Berichten van 9 oktober 2013

De Poolse dichter en schrijver Tadeusz Różewicz werd geboren in Radomsko op 9 oktober 1921. Zie ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Tadeusz Różewicz op dit blog.

 

 

The Story of Old Women

 

I like old women
ugly women
mean women

 

they are the salt of the earth

 

they are not disgusted by
human waste

 

they know the flipside
of the coin
of love
of faith

 

dictators clown around
come and go
hands stained
with human blood

 

old women get up at dawn
buy meat fruit bread
clean cook
stand on the street
arms folded silent

 

old women
are immortal

 

Hamlet flails in a snare
Faust plays a base and comic role
Raskolnikov strikes with an axe

 

old women
are indestructible
they smile knowingly

 

god dies
old women get up as usual
at dawn they buy bread wine fish
civilization dies
old women get up at dawn
open the windows
cart away waste
man dies
old women
wash the corpse
bury the dead
plant flowers
on graves

 

I like old women
ugly women
mean women

 

they believe in eternal life
they are the salt of the earth
the bark of a tree
the timid eyes of animals

 

cowardice and bravery
greatness and smallness
they see in their proper proportions
commensurate with the demands
of everyday life
their sons discover America
perish at Thermopylae
die on the cross

 

conquer the cosmos

 

old women leave at dawn
for the city to buy milk bread meat
season the soup
open the windows

 

only fools laugh
at old women
ugly women
mean women

 

because these beautiful women
kind women
old women
are like an ovum
a mystery devoid of mystery
a sphere that rolls on

 

old women
are mummies
of sacred cats

 

they’re either small
withered
dry springs
dried fruit
or fat
round buddhas

 

and when they die
a tear rolls down
a cheek
and joins
a smile on the face
of a young woman

 

 

 

Vertaald door Joanna Trzeciak

 

 

 

 

Tadeusz Różewicz (Radomsko, 9 oktober 1921)

 

 

 

 

De Vlaamse schrijver Herman Brusselmans werd geboren in Hamme op 9 oktober 1957. Zie ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Herman Brusselmans op dit blog.

 

Uit: Mogelijke memoires

 

“In mei van 1967 werd m’n grootvader Frans blind. M’n vader Gust, m’n moeder Lea en ik, Herman Brusselmans, gingen naar Sint-Niklaas voor een witte stok, omdat er in Hamme geen enkele winkel was waarin je witte stokken kon krijgen. In de Sint-Niklase winkel, waarin je ook rolstoelen, prothesen, bandages en van die dingen kon kopen, zei m’n vader: ‘Voor ons een witte stok graag, het is voor een blinde.’
‘Het is m’n vader,’ zei m’n moeder, ‘hij heeft het zicht aan beide ogen verloren.’
‘Vanmorgen is hij tegen de rand van de deur gelopen,’ zei ik, ‘ik heb het persoonlijk zelf gezien.’
‘Zwijg jij maar,’ zei m’n vader, ‘ik voer hier het woord.’
Daar kreeg ik het van, dat ik al negen jaar oud was en moest zwijgen.
‘Ik heb vier verschillende soorten witte stokken in de aanbieding,’ zei de verkoper.
‘Geef ze maar alle vier,’ zei ik. Met dat zwijgen viel het niet altijd mee. Ik kon gewoon moeilijk m’n bek dichthouden, zo was het nu eenmaal. M’n vader keek kwaad naar mij en zei tegen de verkoper dat één witte stok wel volstond. Toen moesten we kiezen. De vier soorten, verschillend in lengte, uitvouwsysteem en prijs, werden naast elkaar gelegd. Terwijl m’n ouders er hulpeloos naar keken, zei ik tegen de verkoper: ‘Weet je wat? Geef ons toch maar een blauwe stok. Deze vier witte lijken nergens naar.’ Nu zei m’n moeder dat ik me er niet mee moest bemoeien. ‘Ik moei me niet,’ zei ik, ‘ik vind alleen dat een blauwe stok beter geschikt is voor grootvader. Blauw is z’n lievelingskleur.’
‘Dat klopt,’ zei m’n moeder, ‘hij draagt altijd blauwe sokken.’
‘Ja?’ zei m’n vader. ‘Dat is me nog niet opgevallen.’
‘Blauwe sokken,’ zei m’n moeder, ‘al z’n gehele leven.’
‘Wat vreemd dat dat me nooit is opgevallen,’ zei m’n vader.”

