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Citanka - Poetika Lirskog Teksta2
Citanka - Poetika Lirskog Teksta2
DICKINSON, Emily
Poezija / Emili Dikinson; [preveli Jasna Levinger, Marko Veovi].- Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1988. - 337 str : 20cm .- (Biblioteka Svjetski pisci)
Rua za Emiliju / Marko Veovi: str 5-12
Emili Dikinson
Poezija
RUA ZA EMILIJU
I
Ovi prevodi nisu nastali jedino iz saradnje Jasne Levinger i Marka
Veovia. Nego - prvenstveno - iz saradnje oaja i sluaja.
Oaj u najkrae opisati jednom anegdotom iz svijeta ahista. U petom
satu igre - kad su ahisti esto iscrpljeni sasvim, prilazi Mihail Talj jednom
od kolega, pa e ga upitati:
Je li, boga ti, kako ono ide skaka? Ovo pitanje, ne zaboravite, izilo
je iz usta genija. A emu mi ostali, negenijalni, da se nadamo, kad nam
se ivljenje pretvori u taj peti sat igre? Oaj, o kojem je ovdje rije,
trenutak je kad nita ne znam, nita ne mogu, nita nisam. I ne samo to:
ini mi se tada kako je posve prirodno to ne umijem nita, ne shvatam
nita, ne sadrim nita. Biti pronicljiv, biti nadahnut, biti stvaralac, to mi,
tada, doe kao udovian izuzetak od pravila koje je kosmiko - ba onako kako Krlea veli da je glupost - svemirsko naelo. Svaka mi stvar, tada,
postaje onaj Taljev skaka pred kojim zalud kuam da se sjetim kako
ono ide. Svaka stvar stoji sama, ogrezla u vlastitom iskonskom besmislu, ne zna joj se porijeklo, ne zna joj se svrha, osim to popunjava sobom
prostor, da bi ga bilo to manje slobodnog. A to - da sam i ja, nekada,
neto pisao, da sam moe biti napisao togod od valjanja, e, to mi, tada,
izgleda potpuno nevjerovatno. Naprosto, tu sam da bi svjetska pusto
gledala na moje oi. Jedino mi tada nije jasno: jesam li oajan zato to
sam malouman, ili sam malouman zato to sam oajan, ili je to dvoje unakrst povezano? Svak je bolji od mene, a to je i previe, u ove sunane
dane, to rekao Duko Trifunovi.
U ovoj knjizi ista pjesma stoji u drugaijoj verziji: ova je tanija, ona
raspjevanija, a zasluuje da bude objavljena u obje varijante, jer da
nije stajala na Jasninom zidu - ne bi, ni ona, ni sve ostale pjesme, doivjele ponovno roenje - uz nae babienje - na jeziku o kojem nisu ni
sanjale. I tako, posao je krenuo. Nisam, vjerovatno, ni u ta u svojem
vijeku uloio toliko tvrdoglavosti, nesna, ushita, razoarenja, to dakako jo uvijek ne kazuje nita o valjanosti .ovih prevoda - to rekao onaj
Englez: uivanje u nekom poslu obmanjuje u pogledu stvarne vrijednosti
toga posla. Ali, oito, tim vikom ulaganja, iskupljivao sam se za neznanje
engleskog, a zanosom sam htio zagluiti glas zdravog razuma koji mi je
doaptavao: jesi strunjak za sulude pothvate, ali je ovo suludije od svega to ti je dosle naumpalo! Zapravo, kao da sam se odluio igrati partiju
aha bez gledanja u ahovsku plou. Ono, istina, i to se moe, ima takvih
suludnika, ali to zbilja prevazilazi moje snage. Naravno, stvar se mogla
gledati i drugaije: Jasna zna ta je engleski, ja znam ta je poezija, kad se
to dvoje znanja udrue - ispae neto ega se neemo ni jedno stidjeti.
Jeste, ali je Jasna odlazila, a mene ostavljala samog, samog sa engleskim
jezikom, ija te svaka rije gleda s visoka, a Jasna nije mogla sjedeti tu,
kraj mene, dok prevodim, da bi mi odgovorila na onih dvadesetak pitanja koja su iskrsavala - bar ispoetka je bivalo tako - povodom svake
zasebne pjesme. Nego, i to pregrmjesmo!
A sad - vratimo se u vajcarsku:
Nai su ivoti - vajcarska Tako tihi - tako hladni
nice.
Svojom osnovnom tehnikom pjesma me neodoljivo podsjea na Dona. I
njegove naoko okaste, katkad i bizarne poredbe djeluju kao dosjetka,
koja se meutim paljivom razradom u pjesmi pokazuje duboko pogoena. Jeste, na- svakom koraku kod Dikinsonove zatiemo poneto od onoga ukusa svojstvenog metafizikim pjesnicima engleskim iz sedamnaestog stoljea, za koje je reeno da im je zajednika odlika razvijanje
iskustva unutar jedne odabrane figure koja tom iskustvu namee osebujnu logiku ralanjivanja, pa i posebnu vrstu znaenja, koje emo u
njemu otkriti. Ono to je isprva djelovalo kao iskoena pa moda i luckasta duhovitost, u pjesmi pokazuje punu opravdanost:
(str.15.) prisiljeni smo priznati da onaj ko vidi drugaije u stvari vidi vie
od nas.
Javor ima areniji al A polje haljine skerletne Da iza mode ne zaostanem
Nakit u da metnem Posljednji stih otkriva nam da pjesnikinja al i haljine uzima ozbiljno, ne kao neobavezne metafore, nego kao temelj za dalju gradnju
pjesniku. Taj nagli prelaz iz jedne ravni u drugu, taj preskok iz svijeta
prirode u svijet mode, djeluje i humorno i lirino - jednaei se preko
nakita sa hodom vremena u prirodi pjesnikinja nam nagovjetava razne
stvari o ta dva razdaleka svijeta - sjetimo se samo Bodlerove tvrdnje da
je moda ponitavanje prirode, prezir prema prirodi. Kod Emili Dikinson
oito, ljudska moda je dio prirodnih zbivanja, a na drugoj strani - smjenjivanje godinjih doba vieno kao smjenjivanje modnih krikova
nagovjetava koliko ona osjea prisustvo boanske pozadine svijeta kao
nepromjenljive iza svih igara oblika i boja na povrini, to joj ne smeta
da enski uiva u tim igrama, iako privremenim. Dikinsonova je nosila u
sebi vizionara koji neumorno vadi iz sebe nadahnutiju za nadahnutijom
slikom besmrtnosti, beskraja, Boga, ali i enu ije je oko osjetljivo za najmanji nov preliv boje u pejsau. Drala je na oku istovremeno ovostrano
i onostrano, vjeno i trenutano, a vanredne poetske efekte postizala iz
njihovog sudaranja, mijeanja, preplitanja - kao da je itavog ivota tra-
je izvor neprestanih emotivnih i isto pjesnikih zbivanja - jer je zahtijevao da se pjesniki duh uvijek isponova prema njemu odreuje, to
je porodilo dramatiku i raznovrsnost duevnih i imaginativnih zaokreta
u ovoj poeziji bez kojih ne bi ni bilo tolikog bogastva ovog djela a kojih
ne bi bilo da za Dikinsonovu vjera kao sumnja ne bjee polazna pretpostavka za bogotraiteljstvo. To traganje odvija se u slikama toliko neposrednim i zemaljskim da moramo povjerovati pjesnikinji kad u jednoj
pjesmi proglasi Boga za naeg starog susjeda. I pristao bih da zajedno
sa pjesnikinjom cijelog vijeka traim tog Boga ako bi se to traganje odvijalo u ovakvim prostorima:
beskraj kao slika koja opipljivo daje svu dubinu beznaa, svu veliinu
gubitka. Ve je primjeeno da prostota i sigurnost poteza s kojima ova
pjesnikinja izraava krajnje stepene ushita ili beznaa - predstavljaju
vjeitu vrijednost njene poezije. Tu kao da se i oaj i zanos izraavaju
inom njihovog suzbijanja, susprezanja, pokuajem da se svedu na najmanju mjeru - puritanska strogost duha ove pjesnikinje posee za slikama koje osjeaj treba da umjere a u stvari ga snanije fokusiraju. Sitnica
u poeziji Emili Dikinson posjeduje ogromnu izraznu snagu. Pa i pjesma
kojom smo poeli ovu analizu - i kojoj emo
se vratiti na kraju - zapravo je sainjena na sitnici, na niemu, kao i stotine pjesama Emili Dikinson. I ovdje se ispoljila sposobnost pjesnikinje
da se toliko usredsredi na jednu slutnju, jedan unutarnji drhtaj, jedno
prozrenje o ivotu, i da po njemu rije sve dok ga ne napravi velikim a
da pri tom nije izmijenila njegovu prvobitnu prirodu, nita nije naduvala
ni preuveliala, niti rekla ita to ne bi bilo po mjeri njene sopstvene
mudrosti - iscrpljen je jedan duhovni bljesak do kraja, i pjesma je gotova. Strogost sa kojom razvija svoju temu, strelovitost sa kojom pjesma
stremi poenti, (str.18.) misao koja preskae sve osim najnunijega, te
stoga njeno kretanje lii na kretanje ive misli u glavi, a ne na kretanje
pisane misli sve to svaku njenu iole valjanu pjesmu, ma koliko bila
kratka, pretvara u vrst, u sebe zatvoren svijet, opremljen svim najnunijim za zasebno postojanje. U pjesmi o vajcarskoj to se lako uoava. U
prvoj strofi imamo vajcarsku a u drugoj, kao opreku - Italiju. Alen Tejt
ovu poeziju i razmatra kao bogat rudnik primjera za ono to on naziva
tenzijom u poeziji - svojstvom bez kojega, po njemu, nema velikog
pjesnika - a rije je o naponu koji nastaje iz ukrtanja i sudaranja protivstavljenih jezikih registara, osjeanja, slutnji, svjetova. Italija je neka
vrsta protivvajcarske , ali i neto vie. Naime, junjaka, raspojasana,
spontana, buna, vatrena Italija tu se suprotstavlja studeni i tiini i redu
i jalovosti na vajcarski nain, ali njeno znaenje tu ne staje: Italija je
i pjesniki znak za onostrano. Za svijet tajnog, neispitanog, a koje se ini
na dohvatu ruke da je, i vjeno mami preko granice. I kad pjeva tek o dva
naina ivota, ona zapravo govori istodobno o svjetovima s ovu i s onu
stranu. Prei u Italiju ne znai samo odbacivanje studeni i tiine zarad
nesputanog i ljudski toplog ivljenja, nego i iskuavanje tajni koje stoje
onkraj - u svijetu koji je nastavak ovoga, kako na jednom mjestu ree
BILJEKA O PJESNIKU
Emilija Dikinson roena je 10 decembra 1830. godine u Masausetsu, u
gradiu Amherst, gdje je provela cijeli svoj ivot, ako se izuzmu jedna godina kad je dovrila kolovanje u enskom seminaru u Maunt Holiouku,
i otprilike desetak putovanja - dva u Boston, jedno u Filadelfiju, jedno u
Vaington, a ostala u gradove blizu Amhersta. Umrla je 15 maja 1886.
