Berichten van 26 september 2011

De Engels-Amerikaanse dichter en schrijver T. S. Eliot werd op 26 september 1888 geboren in St.Louis, Missouri. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor T. S. Eliot op dit blog.

 

Uit: Little Gidding (Fragment)

 

I

Midwinter spring is its own season
Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown,
Suspended in time, between pole and tropic.
Whem the short day is brightest, with frost and fire,
The brief sun flames the ice, on pond and ditches,
In windless cold that is the heart’s heat,
Reflecting in a watery mirror
A glare that is blindness in the early afternoon.
And glow more intense than blaze of branch, or brazier,
Stirs the dumb spirit: no wind, but pentecostal fire
In the dark time of the year. Between melting and freezing
The soul’s sap quivers. There is no earth smell
Or smell of living thing. This is the spring time
But not in time’s covenant. Now the hedgerow
Is blanched for an hour with transitory blossom
Of snow, a bloom more sudden
Than that of summer, neither budding nor fading,
Not in the scheme of generation.
Where is the summer, the unimaginable
Zero summer?

 

If you came this way,
Taking the route you would be likely to take
From the place you would be likely to come from,
If you came this way in may time, you would find the hedges
White again, in May, with voluptuary sweetness.
It would be the same at the end of the journey,
If you came at night like a broken king,
If you came by day not knowing what you came for,
It would be the same, when you leave the rough road
And turn behind the pig-sty to the dull facade
And the tombstone. And what you thought you came for
Is only a shell, a husk of meaning
From which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilled
If at all. Either you had no purpose
Or the purpose is beyond the end you figured
And is altered in fulfilment. There are other places
Which also are the world’s end, some at the sea jaws,
Or over a dark lake, in a desert or a city—
But this is the nearest, in place and time,
Now and in England.

 

 

 

 

T. S. Eliot (26 september 1888 – 4 januari 1965)   

 

 

 

 

De Nederlandse dichter en schrijver Bart Chabot werd geboren in Den Haag op 26 september 1954. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Bart Chabot op dit blog.

 

 

Magnafox 2002

 

die avond vertrok een auto
richting snelweg
& de honden blaften niet

het dashboardvak was leeg
op de kaart van W Europa na
cassettes

wij reden zwaar weer tegemoet
tegenliggers voerden groot
licht in de verte

wij naderden
de interzone
niemandsland

het grensgebied

 

 

 

Uit: Schiphol Blues

 

 

'Vraagje.

Klein, onbeduidend, heel onschuldig vraagje mijnerzijds.

Hebt u weleens ingebroken? Een kraak gezet? In de zin

van: u wederrechtelijk toegang verworven tot een woning die niet op enigerlei wijze tot uw bezit gerekend kan en mag worden? Meer in het bijzonder: hebt u weleens ingebroken in het huis van een ander, samen met uw vrouw of partner?

Nee?

Ik wel.

Maar dat voelde u al aankomen.

Ik beken: ik heb ingebroken, met mijn lief, onlangs, pakweg enkele maanden geleden, op klaarlichte dag.'

 

 

 

Bart Chabot (Den Haag, 26 september 1954)

 

 

 

 

 

De Braziliaanse schrijver Luís Fernando Veríssimo werd geboren op 26 september 1936 in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010.

 

Uit: Borges and the Eternal Orangutans (Vertaald door Jull Costa)

 

„I am fifty years old. I have led a cloistered life, "without adventures or surprises", as you put it in your poem. Like you, master. A sheltered life spent among books, and into which only rarely did the unexpected enter like a tiger. Not that I am an innocent. I am a sceptic, books have trained me in every category of disbelief and caution when confronted by illogicality. I could never have believed that destiny was calling me by name, that everything had been decided for me and before me by some hidden Borges, that my role was waiting for me, just as Mallarmé's vide papier was waiting for his poems.

The prospect of hearing the Argentinian's comments on the lecture by the German with whom I had corresponded, but whom I did not know personally, was enough in itself to justify the price of the air fare to Buenos Aires (paid for on credit). The conference would take place in July, when my students of English would be taking refuge in their hyperactive hormones, so as to protect themselves from the cold, thus enabling me to have a holiday. No urgent translation required my attention, at least nothing that could not wait a week, the duration of the conference.

The final coincidence: one day after the arrival of the journal containing both the remarkable announcement that the 1985 Israfel Society Conference had been transferred from Baltimore to Buenos Aires and instructions on how interested parties should apply, my cat Aleph died. Not from any discernible cause, but merely out of consideration for the old bachelor who had taken him in. Aleph was the only obstacle to my making the trip, because, now that my Aunt Raquel had gone into a home, there was no-one I could leave him with. Aleph's death convinced me not to miss this never-to-be-repeated opportunity. Yet even his all too convenient demise failed to arouse my suspicions.”

