Thank you
That was worth reading. Ish.
Probably better without the examples.

I think re Lizzie 1 it's worth mentioning that world views were a teensy
bit different then in all sorts of ways with people writing poetry as part
of an education, those who got one

[and in that context consider the fat of Robert Hooke who was treated with
some contempt because he was relatively lowly, unlike his clear better,
Boyle

I don't think his strong Isle of Wight accent (I assume he had one, but it
wouldn't have been remarked) would have mattered then ]

which beats the many writing poetry as part of self expression and "you
can't say my poetry's no good cos that's just your opinion and anyway I
have a democratic right to...."

just turn the sound down on that

thanks for that anyway; kind of you. I wonder if Donald Trump writes poetry

L



On 14 March 2016 at 16:43, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> On Mar 14, 2016, at 9:39, Lawrence Upton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > just the same
> >
> > I had something or other somewhere that wouldnt load
> > with a pompous note to the effect that they - whoever it was - could not
> > countenance some sites which were not suitable in a family environment
> >
> > who said anything about family environments?
> >
> > oh well, don't worry
> >
> > L
> copying now the unsuitable piece
>
> Elizabeth I
> is one dictator!
>
> Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Suleiman the Magnificent had two major
> things in common: a tendency to rule with an iron fist and a burning need
> to channel their emotions into poetry. And as it turns out, they weren't
> the only totalitarian rulers with a poetic side.
>
> Dutch writer and journalist Paul Damen gathered as many poems by
> authoritarian leaders as he could find, and he assembled them into the book
> Bloemen van het Kwaad(Flowers of Evil), which was published by Koppernik
> earlier this month.
>
> I spoke to Paul to find out why dictators tend to write poetry, how the
> book came about, and whether or not their poetry is actually any good.
>
>
>
>
> Poetry by Adolf Hitler from 'Bloemen van het Kwaad.' With all images in
> this article, the poem on the left is the original poem from the book, and
> on the right is our own rough English translation for your convenience.
>
> VICE: What do you love about dictators' poetry so much that inspired you
> to spend eight years studying it?
> Paul Damen: Well, I don't really. It's just a hobby that got out of hand.
> I knew Hitler and Mussolini had written poems, and that Nero had written a
> lot, so I thought, What about the rest of them?
>
> How did you manage to find all these poems?
> It was difficult at first, because when I started the internet wasn't as
> extensive as it is now. I remember going to the university library in
> Naples to go through the 36 enormous volumes of Mussolini's Opera Omnia. It
> all became a lot easier when the works started appearing on the internet.
>
> The whole project was a gamble, because I had no idea how many
> poet-dictators I would find. If you find five of them after a long search,
> you still have nothing—you have to have at least 20 to turn it into a book,
> I think.
>
>
>
>
> Poetry by Hirohito from Bloemen van het Kwaad.
>
> How did you translate the poems?
> I know about seven different languages, so I could handle most of the
> poems. Some chapters were difficult, such as the poetry in Arabic, but
> based on context, I managed to get relatively far.
>
> Hirohito's poems are a good example. By looking at certain key words, I
> could figure out the context. If you read "mountain," "snow," "green tree,"
> and "panoramic views," it's not difficult to tell what the poem is about.
> After that, you check character after character—because my Japanese is not
> great—for a possible translation, based on that context. The translation
> that I ended up with, I had checked by two or three people who actually do
> understand Japanese.
>
> Wouldn't it have been easier to just hire a bunch of translators?
> No, I wanted to do everything myself. And translators can screw it up,
> too: A lot of poetry translations, such as the ones I found of Mao's
> poetry, made no sense whatsoever. So I preferred to translate everything
> myself, and then have it checked afterward.
>
>
>
>
> Poetry by Osama Bin Laden from 'Bloemen van het Kwaad'
>
> Isn't it weird that these ruthless dictators have such a well developed
> sensitive side?
> Well, in most Arab countries, it's perfectly normal that dictators or
> rulers write poetry. It's part of their culture, as it is in China and
> Japan. A true warrior should know how to fightand write poetry—at least,
> that's the idea. That may seem weird from our Western perspective, but
> we're the exceptions—not the rest of the world.
>
> Kim Jong-un, Kim Jong-il, and Kim Il-sung were all tremendous assholes,
> but they're no strangers to poetry. The same is true for Osama bin Laden.
> He was simply expected to write poetry, and it was part of his education:
> rhetoric and poetry.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Poetry by Elizabeth I from 'Bloemen van het Kwaad'
>
> Why would they take time out of their busy days just to write poetry?
> Their motives vary. A number of them wanted to prove that they had other
> qualities besides being a dictator. Hitler always said about himself that
> he was a writer. Someone like Elizabeth I wrote to express her feelings.
> Suleiman the Magnificent did that, too.
>
> But there are some who wrote purely for propaganda purposes, like Mao,
> Fidel Castro, and Nicolae Ceaușescu. Or António Salazar from Portugal. He
> wrote shitty hymns to the Virgin Mary, God, and the Portuguese flag to
> propagate nationalist and Catholic values.
>
> Right.
> Mussolini is also an interesting case. He wrote poetry when he was
> younger, and as a dictator, he used his talent to spread propaganda. So,
> for example, he established a day to honor bread and wrote a poem about it,
> like: "Honor the bread, hooray for the bread, everybody's happy with
> bread," and that was printed on posters and distributed all over the
> country.
>
> Poetry by Suleiman I from 'Bloemen van het Kwaad'
>
> Is any of the poetry actually good?
> I like Suleiman's poems. You can see that Mussolini is a writer at heart,
> and, strangely enough, Karadžić, the Butcher of Bosnia, is pretty good. His
> themes are terrible—it's all about blood and people coming from the
> mountains to retaliate—but it's well crafted.
>
> Actually, when you read the poems, you should detach yourself from the
> idea that they're all bloody madmen. They're not your typical romantic
> poets; they don't wake up in the morning and suddenly decide to write about
> the beauty of life. Almost all of them have a hidden agenda or ulterior
> motives with their poetry.
>
> Are there any dictators missing in your collection?
> I would've liked to include dictators like Enver Hoxha, Franco, Pinochet,
> or Jaruzelski, but they've not written poems, unfortunately. And there are
> some poets I didn't include. If you look at my personal bullet points of
> what exactly makes a dictator, you could see the prophet Muhammed as one.
> He had his own caliphate, where his power was unlimited. And half the
> Qur'an is full of poetry. But I won't translate it—I love my life and don't
> want to deal with what could happen if I do.
>
>
>
> Poetry by Mussolini from 'Bloemen van het Kwaad'
>
> It's remarkable how many dictators are poets—could you turn it around and
> say that many poets could have been dictators?
> I don't know about that. A poet needs to be somewhat romantic and have an
> enormous power over language. A poet wants to move with language, shock
> with language, or at least exert some influence with language. Dictators
> and poets have that in common: wanting to have an influence and leave a
> mark on their audience.
>
> Below are two more poems from Bloemen van het Kwaad, the first by Mao
> Zedong and the second by Fidel Castro.