godine u kui gdje se rodila, nakon ivota posve lienog vanjskih dogaaja. ini se da je ostvarila ideal za kojim je jednom uzdahnuo Fokner: Biti
pisac za koga se mogu kazati tek tri reenice: Rodio se, napisao djelo, i
umro. Ker uvenog pravnika, Edvarda Dikinsona, koji je bio jedan od
stubova mjesnog puritanstva, u ijoj kui se ivjelo i odgajala se djeca
u znaku strogih vjerskih i drutvenih tradicija Nove Engleske. Bio je to
ovjek koji je svojoj eni pred vjenanje napisao: Spremimo se za ivot racionalne sree. Ne oekujem, niti hou egzistenciju u zadovoljstvu. U jednom pismu, Emilija kae da je njen otac jednom za svagda odluio da ne postoji nita osim stvarnog ivota, a njen brat Ostin
opisuje ga kao krutog i dosadnog poput pogrebne povorke. Ipak je
pjesnikinja bila dublje vezana za oca, i njen ambivalentan odnos prema
njemu kao da preslikava njen dvosmislen odnos prema novoengleskom
puritanskom duhu. Iako joj poezija posjeduje instinktivnu nezavisnost
koja ili odbacuje, ili prevazilazi, ili transcendira sve to joj je puritanski
duh mogao pruiti, nema sumnje da u temelju njenog naina miljenja
i odnosa prema svijetu ima neeg dublje puritanskog. Recimo: iako je
imala silno utananu sposobnost za samoposmatralako ralanjivanje
i najneuhvatljivijih preliva nutarnjih zbivanja, to nije umanjilo njenu osjetljivost za najsitnija zbivanja u vanjskom svijetu. Po ovom uspjenom
ratovanju na dva razlina pa i oprena fronta, Emilija Dikinson je korijenski puritanac za kojeg bog se jednako snano objavljuje u svakom, pa
i neznatnom dogaaju u dui, tako i u svakom, pa i najsitnijem zbivanju
napolju, u istoriji ili prirodi (Sonja Bai).
Iz oeve kue, u koju se povukla oko 1855. godine, (str.312.) gotovo
uopte nije izlazila do smrti. O razlozima za ovo povlaenje iz svijeta
mnogo se nagaalo u pravoj poplavi njenih biografija, a navodilo se
najee, kao glavni uzrok dobrovoljnom zatoenitvu, njena nesrena
ljubav prema pastoru prezbiterijanske crkve u Filadelfiji, arlsu Vadsvortu. No ini se da je plodnije stvar posmatrati ne kauzalno nego finalno:
onih 1755 pjesama, naenih u njenim ladicama iza njene smrti, bacaju
mnogo vie svjetla na njeno pustinjatvo negoli ne znam kakva pria o
ljubavnom slomu. Jer Dikinsonova je totalni pjesnik koji se kladio samo
na jednu kartu, i uspio da sebe itavog prespe u stihove koji su mono
svjedoanstvo da je rije o jednom od najpotpunijih i najbogatijih ivota
ikad proivljenih na amerikom kontinentu, kako ree Tejt, a mi bismo
ova poezija, ukazuju na srodnost E. Dikinson sa metafizikim pjesnicima engleskim 17 vijeka, nego i zbog toga to postoje u ovom pjesnitvu
izvjesne figure, koje se ponavljaju u razlinim kontekstima, koje se iskoritavaju na razline naine, objedinjujui pjesme, pisane u raznim vremenima, i na razne teme, u krugove cjelovitog smisla. Naime, poreenje
ljudskih ivota i Svajcarske dobija jo jedan sprat smisla ako te ivote
proitamo i kao vajcarske, poto prirodna asocijacija na vajcarske
asovnike pretvara te ivote u mehanike sprave ije je kucanje tako tiho
- tako hladno. To jest, ova dva pridjeva dobijaju posve drukije znaenje
ako ih veemo za Svajcarsku (sanatorijumska tiina i alpska hladnoa) a
posve drukije ako ih shvatimo kao opis kucanja tih ivota-satova (jedvaujan puls, i njegova mehanika ravnodunost!), a da i ne govorimo
o uzbudljivoj poetskoj aroliji, kakve nisu rijetke u ovoj poeziji - koja je
uinila da se snjena tiina jednog geografskog predjela najednom prividi itaocu i kao asovniarska radnja! Poreenje ivota sa asovnikom
uklapa ovu pjesmu u krugpjesama gdje se ova ideja izriitije i opipiljivije
razrauje, kao na primjer, u stihovima iz pjesme 1703:
Utjeno bjee u Sobi Mrenja
Njenoga - uti zvuk ivog sata
A u pjesmi 287 (vidi biljeku) poreenje ivot-asovnik razraeno je u
etiri strofe na nain koji tu pjesmu ini jednim od vrhova poezije E. Dikinson.
NAPOMENE
Pjesma 80. (str.316-317) Poezija E. Dikinson istinski je neprevodiva, mislim, naravno, na ono najsrnije u njoj. Da to otkrijemo, trebalo je, prije
toga, da prevedemo preko 5000 njenih stihova! Ova pjesma je detaljno
razmotrena u predgovoru (pisanom 1986. nakon to smo preveli 220
njenih pjesama)
ali kako smo dublje ulazili u ovo pjesnitvo, i potanje se upoznavali sa bitnim svojstvima pjesnikog postupka E. Dikinson, tako nam se, postepeno, otkrivalo da se ak ni, naizgled, jednostavne pjesme, kakva je i ova,
ne daju bez velike muke prevesti. Stoga smo bili prinueni, nakon to
smo preveli oko 470 njenih pjesama, da iznova doraujemo gotovo sve
pjesme koje su bile objavljene u Treem programu Radio Sarajeva, jer
su nam se, sada, otkrile mnoge greke koje smo tamo poinili, kao i
mogunost da neke stvari bolje prevedemo. Tako je bilo i sa pjesmom
80:-shvatili smo da dvosmislicu iz njenog prvog stiha moramo nekako
prevesti, poto nam se uinila sutinskom. Naime, stih Our lives are Swiss
moe se prevesti kao Nai su ivoti vajcarska ali i kao Nai su ivoti
vajcarski. Prvobitni prevod: Nai su ivoti vajcarska preinaili smo u
Naa su ia vajcarska , pa se sad, i u naem prepjevu, geografski pojam moe shvatiti i kao imenica, i kao pridjev (koje pjesnikinja, uostalom
esto pie velikim slovom). Istina, imenica ice svojom poetinou,
i arhainou, ovdje jamano nije na mjestu: to smo dobili na mostu,
izgubili smo na upriji, a to nam se ne jednom dogaalo kod prevoenja
ove poezije. Ipak, dobijeno je, ini se, dragocjenije od izgubljenog, jer je
od bitne vanosti bilo zadrati dvosmislenost tog iskaza u izvorniku. Ne
samo zbog toga to raznovrsni tipovi dvosmislenosti , kojima obiluje
upleten erotski motiv s kojim se ideja smrti predstavljala kod najromantinijih pjesnika, jer ljubav je simbol uzajamno zamjenjiv sa smru. Uas
smrti objektiviziran je kroz ovu figuru njenoga koijaa koji je natjeran
da ironino slui Besmrtnosti. Ovo je srce pjesme, ona je prikazala tipinu hriansku temu u njenoj krajnjoj nerazrjeivosti, a da nije dala svoj
konaan sud o tome. Nema rjeenja za ovaj problem. Postoji samo njegovo predstavljanje u punom kontekstu intelekta i osjeanja. Ne kae nam
se ta da mislimo. Kae nam se da sami pogledamo. Tako Tejt. Pokaimo,
na jednom primjeru, koliko je fina tekstura ove pjesme. Pjesnikinja
kae da je ostavila / i poslenost i ljenost svoju (My labor and my leisure) zbog udvornosti koju je smrt pokazala prema njoj. U prevodu koji,smo objavili u Treem Programu Radio Sarajeva, stoji doslovno: svoj
rad i svoju dokolicu - smatrali smo da se aliteracija ne moe prenijeti u
na jezik. U naknadnom doraivanju prevoda, odluili smo da rimujemo
rad i nerad, jer je zvuk stiha u izvorniku itekako smislodavan. Rije je o
smrti kao izjednaiteljki (mors nivelatrix) pred kojom i ljudski in, i njegovo odsustvo, bivaju isto.