 

 

 

Luís Fernando Veríssimo (Porto Alegre, 26 september 1936)

 

 

 

 

 

De Nederlandse schrijver Thomas van Aalten werd geboren in Huissen bij Arnhem op 26 september 1978. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2007 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2008 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010

 

Uit: Coyote

 

‘“Waar het op neer komt: de vrouw komt uit het buitenland. Haar platenmaatschappij zit in Heimstadt, maar ze is hier nog nooit geweest. Ze heeft nooit ingecheckt in die hotelkamer. Haar broer weigert te geloven dat het haar tanden zijn. Is het mogelijk dat tanden zo netjes uit iemands mond worden gehaald?”
“Kan iemand die tanden in haar kamer hebben gelegd?” vraag ik en kijk afwezig naar zijn hangwangen.
“Maar dat is het nou juist, die kamer is niet gebruikt. Zelfs de schoonmaaksters zijn niet in die kamer geweest, alles is gecheckt met getuigen. Snapt u hoe zoiets kan?”
Mijn blik verstart.
“Er is nog iets geks. Er zat een Japanse tekst bij de tanden. Een soort haiku. Over een brand in een bos.”
Mijn hart slaat over. “Was ze Japanse?”
Tromp schudt zijn hoofd. “Ze heette Isabella.”’

 

 

Thomas van Aalten (Huissen, 26 september 1978)

 

 

 

 

De Oostenrijkse dichter, schrijver en vertaler Christoph W. Bauer werd geboren in Kolbnitz op 26 september 1968. Zie ook mijn blog van 8 juni 2009 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010

 

Supersonic

XLVII

verlieren verboten ums gelenk buchstabiert
mit pünktlichseinblicken und jeder verdient
eine zweite lektion wie hausarrest für
eskapaden sie grüssten die fahne
das testbild die nächte waren inseln und
aussteiger sie durchs fenster über die grenze
der sperrstunde hinaus wuchsen strände wie
wiesen denen sie die uhren eingruben um
nicht zu hören was ihnen blüht holten sie
alles aus den rekordern und rasten bis
ins felderausfransen mit den winden
um die wette besang Campino das blech
ihrer träume sie haben alle abgehängt

 

 

 

Christoph W. Bauer (Kolbnitz, 26 september 1968)



Zie voor onderstaande schrijvers ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010.

De Engelse schrijver Mark Haddon werd geboren op 26 september 1962 in Northampton. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010

 

Uit: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

 

„My name is Christopher John Francis Boone. I know all the countries of the world and their capital cities and every prime number up to 7,057.
Eight years ago, when I first met Siobhan, she showed me this picture
[sad face]
and I knew that it meant 'sad,' which is what I felt when I found the dead dog.
Then she showed me this picture
[smiley face]
and I knew that it meant 'happy', like when I'm reading about the Apollo space missions, or when I am still awake at 3 am or 4 am in the morning and I can walk up and down the street and pretend that I am the only person in the whole world.
Then she drew some other pictures
[various happy, sad, confused, surprised faces]
but I was unable to say what these meant.
I got Siobhan to draw lots of these faces and then write down next to them exactly what they meant. I kept the piece of paper in my pocket and took it out when I didn't understand what someone was saying. But it was very difficult to decide which of the diagrams was most like the face they were making because people's faces move very quickly.
When I told Siobhan that I was doing this, she got out a pencil and another piece of paper and said it probably made people feel very
[confused face]
and then she laughed. So I tore the original piece of paper up and threw it away. And Siobhan apologised. And now if I don't know what someone is saying I ask them what they mean or I walk away.“

 

 

Mark Haddon (Northampton, 26 september 1962)

 

 

 

 

De Engelse schrijver, criticus en columnist William Self werd geboren in Londen op 26 september 1961. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2007 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2008. en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010.

 

Uit: The Book of Dave

 

„Carl remembered how this ground had been in buddout, each rip mounded with a mixture of moto dung, seaweed, birdshit and roof straw. The motos had deftly laid their own fresh dung, but the other ingredients had to be dug from the byres, scraped from the rocks and gathered from the shore by the older girls and opares.
Next the mummies laboriously dragged truckle after truckle of the mixture up from the manor, before spreading and digging it into the earth with their mattocks. There were no wheels on Ham – save for symbols of them – and therefore no cars or vans either, so the Hamsterwomen tilled the long rips themselves – a team of six yoked to the island’s sole plough, with its heavy irony share. Now the ripening wheatie stood as high as his knees, and it looked as if it would be a good crop this year – not that Carl would necessarily be there to see the mummies grind it under the autumn foglamp, their bare breasts nuzzling the hot stone of their querns as they bent sweatily to the graft.
– Ware, guv, said Billi Brudi, catching Carl’s eye as they reached the linchet bordering the next rip and together stepped over it.

