You're right there, Doug - I'm thinking of Villon & Rabelais for starters.
Not many Anglo-Saxons know him - in Germany he's known for the great novel
about growing up during the Collaboration during WW2 & its aftermath in
post-war Belgium, *The Sorrow of Belgium*, plus being married to Silvia
Kristel (Emmanuelle) - why, I even have a VHS cassette somewhere with a
whole very entertaining TV documentary about him. The German bilingual
poetry selection is much bigger than the American monolingual translation;
interestingly the poetry in the latter makes a cooler effect than the former
& there are no doubles. I couldn't translate from Dutch/Flemish without a
crib, though I had to weed out a bad German translationese distortion or
two, using an online Dutch dictionary. Here's a link to a review of a Claus
novel & that US-English edition of his poetry:
http://www.greeninteger.com/green_integer_review/issue_2/Douglas-Messerli-Rickabone.htm
I'd like to translate more of his stuff,I find it very congenial - looks
like I might have to learn Flemish properly...
mj
And the globe keeps rolling towards a pocket without a bottom although on
the way the green cloth field is smooth. - Louis MacNeice
----- Original Message -----
From: Douglas Barbour
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 4:42 PM
Subject: Re: quote
Having just looked Claus up, I have to admit I'm ashamed I dont know
of him. He might have 'replied' to Eliot, as he apparently did a lot
of 'intertextual' responding.
I did like this comment:
“Purity is the dirtiest word I know,” he is quoted as saying.
He sure wrote widely & wildly.
This one's in a great tradition....
Doug
On 27-Apr-09, at 11:31 AM, Martin Walker wrote:
> ENVOI
> My verses are still yawning a bit.
> I'll never get used to it. They've lived here
> long enough.
> Enough. I'm booting them out, I don't want to wait
> till their toes get cold.
> No more disturbance by their confused howls!
> I want to listen to the drone of the sun
> or of my heart, that perfidious sponge that hardens.
>
> My verses don't screw classically,
> they babble vulgarly or boast too grandly.
> In the winter they get cracked lips,
> in the spring they are laid up by the first touch of warmth,
> they mess up my summers
> and in autumn they smell of women.
>
> Enough. I'm going to hold my hand over their head
> for just twelve more lines on this sheet
> and then they get a kick in the arsehole.
> Go and moan somewhere else, you two-bit rhymes,
> do your trembling elsewhere for twelve readers
> and a snoring reviewer.
>
> Go now, verses, on your light feet,
> you didn't step too hard on the old earth
> where the graves laugh when they see their guests,
> one corpse piled on top of the other.
> Go now and totter towards Her
> that I don't know.
>
> trans. from the Flemish
> mjw
Douglas Barbour
[log in to unmask]
http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
Latest books:
Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy)
http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664
Wednesdays'
http://abovegroundpress.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-from-aboveground-press_10.html
There's the wind and the rain
And the mercy of the fallen
Who say they have no claim to know what's right
Dar Williams
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