Anderson kae da smrt, kao ljubazan udvara, stoji umjesto tradicionalnog anela koji dolazi po due, to je nain da se naglasi saosjeajna
misija smrti u izbavljenju pjesnikinje iz patnji ovoga svijeta. A Zvonko
Radeljkovi kae da je Besmrtnost, koja se vozi u koijama zajedno sa
Smru i pjenikinjom, neka vrsta garde-dame, stvar koja se ini veoma
pogoenom ve i stoga to je E. Dikinson, u mladosti, isprva bila poela voditi normalan ivot amherstske djevojke koja se izvozi, koijama, u
etnju, sa udvaraima, i u pratnji osobe iz porodice, ili prijateljice, koja
nadgleda to udvaranje. Tako da najmetafizinija pjesma E. Dikinson
poinje slikom pozajmljenom iz banalne, provincijalne stvarnosti. Smrt
je pristala da se ponaa u skladu sa kodeksom koji nalae puritanski moral gradia zabitnog, kako za Amherst pjesnikinja ree u drugoj pjesmi. italac se na poetku obreo u svagdanjici, a na kraju je ostavljen
da, zajedno sa konjima, gleda u vjenost. To je raspon koji objelodanjuje
neto bitno u umjetnikoj strategiji ne samo ove nego i mnogih drugih
velikih pjesama E,Dikinson. Rije je o pjesnikom postupku zasnovanom
na probijanju uma vani - na prodoru kroz obino, svagdanje, pa i provinicijalno, do najirih obzorja Sudbine, Vjenosti, posljednjih pitanja
ljudskog opstanka. ta je Tejt podrazumijevao pod slivanjem heterog-
enog niza slika u jedinstven percepcijski red objanjava potanje Anderson. Djeca koja se igraju na odmoru, ito koje pilji i sunce to zalazi,
iako su raznorodne slike, oivljavaju sobom cjelinu smrtnikog iskustva:
mladost, zrelost i starost, kao i vremenski ciklus od jutra do veeri. ak
nagovjetavaju napredovanje godinjih doba od prolea, kroz zrenje, do
opadanja. Isto tako, rad i nerad u prirodi dati su stavljanjem vesele aktivnosti djece napram pasivne zagledanosti ita i optike iluzije zalaska 14
slici sunca koje se zaustavilo (Setting Sun). Tako je itav raspon iskustva,
ovjek naspram prirode, i iva naspram neive prirode, uhvaen u ovim
disparatnim slikama koje se meutim slivaju i na planu sintakse, jer,
uporno ponavljani obrazac proosmo, to prolaenje koje traje pred
nama, ta prolaznost vidljivo i ujno pokazana, sve to pojaava jedinstvo
tog slijeda slika koji podsjea na film ivota to se, jo jedared, odmotava
pred nama: sebidovoljna mladost koja se ne obazire na mrtvaku koiju,
plodovita zrelost koja je zapiljena u zagonetku smrti, i napokon zalaenje
ivota.
Pjesma 861. (str.329-330)Iako je i ovo neprevodiva pjesma, smatrali smo
da je bolji ikakav nego nikakav prevod, jer se radi o vanoj i uvenoj pjesmi E. Dikinson. Ali, kako da se prevede stih:
Loose the Flood - you sh al find it patent?
Jer rije Flood zapravo znai Blood, tako da slika jednovremeno
daje i jedno elementarno zbivanje, i sliku iz laboratorije istraivake: i
naviranje talasa poplave, i ikljanje krvi kad skalpel zasijee meso. A ono
it je takoe dvosmisleno: odnosi se u prvom redu na Flood. Ali ovo je
pjesma i o traenju sutine muzike. Naunik, koji pokuava da seciranjem
eve otkrije odakle potie njena muzika, putanjem poplave-krvi, zapravo otkriva i oiglednu muziku. Osim toga, razlika u duini meu
naim i engleskim rijeima ponekad zaista baca u oaj prevodioca. Recimo, stih: To foe of His -Im deadly foe, ima 8 slogova, a kad se prevede
na na jezik dobija se 16! (Njegovom neprijatelju - ja sam smrtni neprijatelj. Nevolje su tim vee to epigramski koncizan stil E. Dikinson - kako
ree S.T. Vilijams - nalaze traenje najkraih rijei u engleskom jeziku, to
jest upotrebu jednoslonih i dvoslonih rei, i to najee onih koje
se uju po domovima Nove Engleske, iji je nerazdvojan deo bila ona
sama; takve su rei metla (broom) i kapa (bonnet), trag od tokova na
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/emily-dickinson
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/162174/Emily-Dickinson
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/emilydic.htm
ITAOCU
Glupost, zabluda, grijeh i tvrdiluk su nama
Duhove zaposjeli i mue naa tijela,
Grizodujima milim priskrbljujemo jela,
Ba kao to prosjaci tove vlastitu gamad.
Tvrdoglavi nam grijesi, a kajanja nam mlaka;
Svako priznanje nae eka debela plata,
I radosno se opet vraamo na put blatan,
Ko da je podlom suzom saprana mrlja svaka.
Na jastuku zla dugo sve nas uljuljkivae
Satana Trismegistos, koji nam duh zaara,
I u rukama ovog mudrog alhemiara
Ispari dragocjena kovina volje nae.
avo u ruci dri konce koji nas miu!
U stvarima odvratnim mi draest nalazimo,
I za po jedan korak svakog dana silazimo
Ka Paklu, bez uasa, kroz punu smrada tmicu.
Ko to ljubi i grize razvratnik bez krajcare
Kakvoj bludnici staroj grud silno izmuenu,
Krademo, u prolasku, nasladu zabranjenu,
Cijedei je snano, poput narande stare.
KOVA, Nikola
Upitna misao / Nikola Kova. - Beograd : Prosveta, 1980. - 317 str. ; 22 cm.
Nikola Kova
(str.161)
I
Svako razmiljanje o poeziji arla Bodlera (Charles Baudelaire) vezuje
se za nasljee romantizma, tu veliku duhovnu prekretnicu kojom, u
evropskoj istoriji, zapoinje novo doba na ruevinama starog svijeta
nad kojima jo lebdi duh Francuske revolucije. Generacija francuskih
romantiara, od kojih mnogi jo nisu bili ni stupili na knjievnu scenu
kad su veliki pjesnici njemakog i engleskog romantizma zavrili svoj
ivotni vijek, dala je ovom pjesnikom buntu znaaj i razmjere epohalnog prevrata otvarajui perspektivu miljenja i djelovanja na novim
estetskim i idejnim osnovama: na udaru nove osjeajnosti nale su
se tekovine racionalizma i ideali prosvjetiteljstva. Svoje osloboditeljske vizije i kult individualizma romantiari su prije svega artikulisali u
domenu pjesnikog govora ne prezajui pri tom od stvaranja mita o
sudbini pjesnika, zanesenjaka i proroka. Romantizam je, nesmnjivo
obogatio tokove pjesnikog saznanja i otkrio nesluene prostore imaginarnih ponora.
Glorifikujui linost i ulogu pojedinca u istorijskim zbivanjima, romantizam je formulisao pretpostavke novog senzibiliteta i novog doivljaja
svijeta. Pobuna i akcija, kao i zahtjev da se svijet i istorija predstave kao
integralni dio ovjekovog emancipatorskog elana, dobili su u romantizmu snagu i znaaj regulativnih naela i miljenja i pjevanja i ponaanja. Od biblijskih legendi do (str.162.)savremene istorije, od intimne
ispovijesti i do satirikog i moralistikog pamfleta, od lepravih kliktaja
radostima ivota do metafizike zbunjenosti pred neizmjemou svijeta
- svuda je pjesnik elio da istakne primamost subjektivnog doivljaja i
nesputanu slobodu svoje inspiiisane avanture. No, uza sve to, imajui u
vidu razliite individualnosti pjesnika i neujednaenost njihovih ostvarenja, romantizam nije uvijek uspijevao da u pjesnikom jeziku oblikuje
skromna renta, koju e, uza sav prezir prema porodici zbog ove okrutne
i poniavajue mjere, primati itavog ivota kao jedini stalni izvor
prihoda. Odbaen i ponien, Bodler je prihvatio svoju ivotnu sudbinu
kao prokletstvo i nezasluenu kaznu. To ivotno opredjeljenje pratila su
bezbrojna i tragina iskuenja, od materijalne oskudice i sudske osude
prvog izdanja njegovih pjesama, preko neizljeive bolesti i potucanja po
Belgiji punih razoarenja, do konane smrti u stanju potpune oduzetosti
i afazije.
izraz jednog dubljeg ivotnog i misaonog opredjeljenja u kome dominira svijest o uzaludnom pokuaju promjene svijeta i .razumnog djelovanja na tokove njegova razvitka. U svijetu besmisla, ludosti i okrutnosti
Bodler nalazi jedino razumno utoite u lucidnom sagledanju sveopte ljudske komedije i razotkrivanju njenih paradoksalnih obrta. Ta
lucidna svijest u Bodlerovom djelu razlae se kao bipolarna konstanta
(pjesnikovo prokletstvo i spoznaja boanske vokacije, bjekstvo u sfere
pjesnikog ideala i vezanost za realnost u njenom najodvratnijem ispoljavanju, ekstaza ivota i uas ivota), Obiljeavajui njegov pjesniki
lik kao simbol nespojivih krajnosti i tragine rastrzanosti izmeu ideala
i zbilje.
(str.167.) Jo snaniji izrazi okantniji kontrast izmedu istinskih ivotnih vrijednosti i bezrazlonog ali nunog propadanja materijalnog i organskog svijeta Bodler je ostvario u uvenim stihovima pjesme Strviina.