–  Nu´ Lundun, Carl replied.
– Ware, guv, Sam Brudi chipped in – and his brother Billi chimed up: –  Nu´ Lundun.
Then Gari Edduns uttered the salutation, and Peet Bulluk made the response – and so it went along the line. Between them the nine lads represented all the six families of Ham, the Brudis, Funches, Edduns, Bulluks, Ridmuns and De´vu´shes. Good, solid Ingish names – all from the Book, all established on Ham from time out of mind, as rooted as smoothbark and crinkleleaf.“

 

 

 

William Self (Londen, 26 september 1961)

 

 

 

 

De Amerikaanse schrijfster Jane Smiley werd geboren op 26 september 1949 in Los Angeles. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2008 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010

 

Uit: Charles Dickens: A Life

 

„Charles Dickens was a public man and a famous man, and he assumed both of these slightly different roles in his early twenties. His first sketch, "A Dinner at Poplar Walk," was published in the Monthly Magazine in December 1833. Dickens, born on February 7, 1812, was only twenty-one, but because of his work as a parliamentary reporter (he had taught himself shorthand and was able to take down speeches word for word), he was already familiar with seeing his name in print. Nevertheless, he related later that "I walked down to Westminster Hall, and turned into it for half an hour, because my eyes were so dimmed with joy and pride, that they could not bear the street, and were not fit to be seen there." Further sketches published in monthly and weekly magazines over the following months attracted considerable notice, and when Sketches by Boz appeared in volume form in February and December 1836, they were well reviewed. What everyone, including Dickens himself, considered especially remarkable was their breadth of scope, and in particular the variety of lower-class characters and scenes depicted, perhaps a first in English literature. One reviewer called them "a perfect picture of the morals, manners, and habits of a great portion of English Society."
At only twenty-four, Dickens found himself in an advantageous authorial position—he was invited to contribute the text for a series of sporting engravings to be published by the firm of Chapman and Hall. They offered Dickens £14 per month (it is impossible to know exactly what this would be equivalent to in modern dollars, but it is useful to multiply any Dickensian sum by 35, which would make his fee about $500). „

 

 

 

Jane Smiley (Los Angeles, 26 september 1949)

 

 

 

 

De Russische schrijver en dissident Vladimir Nikolajevitsj Vojnovitsj werd geboren in Doesjanbe op  26 september 1932. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2008 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009 en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010

 

Uit: Die denkwürdigen Abenteuer des Soldaten Iwan Tschonkin (Vertaald door Alexander Kaempfe)

 

“Es verging einige Zeit. Njura kam zu sich. Die Sonne brannte ihr auf den Rücken. Es roch nach trockener Erde und Mist. Irgendwo zwitscherten Sperlinge und gackerten Hühner. Das Leben nahm weiter seinen Lauf. Njura öffnete die Augen und sah unter sich die klumpige Erde.
»Warum liege ich hier eigentlich herum?« dachte sie ratlos, und da fiel ihr der eiserne Vogel wieder ein.
Njura war ein gebildetes Mädchen. Manchmal las sie das »Notizbuch des Agitators«, das Parteistellenleiter Kilin abonniert hatte. Im »Notizbuch« hieß es klipp und klar, daß jeglicher Aberglaube zum Erbe der finsteren Vergangenheit gehöre und folglich auszumerzen sei. Diesen Gedanken hielt Njura für durchaus zutreffend.
Njura wandte den Kopf nach rechts und sah die Außentreppe ihres Hauses sowie den Eber Borjka, der wieder dabei war, die Erde umzuwühlen. Daran war nichts Übernatürliches. Borjka ging dieser Beschäftigung regelmäßig nach, wenn er einen passenden Ort dafür fand. Fand er ihn nicht, tat er dasselbe am unpassenden Ort. Njura drehte den Kopf ein Stück weiter und sah den klaren blauen Himmel und die blendend gelbe Sonne.
Kühner geworden wandte Njura den Kopf nach links und stürzte gleich wieder, mit dem Gesicht nach vorn, zu Boden. Der entsetzliche Vogel war leibhaftig da. Er stand unweit von Njuras Gemüsegarten auf der Erde und hielt seine großen grünen Flügel gespreizt.”

 

 

 

Vladimir Vojnovitsj (Doesjanbe, 26 september 1932)

 

 

 

 

Zie voor onderstaande schrijvers ook mijn blog van 26 september 2010.

 

 

De Nigeriaanse schrijver Cyprian Ekwensi werd op 26 september 1921 in Nigeria geboren in Minna. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2006  en ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009.

 

De Oostenrijkse schrijver Peter Turrini werd geboren op  26. September 1944 in St. Margarethen im Lavanttal. Zie ook mijn blog van 26 september 2009.

 

De Engels schrijver, dichter en germanist Edwin Keppel Bennett werd geboren op 26 september 1887 in Wareham, Dorset.

 

De Australische dichter en schrijver Joseph Furphy werd geboren op 26 september 1843 in Yering, een voorstad van Melbourne.