 

 

 

Herman Brusselmans (Hamme, 9 oktober 1957)

 

 

 

 

 

De Braziliaanse dichter en schrijver Mário de Andrade werd op 9 oktober 1893 in São Paulo in Brazilië geboren. Zie ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Mário de Andrade op dit blog.

 

 

Streets of my São Paulo

Streets of my São Paulo:
Where is the living love,
Where is it?

Roads of my city:
I run after my friend,
Where is he?

Streets of my São Paulo:
Love greater than food,
Where is it?

Roads of my city:
An answer to my request,
Where is it?

Streets of my São Paulo:
The fault of the restless one,
Where is it?

It must be in the past:
In the damned centuries,
There it is.

 

The man who walks all alone

That man who walks all alone
Along those squares, those streets,
Ha in himself an enormous secret.
         He is a man.

That woman like all the others
Along those squares, those streets<
Has in herself a cruel surprise.
         She is a woman.

The woman meets the man,
They smile and hold hands,
The surprise and the secret expand
         Violently.

But the shadow of the restless one
Guards that mystery in the dark.
Death watches with her scythe.
         Verily, it is night.

 

 

 

 

Mário de Andrade (9 oktober 1893 – 25 februari 1945)

 

 

 

 

De Britse schrijver en filmmaker Colin Clark werd geboren op 9 oktober 1932 in Londen. Zie ook alle tags voor Colin Clark op dit blog.

 

Uit: My Week With Marilyn

 

“FRIDAY 14 SEPTEMBER
As soon as we broke for lunch, Milton Greene was waiting for me: ‘Colin, I must talk to you very seriously. I had a call from Arthur Miller in Paris. He called Marilyn late last night and when he asked her why she took so long to answer the phone she said she had been saying goodbye to you. What were you doing there?’

‘I wasn’t doing anything!’

‘Colin, please don’t go over to see Marilyn again. Or even talk to her without telling me. I’m going to have dinner with her this evening and I’ll explain the situation to her. She told us that she might see you again tonight, and clearly that must not happen. OK?’

It had been fun while it lasted but I didn’t want to lose my job. Nothing had happened, but I felt desperately sorry for Marilyn. She was trapped by her own fame.”

Colin Clark (9 oktober 1932-17 december 2002)

Eddie Redmayne en Michelle Williams als Colin Clark en Marilyn

in de film My Week With Marilyn uit 2011

 

 

 

De Joods-Duitse filoloog en schrijver Victor Klemperer werd geboren in Landsberg an der Warthe (tegenwoordig Gorzów Wielkopolski) op 9 oktober 1881. Zie ook alle tags voor Victor Klemperer op dit blog en ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010

 

Uit: Ich will Zeugnis ablegen bis zum letzten, Tagebücher 1933-1945

 

“1933
14. Januar, Sonnabend
Rektorwahl: Nach großem Intrigenkampf wurde Reuther zum zweitenmal gewählt, und Gehrig unterlag. Es war eine schmutzige Sache, ein gegen unsere Abteilung gedrehtes Ding. Trotz meiner Beteiligung an der "Munkelkonmmission" blieb ich innerlich fast unberührt. Ebenso gleichgültig war es mir, daß gestern abend (Abteilungssitzung) Beste Dekan wurde.
Die Qualen des neuen Jahres die gleichen wie vorher: das Haus, Frost, Zeitverlust, Geldverlust, keine Kreditmöglichkeit, Evas Verbohrtheit in den Hausbau und ihre Verzweiflung immer noch wachsend. Wir werden wirklich an dieser Sache zugrunde gehen. Ich sehe es kommen und fühle mich hilflos.
Der Hueberprozeß quält mich auch sehr, raubt Zeit und nimmt keinen günstigen Verlauf. Ich hätte mich mit den gebotenen 250 M begnügen sollen; im Prozessieren ist der Mann mir über. Bei ständiger Ablenkung stockt das "Frankreichbild".
Mit den "Dresdener NN" sind zwei Kleinigkeiten verabredet. Kleinigkeiten (Stendhal-Centenar, Neues Spanien), aber Zeit kosten sie auch. Dazu die Kollegien, die mir immer wieder Mühe bereiten, und die Wirtschaftsmisere (Heizen, Staubwischen, Abtrocknen - kostbare Stunden). -
[...]
Gestern nachmittag Liesel Sebba bei uns (gealtert) und die jungen Köhlers. Gelegentlich unsere üblichen Abendgäste. Am 3. Januar wurde das Nickelchen kastriert, und jetzt sind die beiden Tiere schon viel zusammen. Ich habe manchmal den Eindruck, sie seien das einzige, was für Eva noch eine reine Freude und sichere Lebensbindung bedeute.”