Ova poema (koja je protiv sebe izazvala bijes Brintjerovog dogmatizma)
jo upeatljivije dovodi u opreku najelementarnije oblike propadanja i
neunitivost ovjekovog doivljaja i iskustva oblikovanog sredstvima
umjetnikog govora. I dok se, na primjer, u pjesmi Harmonija veeri
pjesnik uzdie nad strahom i zebnjom od svakidanjeg , prolaznog i
smrtnog, u trenutku kad uspomena na voljenu enu trijumfuje nad
nitavilom, ovdje je protest saet u krik prezrenja, i u vapaj za spasenjem, vapaj ovjeka koji je sauvao oblik i sutinu boansku svog
neotuivog iskustva, svoje suverene pjesnike rijei. N ajzad, to je
poklik trijumfa bodlerovskog Sizifa nad neizmjernou vlastitog ponora
i gadostima umiranja: i kao to poezija poinje Orfejevinm silaskom u
Pakao (Blano), to jest grijehom i izazovom, tako se i pjesnik iskupljuje kad svoje ponorne predstave stavi u slubu istraivanja novih
mogunosti poetskog izraza. Sri-vina, kao i Balkon, upravo su izraz
tog u pjesnikog iskupljenja: prolaznom i smrtnom pjesnik daje oblije besmrtnog i trajnog; subjektivna osjecanja nadivljuju i trenutak
i objekat koji ih je pobudio: zahvaljujui sjeanju ljubav ne iezava;
ona u pjesnikoj svijesti traje kao drugi svijetkao pjesnika fikcija iz
koje iskrsavaju fantomr izgubljenog vremena. Pred realnou svijeta i neminovu njegove mehanike Bodler se prkosno suprostavlja
tronom i efemernom veliajui ideal spiritualizacije realnih predstava i
njihovog (str.168.) umjetnikog fiksiranja u trajnim oblicima ljepote. Pri
tome, svijest 0 divergenciji zbilje i ideala ostaje trajno obiljeje pjesnikove inspiracije. Ta dualistika rastrzanost i svijest o polarizaciji ideala
i fakticiteta, trajnih vrijednosti i neizbjenog besmisla ispoljava se kod
Bodlera kao opreka Splina i Ideala, boanskog i demonskog, tjelesnog i
duhovnog. Dinamiku tih suprotnosti saima u sebi i metaforiki naslov
Cvijee zla. U tom jezikom spregu dovedeni su u meusobni odnos
elementi dvaju suprotnih misaonih impulsa i dvaju podruja pjesnike
vizije: tenju ka istoti i ljepoti simbolizuje cvijee izraslo po poljima
zla, cvijee koje, kao znamenje ovjekovoga trijumfa nad nitavilom,
preobraava pejzae ovjekova prokletstva i uzludnog traenja sree u
vjenom izgnanstvu.
U toj sprezi suprotnih zahtjeva vlastitog bia ne postavlja se pitanje
izvora: pjesnik nastoji da na planu izraza maksimalno iscrpe imaginarno
bogatstvo tih suprotnosti i da im da punou i intenzitet autentine ljudske drame. Predstava ponora i neizmjerne disproporcije izmedu bia i
ideala samo su rezultat saznanja o nemogunosti ina; Sartr s pravom
kae da je bol samo afektivni aspekt lucidnosti, to u potpunosti odgovara Bodlerovom shvatanju sukoba izmedu idealnog i realnog, imaginarnog i racionalnog. Bodler je tu statinu opreku pretvorio u dinamiku
pjesnikog oblikovanja.
Bodlerova tenja ka nedokuivom, proizala iz elje da svijet sagleda
kao ukupnost najrazliitijih fenomenalnih odlika i oznaka, projicirana
je u sferu (str. 169.) pjesnikovog doivljaja ljepote, prirode i ljubavi.
Ljepota je ne samo domen pjesnikovih snova i konstantnog iskuenja,
nego prije svega, sutinsko razvoe svake poetike i svakog opredjeljenja. Velianje ljepote za Bodlera predstavlja jedan od puteva pjesnikog
bjekstva: za njega, ljepota otvara prostore beskraja i slobode, prekorauje granice vremena i patnje i u svom satanskom elanu spaja
najvie naslade sa uasima neizmjernih ponora. Bodler ne zaboravlja
ni romantiarski mit Prometej ske pobune i demonske fascinacije koju
pobunjeni odmetnici prenose na! pjesnike i sanjare. Krlea kae da je
Bodler, u stilu svoga vremena, pojam Ljepote izdvojio od stvarnosti, uzvisivi ga do Svetinje, kojoj sluiti znai klanjati se metafizikom
fantomu. Ali, bez obzira na njeno porijeklo, boansko ili demonsko.
tajna oblikovanja ljepote, i uivanje u mnotvu njenih medusobno pro-
zamijenio tunim snimcima trauma urbanog ovjeka na margini drutva, nemonog pobunjenika preputenog samoi i bolu. Verlen kae da
jedan aspekt Bodlerove originalnosti lei i u nainu predstavljanja
modernog ovjeka izloenog zamkama i rafiniranostima jedne pretjerane civilizacije, modernog ovjeka sa svojim izotrenim i prenapregnutim ulima, svojim bolno suptilnim duhom, s mozgom zasienim
duvanom i s krvlju spaljenom alkoholom, jednom rijeju - neurotika par
exellence. Prizori oajne samoe i groteksne scene gojinske inspiracije (Male starice, Slijepci, kao i pjesma u prozi Udovice) samo su jedan
dio pjesnikog mozaika o velegradskom bolu, besmislu i prijeteem
demonu zla. U toj paskalovskoj projekciji ovjeka osudenog na samou
i vjeno traenje nedokuive harmonije, Bodler je otkrio nova podruja
misaonosti i nove obrasce pjesnikog govora: daleko od deskriptivne
evokacije ili inspirisanog zanosa romantiara. Bodler je svoj cinini
ton, svoje gorke paradokse i svoj kapriciozni dendizam pour pater
le beourgeis spojio u jedinstven spreg vatrenog idealizma i izazovne
senzualnosti kulta bola i tenje ka njegovom prevazilaenju u umjetnosti i ljubavi prema lijepom. U tom spoju senzualnog i spiritualnog,
grozniavog i (str.173) trezvenog, strasnog i misaonog Bodler je traio
mogue oblike trajne harmonije izmedu ovjekovih duhovnih tenji
i njegoveivotne situacije, izmedu idealnog i realnog. Za Bodlera je
moderni grad sa uurbanim ivotom izgradnje, ruenja, mehanizacije i
rastue bijede predstavljao sliku iz predvorja pakla, sliku svijeta lienog
nade. U licima njegovih nesrenih itelja, usamljenih, prognanih,
bespomonih, baroknih brodolomnika ivota, Bodler je prepoznao i
sudbinu modernog pjesnika, izgubljenog u drutvu koje ga odbacuje.
Nije udo to je Bodler svoje pjesme Sedam staraca i Male starice (a
neto kasnije i poemu Labud iz istog ciklusa) posvetio upravo Viktoru
Igou, zatoeniku sa ostrva Gemsi.
Razoaran i osuen na samou, pjesnik ni u ljubavi ne nalazi utjehu ni
obeani spokoj zadovoljenih tenji i harmoninog spoja elje i objekta.
Cinina i izazovna, raspusna i pohlepna, samozodovoljna i lascivna,
iskljuiva i nezajaljiva, Bodlerova ljubav je predstavljena ili kao kazna i
stalni izvor zla Blagoslov (Bndiction), ili kao afektivni elan koji ulne
senzacije pretvara u imaginarne simbole i iste poetske slike ( Egzotini
miris i Kosa), ili kao ponor iz koga jo izbijaju sjeanja na dane sree i
govora kao jedino svjedoanstvo o autentinosti vlastitog bia ispunjenog sukobima i nemirima.
Od dendizma do ponora rijei Bodler se kretao putevima bjekstva i
traenja spasa, svjestan neminovnosti pjesnike sudbine i uzaludnog
otpora vremenu, bolu i smrti. Realnost i pjesniko iskustvo otvaraju
ponore imaginarnih uzleta, pri emu se ideja o apsolutnom i svijest o
neminovnosti pada spajaju u jedinstven koncept ivljenja i pjevanja. Raspon izmedu pjesnikove vizije autentinog doivljaja i trivijalnog nalija
realnosti, ijoj se mehanici ne moemo oduprijeti, dobio je razmjere
pjesnike utopije, koju Bodler razvija sa strau apsolutnog angamana,
pjesnikog i ljudskog. Najelementarnji izraz tog angamana je protest: svoj protest melanholinog i iznevjerenog sanjara Bodler izraava
tonom razoaranog pobunjenika protiv svijeta gdje in brat snu nije.
Vinjijevom dostojanstvenom stoicizmu Bodler suprostavlja anatemu
boanstva koje uiva pred prizorom ljudske patnje:
II
Tematskoj koheretnosti Bodlerova djela i autentinosti duhovnih dilema
koje ono uobliava odgovara i specifina struktura njegovog pjesnikog
izraza. Ponor pjesnike misli i silazak u najtamnija podruja ljudskog
bia omoguen je upravo stvaranjem novih izraajnih oblika i traenjem novih obrazaca pjesnike (str.178) imaginacije. Znaaj Bodlerovog
poduhvata ogleda se ne toliko u formalnim razlikama koje se mogu
uoiti izmedu njegove poezije i poezije romantizma koliko u nainu
radikalizacije onih pjesnikih zahtjeva koje su romantiari ve afirmisali.
Ideja o podudarnosti i suglasjima, koju Bodler preuzima od Svedenborga (iako moemo nai njene tragove i u Bilbiji i mnogim srednjevjekovim vjerskim uenjima o kozmikom skladu i simetriji nebeskog i Zemaljskog), pored svojih estetskih obiljeja nudi i odreene egzistencijalne
i moralne implikacije bliske Bodlerovom globalnom konceptu svijeta i
ovjekovog poloaja u njemu. Kao pjesnik ljudske prirode zatoene u
nesavrenstvo, Bodler ideju suglasja - kao pjesniki ideal- suprotstavlja
viziji nedovoljnosti i manjkavosti svijeta kao i ugroenosti i neizvjesnosti
ovjekova mjesta u tom svijetu. Ali, iz tog radikalnog nezadovoljstva
realnou, ljudskom i svemirskom, koje Sartr naziva okamenjeno nezadovoljstvo iobjektivna transcendencija , Bodler nastoji da, prije
svega, u svom njegovanju kulta ljepote, u svojoj aspiraciji ka
beskonanom, ponovo pree put stvaranja koje se, u svom prvom inu,
pokazalo kao nepotpuno i nesavreno. To nezadovoljstvo svakim pojedinanim fenomenom realnosti biva podsticaj neiscrpnoj (str.181)
ambiciji poezije da potvrdi superiornost ljudskog duha nad stvarnou i
uslovnostima ovjekove ivotne situacije. Tako jedna afektivna frustrira-
nost dobija opseg univerzalne drame stvaranja u kojoj subjekat postavlja zahtjev za ljudskom rehabilitacijom svog iskonskog prava na izraz.
