> Stephen,
>
> Is it Eugene O'Neill's _Mourning Becomes Electra_
> that's ringing your bells?
>
> Candice
>
Beverly Dahlen's work - which I am far from alone in recommending - is full
of such 'play' . You are right, O'Neil's play title is clearly echo and
bounce, no question. The implication of reducing "Electra" to "etc.", the
sublime to repetitious ordinary, is what, I believe, rings my bells.
Stephen
>
> --- Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> If it wasn't the reason, how can it be the
>> intention?
>>
>> A few other correctives. The great cemeteries of
>> Paris were the result of urbanization--as the
>> population density increased the churchyards
>> became more valuable, so the bodies were
>> transferred. There was also concern about
>> sanitation (there are I think only two of the
>> older cemeteries that survive--the churchyard in
>> Menilmontant, and the convent where the victims
>> of the Terror were buried). In no sense are they
>> national cemeteries--the closest Paris has to
>> that are the Pantheon, with a couple of dozen
>> notables, like Voltaire, the Invalides, with
>> Napoleon and some of his generals, and the
>> cathedral of Saint Denis, with most of the kings.
>> Pere Lachaise is just a cemetery--the vast
>> majority of those buried there were ordinary
>> folks. A great many are in fact cremated,
>> including Isidora Duncan. She rests, like the
>> others, in a wall niche, which seems to be what
>> most people do with the ashes of loved ones, except
>> in Hollywood movies.
>>
>> The cemeteries were also built as parks, like
>> Brooklyn's Greenwood Cemetery, at a time when
>> urban space wasn't being routinely set aside for
>> greenery and the royal parks were still royal. It
>> wasn't tourists who were expected to stroll
>> there, but locals. Last I was there they didn't
>> sell tickets. Except on national holidays
>> (especially Armistice Day) they're not very
>> crowded, except for the vicinity of Jim Morrison.
>> Pere Lachaise is unique in the volume of its
>> tourist traffic--usually the Montparnasse, which
>> I lived a block away from for a few months, is
>> deserted except for folks taking a shortcut or a
>> neighborhood stroll. Not a tour bus in sight.
>> Lots of famous dead, though. Likewise the Montmartre
>> and Passy cemeteries.
>>
>> After the fall of the 1871 commune a couple of
>> thousand communards were lined up against the
>> north wall of Pere Lachaise and shot. I don't
>> remember if there's a plaque. Another use for open
>> space.
>>
>> In the year that I lived five blocks from Pere
>> Lachaise I went in once, on Armistice Day.
>>
>> Do you really think that large numbers of people
>> come to Paris for the cemeteries? The only place
>> that might be true of is the Nile Valley.
>>
>> Mark
>>
>> At 05:28 PM 3/31/2007, you wrote:
>>> Anny, the cynic and once Francophile in me wants to
>> say that early on the
>>> French Government, it appears, was into marketing -
>> putting or burying fame
>>> all in one place and then making it into a global
>> destination target!
>>> Certainly that was not the original reason why much
>> of Frances cultural
>>> wealth got buried in the same place. But a tourist
>> economy trumps all other
>>> intentions, I suspect, and so France has discovered
>> another level of
>>> mortuary meaning.
>>> (Somebody recently said that if Tourism were a
>> country, it would be the
>>> third or fourth largest in the world!)
>>>
>>> I also suspect there are the families of both
>> famous and/or not who prefer
>>> cremation - inaccessibility of remains becomes a
>> virtue. Or, if you are
>>> really interested, read the books or look at the
>> art of the beloved
>>> deceased.
>>>
>>> Yet, to contradict, I love the Vietnam Memorial as
>> a site of grievance - and
>>> its huge service to the needs of this country to
>> take account the dark facts
>>> of that way. May the Memorial for the Iraq dead
>> (both Iraqi and 'Coalition
>>> Forces' }be enshrined in Crawford, Texas - I say.
>> Bush should never left to
>>> live with himself again. I diverge!
>>>
>>> As to where to bury and enshrine poets, it's kind
>> of a startling thought -
>>> but sweetly curious for the imagination to wonder -
>> if there could be a
>>> national burial ground in the USA, Canada,
>> Australia or anyone else. Imagine
>>> - in the USA - Wallace Stevens, Dickinson, Frost,
>> Lowell, Rexroth, Duncan,
>>> Langston Hughes, etc., etc., all buried in shared
>> grounds. Talk about
>>> possibilities for creative landscaping! (And the
>> politics of getting in.
>>> One hesitates to think of National Endowment for
>> the Arts application to get
>>> your remains into a 'plot'!
>>>
>>> Just off the cuff, a single line from Beverly
>> Dahlen's recent book, A
>>> Reading 18 - 20:
>>>
>>> Mourning becomes etc.
>>>
>>> I am not sure precisely why that line rings some
>> bells, hard one. I am sure
>>> it was written during the overwhelming number of
>> deaths from AIDS as that
>>> epidemic took off in the eighties.
>>>
>>> Stephen V
>>> http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> I googled Père Lachaise Cemetery because I had
>> the idea of quoting it in a
>>>> poem, see here for God's sake who is in there
>> besides the ones that Mark
>>>> mentioned: Doré, the same Abelard, Balzac,
>>> Isadora Duncan, Max Ernst, Gérard
>>>> de Nerval, and I haven't scrolled down the page,
>> yet.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Burials_at_P%C3%A8re_Lachaise_Cemetery
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 3/30/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]>
>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> You pass Chopin, Berlioz, Yves Montand and
>> Simone Signoret on the way
>>>>> from the one to the other. Pretty neat, tho it
>> definitely could use a
>>>>> cafe. Every decent cemetery should have a cafe.
>>>>>
>>>>> Don't tell Starbucks.
>>>>>
>>>>> The tombs of the Rothchilds are in the
>> Montparnasse cemetery, near
>>>>> where I used to live. Their very plain crypts
>> are marked with a larfe
>>>>> R, reminiscent of the double R of Rolls Royce.
>>>>>
>>>>> Check outthis funereal news in the New York
>> Times:
>>>>>
>> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/30/us/30ashes.html
>>>>>
>>>>> Mark
>>>>>
>>>>> At 04:34 PM 3/30/2007, you wrote:
>>>>>> I guess I would just split myself and gather
>> around both. Never been
>>>>> there
>>>>>> even if I was twice in Paris but just for a
>> short stay.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On 3/30/07, Mark Weiss
>> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Which in French means "don't gambl;e with
>> tough guys." Always good
>>>>> advice.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Last time I was in Pere Lachaise more folks
>> were gathered arounf
>>>>>>> Apollinaire than Morrison. Something to cheer
>> about.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Mark
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> At 03:33 PM 3/30/2007, you wrote:
>>>>>>>> Sorry, I meant to add that in Paris, where
>> Jim
>>>>>>>> Morrison is buried, they have a French
>> saying that
>>>>>>>> translates roughly as "don't put the cart
>> before The
>>>>>>>> Doors."
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Candice
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>
> === message truncated ===
>
>
>
>
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