 

 

 

Victor Klemperer (9 oktober 1881 - 11 februari 1960)

Cover

 

 

 

Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 9^e oktober ook mijn vorige blog van vandaag.

De Russische dichteres en schrijfster Marina Tsvetájeva werd geboren op 9 oktober 1892 in Moskou. Zie ook alle tags voor Marína Tsvetájeva op dit blog en ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010

 

 

Why such tenderness?

 

Why such tenderness?

Not the first – these curls

I stroke, I’ve known, yes,

Lips much darker than yours.

 

As stars fade and rise,

– Why such tenderness?

Eyes have risen

And faded to my eyes.

 

Yet with no such song

Have I heard night darker

Crowned – O tenderness –

In the breast of the singer.

 

Why such tenderness,

And what to do with it, singer

So young, simply passing by?

And could eyelashes – be longer?

 

 

 

 

Dying, I’ll not say: ‘I was’.

 

Dying, I’ll not say: ‘I was’.

No regrets, I’ll not cast blame.

There are greater things in this world

Than love’s storm, and passion’s game.

 

But you – wing-beat against my chest,

Fresh, guilty cause of my inspiration –

You I command to: – Be!

My obedience – knows no evasion.

 

 

 

 

When I watch the flight of leaves,

 

When I watch the flight of leaves,

To the cobblestones at my feet,

Swept up – as if by an artist,

Whose picture’s at last complete,

 

I think how (already no one likes

My figure, face deep in thought)

A strongly yellow, decidedly rusty,

Leaf, there at the crown’s – forgot.

 

 

 

Vertaald door A. S. Kline

 

 

 

Marína Tsvetájeva (9 oktober 1892 – 31 augustus 1941)

Portret door George G. Sjisjkin

 

 

 

 

De Noorse schrijver, schilder en essayist Jens Bjørneboe werd geboren op 9 oktober 1920 in Kristiansand. Zie ook alle tags voor Jens Bjørneboe op dit blog en ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010

 

Uit: Powderhouse (Vertaald door Esther Greenleaf Mürer)

 

“It's very clear that at a Soviet embassy in a Christian country this is not compatible with diplomatic dignity and etiquette. And it's evident that for the wife herself these diplomatic years beside her silent, flawless ambassador-husband were pure purgatory, before she finally said to hell with it and took to howling and raping freely. That's how she came here. Nothing is simple.

    Of course I'm not a "caretaker," but—as Lefèvre puts it—"combination caretaker and physician-in-chief of the Institute," and as such I naturally have a radical insight into all that goes on here, into everything that happens. Now when I say "physician-in-chief," that's of course to be understood in a higher, so to speak purely spiritual sense—as chief ideologist and father-confessor to nearly everybody. From the viewpoint of the employment roster I'm a caretaker. Janitor. Cleaning man.

    This last point in particular—my being the place's trusted renovation worker—must not be underestimated from an epistemological standpoint. How else, for example, would I have had any awareness of the stupendous quantities of prophylactics with which the diplomat's wife fills her wastebasket between attacks? What, indeed, would I have understood of anything at all without access to wastebaskets and garbage pails?