Na planu pjesnikog jezika, saglasja predstavljaju prije svega stvaralaki prodor u nov izraz, to jest napor da se svijet realnih datosti
preobrazi u svijet simbolikih formula. I kao to Kolrid u svojoj teoriji
imaginacije istie zahtjev za prevoenjem svijeta trans-relanih vizija u
domen realnosti, Bodler tei da posredstvom drukije i preciznije upotrebe jezika dokui tajanstvene analogije izmedu razliitih perceptivnih
utisaka: Ima u rijeima, u verbwn-u, neega svetog to nam ne dozvoljava da ih prepustimo igri sluaja. Vjeto vladati jednim jezikom znai
praktikovati neku vrstu evokativne arolije. Tada i boje govore, kao
dubok i zvonak glas; (. . .) miris budi odgovarajue misli i uspomene (Iz
lanka o Teofilu Gotjeu).
Pjesnika rije na taj nain oslobaa se svog denotativnog karaktera i
postaje izraz komparativnog pribliavanja razliitih imaginamih i osjeajnih podruja s tim to su utisci, osjeanja ili ideje predstavljeni kao izraz iste fantazijske igre. U toj igri kao jedinom autentinom svjedoanstvu pjesnikove superiomosti nad iskustvom, postaje mogue slobodno
i beskonano evokativno i asocijativno povezivanje najrazliitijih slojeva
pjesnike svijesti. Kod Bodlera najee susreemo simboliku analogiju
kao oblik (str.182) dovodenja i meusobnu vezu ulnih utisaka sa svijetom ideja pri emu se oslanja na evokativnu snagu metafore u kojoj
nam apstraktnu ideju sugerie sloj vizuelnih predstava ili, jo neposrednije, taktilni i oflaktivni utisci preobraavaju se u duhovno kompleksne
vizionarske koncepte. U oba sluaja, do apstrakcije se dolazi spiritualizacijom objekta, njegovim postepenim pomjeranjem iz polja puke
pojavnosti u sferu vizionarske evokacije i asocijativnih povezivanja
udaljenih stavmosti. Drugim rijeima, relativizirajui pojmove stvarnosti
i iluzije, to jest neprestanim ukrtanjem perceptivnog i vizionarskog plana, objekta i njegove pjesnike projekcije, Bodler je od pjesnikog izraza
napravio orude vlastitog umjetnikog i filozofskog koncepta, i ostvario
najuniverzlniji oblik pjesnike komunikacije u modernom pjesnitvu.
III
Ono to Bodlerovom pjesnikom inu daje snagu i uvjerljivost modernog koncepta umjetnikog stvaranjai to ga izdvaja iz hora efemernih
stihotvoraca erudita, intimista ili utilitarista iz sredine prolog vijeka,
to je svakako uvjerenje da se poezija rada kao neminovnost punog reagovanja bia i na ivot i na ukupnost ljudskih predstava o ivotu i svijetu
jednog vremena. Iz tog uvjerenja proizlazi i potreba za stalnim suoavanjem lica i nalija stvari, realnosti i fikcije, za predstavljanjem linih
trauma i iskuenja (str.184) kao univerzalnog iskustva duha u sukobu sa
vlastitim oprekama i neizbjenim granicama realnog svijeta.
Radikalizacija pjesnikog jezika dola je kao rezultat kompleksnijeg koncipiranja pjesnikove misije i pjesnikog misaonog horizonta. Pjesnik nije
vie inspirisani mag koji tumai boanske tajne ili svoju ranjenu osjeajnost proglaava svjetskim bolom traei utjehu u sveoptoj patnji
ljudskog roda: pjesnik, kako ga zamilja Bodler, postaje svjedok i nosilac
intenzivnog unutranjeg sukoba nepomirljivih suprotnosti, zatoenik
otudenog svijeta i drutva koje ga odbacuje, nostalgini zaljubljenik
eterinih sfera bjekstva i sna, usamljen i izgubljen putnik u dedalu ivota neopozivo suoen s elementarnim silama razaranja, sa zlom i patnjom, lucidni analitiar nitavila i neustraivi izaziva smrti. I najpovrniji
pregled bodlerovskih tema pokazuje nam kako pjesnik nije privilegovani genije koji uva tajnu kozmikog poretka i univerzalne harmonije:
pjesnik je izaao iz kule od Slonovae da bi podijelio sudbinu svojih
savremenika, da bi otvorio sve ponore istine o sebi i drugima, i ukazao
na paradoksalnost obezglavljene mehanike svijeta. (str.188)
Zarobljen ivotom i pun snova o putovanju i predstava beskraja, pobunjeni dendi i turobni Itautantimoroumnos, Bodler je svoj pjesniki
in povezao sa samim osnovama ivotnog iskustva kao nerazdvojno
jedinstvo artikulisano naelima poetike i stihijom realnosti. U svojoj
otudenosti Bodler je osjetio da pjesnik nije volebni centar svijeta i da
je poezija jedini oblik ivljenja u kome je mogue pronai razrjeenje sukoba i put ka sferama autentinog doivljaja. Stoga je i tenja
ka ljepoti kao vrhunskom estetskom zahtjevu i jedinom preduslovu
poetizacije bijedne ljudske stvarnosti (Krlea) , za Bodlera, samo put
ka nesluenoj slobodi, put ka moguem izmirenju traginog dualizma
koji ga razdire. Bodler je na taj nain anticipirao i malroovski koncept
NAPOMENE
Hermes Trismegist je otac alhemije i magije. Stihovi 29. i 30. - nabrojane ivotinje personifikuju sedam smrtnih grijehova: oholost, tvrdienje, poudu, gnjev, lakomost, zavist i lijenost.
FRIEDRICH, Hugo
Struktura moderne lirike : od Baudelairea do danas / Hugo Friedrich ;
pogovor Milivoj Solar ; [prijevod Truda i Ante Stama ; prijevod stihova
Nikola Milievi ... [et al.]. - Zagreb : Stvarnost, 1969. - VII, 309 str. ; 21 cm. (Svijet suvremene stvarnosti)
Prevod dela: Struktur der modernen Lyrik
BODLER, arl
Spleen Pariza : male pjesme u prozi / Charles Baudelaire ; preveo s francuskoga i pogovor napisao Vladislav Kuan. - Zagreb : Znanje, 1982. - 144
str. ; 20 cm. - (Biblioteka Evergrin ; 23)
Prevod dela: Spleen de Paris. - Geneza pjesme u prozi i Spleen Pariza: str.
125-144.
81
118
231
232
233
234
235
236
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/charles-baudelaire
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/56335/Charles-Baudelaire
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/baudelai.htm
MARINA
SAMOGLASNICI
A crno, E belo, I rujno, O plavo,
U zeleno: tajna roenja vam tu je:
A, crn kosmat pojas muha to blistavo
Nad svirepim smradom kupe se i zuje,
Zatoni sene; - E, koplja gordih santi,
Belina adora, cvee zanjihano;
I, krv ispljunuta, smeh to gnevno plamti
Na usnama lepim, u kajanju pjanom;
U, drhtanje kruno boanstvenih mora,
Spokoj panjaka i stada, spokoj bora
Koje alhemijom stiu uenjaci;
O, vrhovna Truba, puna cike lude,
Mir kojim Aneli i svetovi blude,
- Omega, Oiju silnih modri zraci!
MOSTOVI
Nebo sivo, kristalno. udna ara mostova, ovih ovdje
ravnih, oni tamo ispupenih, a drugih to se sputaju ili
sklapaju uglove sa prvima. Ti se oblici ponavljaju i na drugim
rasvetljenim zavijucima kanala, ali su tako dugi i lagani,
da se obale, optereene kubetima, sniavaju i smanjuju.
Neki od tih mostova jo su pritisnuti udericama. Drugi
podupiru jarbole, signale, krhke ograde. Niski akordi se
ukraju i teku, uad se penje na strme obale. Raspoznaje se
jedan crveni prsluk, a uz njega moda i drugi kostimi i
muziki instrumenti. Da li su to narodne pesme, delovi
vlasteoskih koncerata, ostaci javnih himni? Voda je siva
i plava, razlivena kao morski rukavac. Jedan beli zrak,
padajui s nebeske visine, unitava tu komediju.
PIJANI BROD
OFELIJA
Mirnim crnim valom, gdje zvijezde spiju,
Bijela Ofelija ko krin krupan plovi
Polako, velovi dugi joj se viju...
Iz dalekih uma uju se rogovi.
III
- Pjesnik ree: Zraka zvjezdana te snijela
Da cvijee koje u noi si brala
Trai, i da vidje sred velova, bijela
Ofelija plovi, krupan krin svrh vala.
FRIEDRICH, Hugo
Struktura moderne lirike : od Baudelairea do danas / Hugo Friedrich ;
pogovor Milivoj Solar ; [prijevod Truda i Ante Stama ; prijevod stihova
Nikola Milievi ... [et al.]. - Zagreb : Stvarnost, 1969. - VII, 309 str. ; 21 cm. (Svijet suvremene stvarnosti)
Prevod dela: Struktur der modernen Lyrik
81
246
RIMBAUD, Arthur
Alhemija rei : izbor iz celokupnih dela / Artur Rembo ; preveo Nikola
Bartolino ; izbor, predgovor i beleke Nikola Bertolino ; bibliografija Jovan
Janiijevi. - Beograd : Beogradski izdavako-grafoki zavod, 1979. - 376 str.,
sl. avtorja : ilustr. ; 21 cm. - (Biblioteka Vrhovi)
294-295
298
365
376-377
471
REMBO, Artur
Sabrana poetska dela / Artur Rembo ; prevod, predgovor i napomene
Nikolina Bertolino. - 1. izd. - Beograd : Paideia, 2004 (Beograd : BIGZ). - 295
str. ; 22 cm. - (Biblioteka Poezija / Paideia, Beograd)
Izv. stv. nasl.: Oeuvres / Arthure Rimbaud. - Tira 2.000. - Artur Rembo: str.
