always ordered you to take something. Though he was felt to be extremely thorough, he was not uncomfortably theoretic; and if he sometimes explained matters rather more minutely than might seem of use to the patient, he never went so far (like some practitioners one had heard of) as to trust to the explanation alone, but always left behind him an inscrutable prescription. There were some doctors that left the prescription without offering any explanation at all; and he did not belong to that class either, which was after all the most vulgar. It will be seen that I am describing a clever man; and this is really the reason why Doctor Sloper had become a local celebrity.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

De Nederlandse schrijfster Ina Boudier-Bakker werd geboren in Amsterdam op 15 april 1875. Zie ook mijn blog van 15 april 2007.

 

Uit: De straat

 

“Onder de grauwe wijde hemel lag in de stille najaarsdag de Straat - de hoofdstraat van het kleine vergeten stadje, in zijn vereenzaming achter de uiterwaarden van de grote rivier. De brede lege straat, met z'n deftige herenhuizen gerijd van poort tot poort.

Vele malen, in vroeger eeuwen, hadden wilde horden vreemd krijgsvolk de nauwe donkere poort bestormd, en de sterke verschansing van grijze wallen rondom. Strijd was er geweest en fel leven, en altijd een geest van verweer had de harten beroerd, bedacht op overval en verraad.

Daarna was gekomen het verval, de rust, de verlatenheid. In de grote herenhuizen met hier en daar een winkeltje, een werkplaats ertussen, woonden de notabelen; en achter de vensters zagen stille gezichten toe op al het dagelijks gebeurende, wéérkerende. De Straat was hun wereld, die alles beheerste, waar alles zich afspeelde. Over de Straat laaiden van achter de gesloten vensters de gedachten, die geen daden ooit werden, uit stille ogen en zwijgende monden; over de Straat sponnen zich de gedachten uit de strakke besloten huizingen voort tot elkaar, vonden elkaar en braken - klemden elkaar als worstelende vijanden, om zich dan weer plots verloren te vinden in een mist van vergetelheid en onmacht; voortgedreven, zwervende, doelloos heen en weer. Een web van onzichtbare draden tussen de huizen van de Straat, waar aan beide einden, van de poort, en van de oude gotische kerk, de klokken de tijd afbeierden - de tijd, die wegwiste de seizoenen, de jaren, in de nevel van nauw bewuste herinnering.

Eénmaal in het jaar gebeurde er iets vreemds in de straat. In de herfst, als koel en hoog de hemel spande over de groene uiterwaarden en de blauwe glinsterende rivier, kwamen grote wagens met kermistuig de houten schipbrug overzeulen, met moeite de dijk op, en de enge donkere poort onderdoor.”

 

 

 

 

 

De Canadese dichter Bliss Carman werd geboren in Fredericton, in de provicincie New Brunswick op 15 april 1861. Zie ook mijn blog van 15 april 2007.

 

 

Rivers of Canada

 

O all the little rivers that run to Hudson's Bay,
They call me and call me to follow them away.

Missinaibi, Abitibi, Little Current--where they run
Dancing and sparkling I see them in the sun.

I hear the brawling rapid, the thunder of the fall,
And when I think upon them I cannot stay at all.

At the far end of the carry, where the wilderness begins,
Set me down with my canoe-load--and forgiveness of my sins.

O all the mighty rivers beneath the Polar Star,
They call me and call me to follow them afar.

Peace and Athabasca and Coppermine and Slave,
And Yukon and Mackenzie--the highroads of the brave.

Saskatchewan, Assiniboine, the Bow and the Qu'Appelle,
And many a prairie river whose name is like a spell.

They rumor through the twilight at the edge of the unknown,
"There's a message waiting for you, and a kingdom all your own.

"The wilderness shall feed you, her gleam shall be your guide.
Come out from desolations, our path of hope is wide."

O all the headlong rivers that hurry to the West,
They call me and lure me with the joy of their unrest.

Columbia and Fraser and Bear and Kootenay,
I love their fearless reaches where winds untarnished play--

The rush of glacial water across the pebbly bar
To polished pools of azure where the hidden boulders are.

Just there, with heaven smiling, any morning I would be,
Where all the silver rivers go racing to the sea.

O well remembered rivers that sing of long ago,
Ajourneying through summer or dreaming under snow.

Among their meadow islands through placid days they glide,
And where the peaceful orchards are diked against the tide.

Tobique and Madawaska and shining Gaspereaux,
St. Croix and Nashwaak and St. John whose haunts I used to know.

And all the pleasant rivers that seek the Fundy foam,
They call me and call me to follow them home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zie voor onderstaande schrijver ook mijn blog van 15 april 2007.

 

De Vlaamse schrijver Staf Weyts werd geboren op 15 april 1909 in Mechelen