    Another side of the matter is that I have full opportunity to pursue my studies and my research here. My interests are the same as before, even though I've acquired an ice-cold scientific attitude to reality. Of course, while collecting my documents I had to come sooner or later to one of the central points in our Christian culture—possibly to its heart, to the matter's core. It's natural too that I began on the topic in just the geographic situation in which I now find myself: in a landscape which has been the historic arena for our culture's very innermost concerns. One is located even more centrally if one travels some miles further to the northeast, up to Trier. It was impossible to continue with The History of Bestiality without taking up the Christian churches' heretic and witch trials.”

 

 

 

Jens Bjørneboe (9 oktober 1920 – 9 mei 1976)

Hier met leerlingen van de Rudolf Steinerschool in Oslo, 1952 

 

 

 

 

 

De Senegalese schrijver Léopold Senghor werd geboren op 9 oktober 1906 in het plaatsje Joal aan de Atlantische kust, zo'n 70 kilometer van de Senegalese hoofdstad Dakar. Zie ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Léopold Senghor op dit blog.

 

 

Night in Sine

 

Woman, place your soothing hands upon my brow,

Your hands softer than fur.

Above us balance the palm trees, barely rustling

In the night breeze. Not even a lullaby.

Let the rhythmic silence cradle us.

Listen to its song. Hear the beat of our dark blood,

Hear the deep pulse of Africa in the mist of lost villages.

 

Now sets the weary moon upon its slack seabed

Now the bursts of laughter quiet down, and even the storyteller

Nods his head like a child on his mother’s back

The dancers’ feet grow heavy, and heavy, too,

Come the alternating voices of singers.

 

Now the stars appear and the Night dreams

Leaning on that hill of clouds, dressed in its long, milky pagne.

The roofs of the huts shine tenderly. What are they saying

So secretly to the stars? Inside, the fire dies out

In the closeness of sour and sweet smells.

 

Woman, light the clear-oil lamp. Let the Ancestors

Speak around us as parents do when the children are in bed.

Let us listen to the voices of the Elissa Elders. Exiled like us

They did not want to die, or lose the flow of their semen in the sands.

Let me hear, a gleam of friendly souls visits the smoke-filled hut,

My head upon your breast as warm as tasty dang streaming from the fire,

Let me breathe the odor of our Dead, let me gather

And speak with their living voices, let me learn to live

Before plunging deeper than the diver

Into the great depths of sleep.

 

 

 

Vertaald door Melvin Dixon

 

 

 

 

Léopold Sédar Senghor (9 oktober 1906 - 20 december 2001)

 

 

 

 

 

De Deense dichter en schrijver Holger Drachmann werd geboren op 9 oktober 1846 in Kopenhagen. Zie ook alle tags voor Holger Drachmann op dit blog en ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 2010

 

 

Sakuntala

 

I could not sleep for longing,
a flower-wind
wafted towards me,
streaming in through my window
like a fragrance-breathing river;
I heard the tall palm trees
gently murmuring
with music sweet;
it whispered where I placed my feet:
Sakuntala, Sakuntala.

You eternal Himalaya
with summit high
against the roof of the sky,
why do you send your springs
to meet my foot today?
Why do the scented waves
heavy with memories
purl past my feet?
why trembling does my gaze again meet:
Sakuntala, Sakuntala!

O maiden, you lower your eye
so moist and soft
into my gazing eyes,
as if it were at this hour
you were given the ring that binds!
ah, not a single hour,
a single day,
but a thousand years
do separate us now, I fear:
Sakuntala, Sakuntala!

You did not lose your ring in the river
Dushjántas himself
has flung it therein,
and should he not stem the swift-fl owing stream,
the ring he will not bring again.
Dushjántas in the grove of palms
will hunt
along the river’s slope;
he downs an antilope:
Sakuntala, Sakuntala.

 

 

 

Vertaald door Rolf Kristian Stang

 

 

 

Holger Drachmann (9 oktober 1846 – 14 januari 1908)

Portret door Edvard Munch, 1902

 

 

 

Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 9^e oktober ook mijn blog van 9 oktober 20011 deel 3.