7-22. - Napomene: str. 273-288.
263
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/arthur-rimbaud
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/503830/Arthur-Rimbaud
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rimbaud.htm
ZIDOVI
Bez saaljenja, obzira il stida
sagradie oko mene debele zidove.
Sad beznadan sjedim ovdje.
Ne mogu mislit o drugom; izjeda ovaj me udes,
toliko poslova napolju eka.
(Kako ih, dok zidahu, ne spazih?)
Ali od tih graditelja ne uh nikakav zvuk.
Neprimjetno, od vanjskog me odvojie svijeta.
SVIJEE
Budui dani pred nama stoje
ko red svijea u sjaju,
onih malih, zlatnih i ivahnih svijea.
Za nama proli ostaju dani
ko alobni niz svijea izgorjelih;
jo dime se najblie one,
hladne, svinute i rastopljene.
were then to make a literal translation of each version into the language of the other, no reader would be able to recognize their connection.
On the other hand, the technical conventions and devices of verse can
be grasped in abstraction from the verse itself. I do no have to know
Welsh to become excited about the possibility of applying to English
verse the internal rhymes and alliterations in which Welsh verse is so
rich. I may very well find that they cannot be copied exactly in English,
yet discover by modifying them new and interesting effects.
Another element in poetry which often survives translation is the
imagery of similes and metaphors, for these are derived, not from local
verbal habits, but from sensory experiences common to all men.
W.H. Auden
ble to the rivalry between demotic and purist, a rivalry that has excited
high passions, both literary and political. We have only Standard English on the one side and regional dialects on the other, and it is impossible for a translator to reproduce this stylistic effect or for an English
poet to profit from it.
Nor can one speak of Cavafys imagery, for simile and metaphor are
devices he never uses; whether he is speaking of a scene, an event, or
an emotion, every line of his is plain factual description without any
ornamentation whatsoever.
Edmund Keeley, Voice, Perspective, and Context (1983). In Cavafys Alexandria, Princeton University Press, 1996
What, then, is it in Cavafys poems that survives translation and excites? Something I can only call, most inadequately, a tone of voice, a
personal speech. I have read translations of Cavafy made by many different hands, but every one of them was immediately recognizable as
a poem by Cavafy; nobody else could possibly have written it. Reading
any poem of his, I feel:
This reveals a person with a unique perspective on the world. That
the speech of selfdisclosure
should be translatable seems to me very odd, but I am convinced that
it is. The conclusion I draw is that the only quality which all human
beings without exception possess is uniqueness: any characteristic, on
the other hand, which one individual can be recognized as having in
common with another, like red hair or the English language, implies the
existence of other individual qualities which this classification excludes.
To the degree, therefore, that a poem is the product of a certain culture, it is difficult to translate it into the terms of another culture, but
to the degree that it is the expression of a unique human being, it is as
easy, or as difficult, for a person from an alien culture to appreciate as
for one of the cultural group to which the poet happens to belong.
But if the importance of Cavafys poetry is his unique tone of voice,
there is nothing for a critic to say, for criticism can only make comparisons. A unique tone of voice cannot be described; it can only be imitated, that is to say, either parodied or quoted.
Edmund Keeley
didactic, then preferred dramatic. Vayenas makes his case for the
term ironic. Of course no single term is sufficient in itself to describe
Cavafys work over the course of his career. All four terms are to some
degree relevant, depending on the period of Cavafys work in question
and the character of individual poems, and sometimes all four might be
brought to bear on a single poem. An even less fruitful aspect of the
problem is posed by the questions How could [Cavafy] write poetry
when his expressive means were those of prose? and How could
poetry transmit emotion when its language was not emotive, that is,
not poetic? (p. 43). Vayenas traces the suggested solutions offered
by the critics Agras, Nikolareizis, Dallas, and Seferis, but finds each too
limited to resolve the mystery of Cavafys presumably unpoetic poetic.
He concludes that the problem of his poetry is not beyond solution
(p. 51) if one looks at his use of irony.
For those interested in exploring the poems themselves with
new insight and recognition, these questions seem remote, and the socalled problem remains in the realm of theoretical rather than practical
criticism. W.H. Auden provided the key to a different approach in his
introduction to the Rae Dalven translation of Cavafy,3 where he offered
the phrase tone of voice to characterize what was unique about
Cavafy and where he implicitly indicated the futility of a debate over
definitions of the kind presented in Vayenass article. Auden states that
a unique tone of voice cannot be described; it can only be imitated,
that is to say, either parodied or quoted (p. ix). And with this remark
he leads the reader back to the poetry itself, which is its own definition, requiring no all-encompassing characterization or categorization
for those who will give the poems a sensitive reading. Fortunately
Vayenas does not limit himself to the hypothetical problem he explores
but uses his solution to provide new insight into several of Cavafys
more complicatedand often misunderstoodpoems, as we shall see
below.
Audens term tone of voice is a more helpful guide to the
work (even if he himself points to its inadequacy) than any definition
he might have attempted, and so is his elaboration of its implications:
Reading any poem of [Cavafys] I feel: This reveals a person with a
unique perspective on the world (p. viii). Voice and perspective are
the terms that give us access to a better understanding of Cavafys subtleties. Audens remarks imply that there is a tone of voice in Cavafys
poetry, a personal speech, that colors the speaking voice in any particular poem, as there is a perspective on the world that colors the
attitude in any particular poem. The tone of voice and the perspective
are strong enough, in Audens view, to emerge through any translation:
I have read translations of Cavafy made by many different hands, but
every one of them was immediately recognizable as a poem by Cavafy;
nobody else could possibly have written it (p. viii).
Tone of voice, in this view, is obviously more than a matter of
personal style and particular language, since these are mostly lost
in translation (one is compelled to add here that Cavafys language
is special enough to contribute significantly to his tone of voice in
Greek, however one interprets the phrase). As I understand Audens
remarks, what he has in mind is the poets particular way of presenting
his material and the perspective that emerges from this presentation,
and I agree that these add up to a unique voice that not only colors individual poems but that implies a certain unified sensibility in
his work. Still, Cavafys presentation is varied and often complex, and
arriving at the perspective that colors individual poems is not as easy
or immediate as Audens remarks may suggest. It is often an exercise
that requires unusual tact and a heightened sensitivity to the poetrys
context. Evidence of the difficulty is the considerable disagreement
even among Cavafys best critics about the perspective that emerges in
specific instances and some disagreement about whether there is what
can be called a perspective at all.
We have seen in chapter 2 that, in developing his mature
voice, Cavafy went through a period of experimentation with various
modeslyric, didactic, narrative, and dramatic among themand
these modes continued to play their role in shaping the poetry of his
mature period. But if we focus on his work from 1910 forward, I think
we can now assume general agreement among his recent critics that
the starting point in gaining access to his poems is a consideration of
the poets stance in a given poemwhat an older generation of critics
might have called the particular mask the poet chose to wear in specific instances. Even if the poets unique tone of voice generally colors his
work, there is still inevitably some stance in Cavafy, whether the poet
chooses to speak in the first person, act as narrator, address a character in the second person, or take on the role of a character in a dramatic monologue. It is in Cavafys narrations and dramatic monologues
that the poets voicethat is, the voice behind the maskis the most
muted, often heard by way of irony alone (as Vayenas suggests), often
discernible only by a careful examination of the poems tone and context. (I use the term tone here in the standard sense of the speakers
attitude in the poem, sometimes quite at odds with the poets attitude
and usually distinguished from it by at least the distance that the term
persona is meant to indicate).
The difficulty of determining the character of Cavafys stance
in the first instance, and of his voice and perspective in the second, in
some of his more subtle (and usually late) poems is illustrated by the
divergent interpretations of On the Outskirts of Antioch (1932/33)
and A Great Procession of Priests and Laymen (1926), the two dramatic monologues that Vayenas discusses at the conclusion of his essay. Both of these belong to the cycle of poems having to do with Julian
the Apostate (see above, pp. 120-122).4
The Julian poems constitute by far the largest group devoted
to the same historical character in Cavafys work. It is therefore exceedingly difficult to consider any single poem in the cycle outside the
context of others in the group; in fact, I would suggest that the critic
who does so, and who also doesnt consider this group in its relation
to Cavafys late mode and voice in general, proceeds perilously. In any
case, the starting point is correctly perceived by Vayenas to be that of
determining the stance and tone of the poems. The speaking voice in
both poemsthe poets maskis that of a Christian who represents
the Christians of Antioch during Julians brief reign, A.D. 361-363, in
the one instance shortly before the end of that reign, and in the other
shortly after. Seferiss reading of the two poems implicitly assumes an
identity between the poet and his speaker, thus promoting an interpretation that sees the poems as an expression of Cavafys total sympathy with the Christians of Antioch and their ridicule of Julians pagan
pretensions. Vayenas shrewdly challenges this view of Cavafys attitude
by pointing out that the tone of both poemsthat is, the speakers
attitude in eachindicates a magnitude of... hatred for Julian inconsistent with the indications of Christian piety in the poems, and this
contradiction serves to suggest the magnitude of the Christians hypocrisy, a hypocrisy that is seen to have its origins in the Antiochians
strong distaste for Julians ascetic version of the ancient worship, the
application of which would result in a code of behavior not unlike that
prescribed by Christianity (p. 54). Vayenas therefore regards Seferiss
assumption in the case of On the Outskirts of Antioch, that the poem
is simply an attack against Julian and that Cavafy is on the side of
Babylas and the Christians and against the ancients, as a misinterpretation. In the case of A Great Procession of Priests and Laymen, he
challenges Seferiss view that the poem is an unfavorable comment
on Julian and Seferiss opinion that the last line of the poem should
be declaimed in the reverent tone appropriate to the prayers of the
divine liturgy. Vayenas asserts that the line should be read in an ironic
tone of voice to call into question the genuineness of the emotion so
skillfully created in the preceding lines (p. 55).
There is some merit in this reconsideration of Seferiss position,
but it is not a full enough account of either poems implications nor a
sufficient designation of Cavafys perspective. Let us review the poems
in turn. The speaker in On the Outskirts of Antioch is depicted as
being not so much hypocritical as arrogant in his defense of his martyr
Babylas (or Vavylas). His attitude toward Julian is too close to what he
portrays Julians to be in dismissing the martyr. The speaker shows us
Julian losing his temper and shouting: ... take him away immediately, this Vavylas. / You there, do you hear? He gets on Apollos nerves.
/ Grab him, raise him at once, / dig him out, take him wherever you
want, / take him away, throw him out. This isnt a joke... Whether or
not the speakers rendering of Julians tone is accurate, the speakers
own tone gives him away for being similarly arrogant and intolerantif
more subtle in his manner of expressionas he brings his irony to bear
in revealing the destruction he and his fellow Christians have wrought
in taking their revenge on Julian:
And hasnt the temple done brilliantly since!
In no time at all a colossal fire broke out,
a terrible fire,
and both the temple and Apollo burned to the ground.
Ashes the idol: dirt to be swept away.
Julian blew up, and he spread it around
what else could he do?that we, the Christians,
had set the fire. Let him say so.
It hasnt been proved. Let him say so.
The essential thing is: he blew up.
The essential thing is that this Christian speaker has cast out
Julians pagan godin spirit if not in factas mercilessly and fanatically
as he depicts Julians treatment of Vavylas. An eye for an eye; no charity here. And the speaker reveals a rather amusing hangover of paganism in himself when he gives the pagan gods more life and reality than
one might think a pious Christian has any business giving them (though
the hangover is of course historically accurate):5 It was [Vavylas] the
false god hinted at, him he feared. / As long as he felt him near he
didnt dare / pronounce his oracle: not a murmur. / (The false gods are
terrified of our martyrs.)
If the speaker condemns himself by showing the same arrogant
intolerance of Julian that he has Julian demonstrate toward this Vavylas, can the reader trust the image of Julian that the speaker projects?
The answer to this seems to me to reside in the poems context, both
the historical context that it presupposes and whatever relevant knowledge of the poets mature voice we can bring to the poem. We know
from history that Julian did indeed order the church that the Christians
built over Vavylass tomb to be demolished and the relic of Vavylas to
be removed, and we also know that he was intolerant of those who
professed to teach while harbor[ing] in their souls opinions irreconcilable with the spirit of the state, namely the spirit of Emperor Julians
austere paganism.6 Whether or not the speaker catches the exact tone
of Julians intolerance, he has the substance of it right. And other of
Cavafys Julian poems would seem to provide the kind of gloss on this
one that suggests the poet is sympathetic toward the speakers image
of the emperor.
Two earlier poems are particularly relevant in this connection,
Julian Seeing Contempt (1923) and Julian and the Antiochians
(1926). Neither is a dramatic monologue; in both the poet enters the
poem through a persona who comments on the historical moment
that the poem dramatizes, as close as Cavafy comes to making a direct
statement in his mature work. In the first, the persona mocks Julian for
attempting to incite and goad his friends, among whom Julian finds
great contempt for the gods, friends who werent Christians but who
also werent ready to go so far as to playas Julian ironically could,
having been brought up a Christianwith a new religious system that
the persona calls ludicrous in theory and application. Julians friends
were Greeks, after all, guided stillthe persona impliesby the ancient maxim that the persona quotes in concluding the poem: Nothing
in excess, Augustus.
This image of Julian as a man given at times to ludicrous excess
is not out of keeping with the Julian who loses his temper in casting
out the martyr Vavylas. Nor is the image of Julian that we find in Julian
and the Antiochians, where the persona contrasts Julians hot air
about the false gods, / his boring self-advertisement, / his childish fear
of the theater, / his graceless prudery, his ridiculous beard with the
notorious, immoral, quite unChristian but nevertheless beautiful and
delectable way of life of Christian Antiochians, which consummated a union between Art / and the erotic proclivities of the flesh and
which was always in absolute good taste. The persona asks rhetorically whether it could ever have been possible for the Antiochians to
give up the latter out of an allegiance to the former. He concludes that
of course they preferred the more tolerant, less puritanical regime of
Apostate Julians Christian predecessors.
The theme of excess and the intolerance it engenders is what
links these two poems to the later On the Outskirts of Antioch and
what helps to clarify the poets perspective in the later poem. Both
the Christian speaker in the poem and unholy Julian demonstrate a
like propensity for excess; both are given to fanaticism and intolerance
toward those with opposing beliefs. Cavafys perspective emerges from
the interplay between the juxtaposed representations of excess in the
poem. In this instance he sides with neither the Christian speaker nor
the pagan emperor; his perspective, most aptly characterized by the
maxim Nothing in excess, transcends both.
This conclusion challenges not only Vayenass view of Cavafys
perspective in both poems but also my own too-hasty generalization
(p. 121 above) regarding those Julian poems that are dramatic monologues (as distinct from those that one might call persona lyrics or
narrations). I say that the tone of each makes it clear that the poet
sides with the Christian speaker. Not so; the tone of each monologue
defines the speakers attitude, not the poets, and it is clear from our
discussion here that the poets perspective can be said to be a degree
ironic toward both the Christian speaker and the object of the speakers sarcasm, in effect siding with neither and subtly satirizing both for
their intolerant excess. And that is often the case both in this historical
context and elsewhere. Even in the poem Julian and the Antiochians,
where the personas irony is overtly at Julians expense, we have that
passing note on the Christians excess: Immoral to a degreeand
probably more than a degreethey certainly were...an ominous
note if one is aware of the close relation between the Christian way of
life depicted in this poem and that of Cavafys ancient Alexandrians,
especially those commemorated in several of the epitaphs he wrote
between 1914 and 1918, where we have seen (p. 86 above) that the
union between elegance, beauty, youth, art, and the erotic proclivities
of the flesh is shown to have its dark side: I, Iasis, lie herefamous
for my good looks / in this great city... / excess wore me out, killed me.
Traveler, / if youre an Alexandrian, you wont blame me. / You know
the pace of our lifeits fever, its absolute devotion to pleasure (from
Tomb of Iasis).
Joseph Brodsky tells us in his generally illuminating essay-review
on Cavafy that the poet did not choose between paganism and Christianity but was swinging between them like a pendulum.7 One might
modify the metaphor by suggesting that it is the speaking voice that
does the swinging; Cavafys perspective is what holds the pendulum in
place, aloof from the action, not taking sides except when arrogance,
fanaticism, intolerance, hubris, or other excess earns his irony. Brodsky
points out that Cavafys most vigorous ironies were directed against
Valens in the East, and within less than a century, the Western empire
will have fallen irretrievably.
The irony here is underlined in Cavafian terms by a passage in
Gibbon, one of Cavafys principal historical sources, as he meditates on
the death of Valentinian the Third in A.D. 455 and the doom of Rome:
...even his religion was questionable; and though he never deviated
into the paths of heresy, he scandalized the pious Christians by his
attachment to the profane arts of magic and divination... The severe
inquisition, which confiscated their goods and tortured their persons,
compelled the subjects of Valentinian to prefer the more simple tyranny of the Barbarians... If all the Barbarian conquerors had been annihilated in the same hour, their total destruction would not have restored
the empire of the West; and, if Rome still survived, she survived the
loss of freedom, of virtue, and of honour.8
The historical context of which the speaker is unaware, source
of the poems dramatic irony, is what Seferis would call the missing
statue on Cavafys pedestal. As we have seen in the discussion of several of Cavafys subtlest late poems in chapter 6Alexander Jannaios
and Alexandra and In the Year 200 B.C. in particularit is events
that follow on the speakers heels which provide the poems final
comment, outside the range of the speakers voice and perception, the
kind of silent comment that raises the poets perspective above the
speakers particular bias to the level of the poet-historian who sees a
more universaland generally tragicpattern behind even those moments of history with which he has shown some degree of sympathetic
identification. As is suggested in chapter 6, the poets perspective may
be seen as a usually unspoken conscience that recognizes any individual success and any specific historical change as subject to reversal by
the gods, that sometimes serves to warn against those excesses that
lead to fanaticism, intolerance, or self-satisfied complacency, and that
sometimes finds wisdom and courage to reside in a recognition of human limitations.
It is this perspective that seems to me to be a fundamental
aspect of Cavafys mature voice, an aspect of the unique perspective
on the world that Auden saw stamped on every Cavafy poem, even
in translation. One might find other terms in which to express the
texts (p. 517). The term world-view is a grand one that I have always
found suspiciously vague, but if it implies what Auden calls Cavafys
perspective on the world, then I would have to acknowledgein
keeping with what I have already indicatedthat I do indeed believe
there is a perspective of that kind in his work. And if the term structure implies that there is an interrelation between Cavafys poems in
mode and attitude, and that a pattern of images and attitudes emerges
from this interrelationwhat I have here called the voice and perspective of his poetrythen I admit to that position as well (though
of course I cannot agree that these do not emerge naturally from his
texts without proposing a non sequitur). The danger of seeing Cavafys
world as one characterized entirely by shifting relativities in which the
poets irony is never used to support his own convictions is that the
critic has little solid basis for determining the object of the poets irony
in specific instances. Without a firm foundation in perspective and
context, one begins to see irony everywhere, hear it everywhere, find
ones sense of the poets irony undercut by another irony, and that by
the irony of this undercutting. In short, it becomes difficult to establish
exactly when the poet intends irony and exactly what he intends to be
ironic about.
In actual practice, Beatons relativist position is qualified by
what he himself calls the context of Cavafys work, and this leads to
some perceptive and helpful criticism of individual poems based on a
proper sensitivity to dramatic form, tone, and historical background
as in his subtle reading of Dangerous Things. But some of his readings
seem to me too clever by half, and their identification of levels of irony
is occasionally misleading. His interpretation of Ionic, for example,
draws heavily on the context of Cavafys work for its substantiation but
is finally overwhelmed by ironies that do not, in my opinion, emerge
naturally from the text of the poem and that in any case serve to
diminish its intended impact on the reader. Context is first invoked to
undermine the literal reading of the poem by emphasizing that the
speaking voice, the poems we, has an actual concrete existence in
a specific historical period, and as always in a poem by Cavafy, this
suggests a distancing that allows us to view the speaker with some
detachment, even irony.9 Beaton then invokes the context of Cavafys
as Beaton has it, nor does he claim to admire beauty or the Greek
pastand since he does not express these various attitudes, he cannot logically refer to a change of heart or be the object of the poets
irony for being unaware of the contradiction between them.
What the speaker does express is his view that, for all the Christians attempt to get rid of the pagan gods by destroying their statues
and driving them out of their temples, the gods are not dead. The implication is that the destruction of statues and temples is not enough to
do in the gods because their vision, their ardorthe of their
life11 is focused and housed elsewhere. With some lyrical fervor the
speaker goes on to say O land of Ionia, you they love still, / you their
souls remember still; that is the emphasis of the Greek syntax:
I, /
(emphasis mine). In fact, the gods still love and remember
Ionia in their souls so ardently that on an August morning one can still
feel the youthful exuberance of their life (existence) passing through
the air and sometimes actually see the young ethereal figure of a god,
indistinct and with hurried pace, crossing above the Ionian hills. The
lyricism of the poem does not so much celebrate the speakers love of
beauty or the Greek past asin keeping with the poems titleit celebrates the land of Ionia, still home for the souls of the gods who cannot
forsake their love of it nor forget what it represents for them.
This celebrative purpose might even excuse the speakers
unusual use of the apostrophe O land of Ionia. In any case, it is not
a romantic landscape that Ionia represents but a sensual one. When
dawn breaks, what appears is not the beauty of nature but a god in
the shape of an ephebe ( ). And if there is irony in the
poem, it is a rather mild kind, consistent with a typical Cavafian emphasis; it emerges not from the poet undermin[ing] the poems lyricism
or undermining his unaware speaker, but from his showing us a Christian who has to acknowledgeeven celebrate the factthat there
is territory presumably beautiful and sensual enough for the gods to
haunt whatever destruction Christianity may choose to wreak on it,
and that, in this Cavafian context, what is most likely to remain alive to
the bitter end in such territory is a god in the unChristian shape of what
Beaton translates as an ethereal boyish form. Also, if Morning Sea
the small Asia Minor principality of Kommagini seems an odd circumstance, one that could point to the possibility of irony. Cavafys use of
the unusual term E (which in Modern Greek normally means
Greek oras Beaton puts itpertaining to Greece or Hellenism
and in ancient Greek anything from Hellenic and Greek to like the
Greeks, and pure Greek, and pagan),13 to describe the kings most
precious quality of Hellenism also could be seen to promote an ironic
reading. I quote the whole of the Ephesian sophists epitaph in the
Collected Poems version:
Hellenism in Cavafy, especially during the historical period encompassed by the poem (his editor George Savidis tells us that this Antiochos could be any one of several kings of the same name who reigned
in Kommagini between 64 B.C. and A.D. 72)? Three other poems that
Beaton discusses in his essay show Syria to be a primary source of Hellenism during this period, in particular the kind of diaspora Hellenism
that is designated by the term Hellenic and that we saw in chapter 5
to be that which Cavafy is reported to have claimed as his own: I too
am Hellenic (E). Notice how I put it: not Greek (), nor
Hellenized (E), but Hellenic (E).15 This remark by
Cavafy in conversation with Stratis Tsirkas comes in so pat against irony
and satire in this instance that Beaton has to work his way around it by
a curious, unsubstantiated argument that seems to me to let him have
his cake and eat it too: he dismisses the evident identity of sympathy
between Cavafy and his character in this poem that the remark appears to reinforce by telling us that the remark was not intended for
publication, and, in any case, an essential and courageous feature of
Cavafys irony is that it spares neither himself nor his predilections (p.
525, n. 22). Sometimes so indeed (as I suggest above in my commentary on In the Year 200 B. C., p. 147), but where are the grounds for
assuming such self-irony, and the distance it implies, in this instance?
The biographical gloss provided by Cavafys remark is not the
only contextual evidence that undermines Beatons ironic reading of
Epitaph to Antiochos... ; we also have the gloss provided by the three
other relevant poems. In Returning from Greece (or, as Diskin Clay
has shrewdly suggested, Going Home from Greece or Homeward
Bound from Greece16), the philosopher-speaker, who identifies himself as a diaspora Greek returning to his home waters of Cyprus, Syria,
and Egypt, tells us that the correct attitude for Greeks like us is to
honor and delight in the Syrian and Egyptian blood in our veinsin
other words, to honor that quality of being Hellenic as distinct from
that quality represented by mainland Greeks (without Asiatic tastes
and feelings) or that quality represented by pretenders to Hellenism,
with their showy Hellenified exteriors based on a Macedonian model.17 The Syrian courtiers of Epitaph of Antiochos... are not identified
specifically as Greeks from Syria, though they could be: as we see in
One of Their Gods, Greeks from Syria are taken to be what we would
now call native Syrians, distinguished in the poem from a stranger or
foreigner () in Syrian Selefkia. They are in any case very much
a part of the mixturethe , as In a Town of Osroini puts it
that constitutes the essence of Cavafys diaspora Hellenic world. And
in Herodis Attikos, which presents this Hellenic world in the second
century after Christ, the speaker describes Alexander of Selefkia in
Syria as one of our better sophists, and he tells us that at this time
future orators being trained by Hellenism are getting their training
in the two Syrian cities of Beirut and Antioch (as well as Alexandria).18
Finally, such dubious Hellenism as the petty Asian monarch of Philhellene can claim comesif at allfrom Syrian sophists.
Given this essential Cavafian context, it is not only difficult to envision the Syrian courtiers in Epitaph of Antiochos... as the object of
the poets irony, but what Beaton sees as a contradiction at the poems
heart, that what is called Hellenic and praised so highly is as much
the creation of Syrians and others as of Greeks is, in the Cavafian context, no contradiction at all. The term Hellenic (E) as distinct
from Greek or Hellene or Philhellene or Hellenified non-Greek,
aptly designates what Antiochos of the small Asia Minor principality of Kommagini would have felt himself to be and would have been
honored to have himself designated in his epitaph, as Cavafy himself
might have in keeping with his identification of himself as E.
And it is Syrian courtiers perhaps even more than a Greek sophist from
Ephesus (which, as Beaton points out, though in Asia Minor had been
close [in this context, read too close] to the centre of the Greek world
since pre-classical times) who would be most likely to understand the
particular relevance of the term. As we have seen in chapter 5, Cavafys
friend and early critic, E.M. Forster, puts the case most succinctly when
he tells us that Cavafy was a loyal Greek but that Greece for him was
not territorial: it was rather the influence that has flowed from his
race this way and that through the ages, and that (since Alexander the
Great) never disdained to mix with barbarism, has indeed desired to
mix. And Forster adds: Racial purity bored him... The civilization he
respected was a bastardy in which the Greek strain prevailed, and into
which, age after age, outsiders would push, to modify and be modi-
fied.19
Antiochoss epitaph does not celebrate the racially pure Hellenism associated with Classical Greece, that which is normally indicated by the term (Greek or Hellene), but the specifically mixed
Hellenism of diaspora Greece that includes Asiatic tastes and feelings
whichas the Syrian-Egyptian philosopher of Returning from Greece
suggestedare sometimes alien to Hellenism of the mainland Greek
tradition and which, in the case of this philosopher, become the source
of proper self-recognition and pride. In short, the E version
of Hellenism is what Syrian courtiers in Kommagini would justly promote as mankinds highest quality. And that is why the poet has the
Ephesian sophist and his Syrian advisers use that unusual, that special,
term to honor the provident, wise, and courageous king of Kommagini.
Neither he nor his courtiers are the object of the poets irony. If there is
irony in this poem too, it is directed at those who might choose to think
that what the epitaph designates as mankinds highest quality is the
exclusive province of racially pure Greeks belonging to the pre-Alexandrian tradition or their disciples, those who might find Cavafys term
E merely strange or confusing or ironic rather than special
and therefore to the point.
In arriving at this not-so-ironic view of Epitaph of Antiochos...
, one lays oneself open to two charges: that the reading is not as complicated or ambivalent as some critical approaches might prefer and
that it draws for some of its implications not simply on the poem under
perusal but also on a structure of attitudes created by other Cavafy
poems presumed to be relevant, in this case specifically those that
are seen to build a complex and special image of Hellenism. Regarding
the first charge, I personally find sufficient complication and richness
in Cavafy for my taste even when his irony is muted, and I would hope
that the approach to his work in this book serves to demonstrate that
richness. Also, given my view of Cavafys work both in this chapter
and throughout Cavafys Alexandria, I have to reaffirm my belief that,
though Cavafy was a consummate ironist, he nevertheless did have
certain convictions, and if not what is called a world-view, at least a
perspective on the world that was complex, subtle, subject to development over the course of his career, yet generally identifiable. In
of his poems and the expanding perspective they shaped over the
course of his career. But I have argued this at length in chapter 6. And
the proof of the value of this approach must still reside in whether or
not the reader finds that it promotes a better understanding and a larger appreciation of individual poems, my primary aspiration in this book.
NOTES
1. The Language of Irony (Towards a Definition of the Poetry of
Cavafy), Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, vol. 5 (1979), pp. 43-56.
Portions of his article first appeared in Greek in The Poet and the Dancer: An Examination of the Poetics of Seferis (Athens, 1979), chapter 1,
section 4 (see especially pp. 95-102).
2. C. P. Cavafy: Irony and Hellenism, The Slavonic and East European
Review, vol. 59, no. 4 (1981), pp. 516-528.
3. The Complete Poems of Cavafy (New York, 1976), pp. vii-xv. The essay also appears in Forewords and Afterwords (New York, 1973).
4. The cycle of Julian poems in the canon numbered six. One more
poem, Julian at the Mysteries, joined the cycle after the 1967 publication of unpublished poems [A ], edited by George
Savidis (though On the Outskirts of Antioch was published for the
first time after Cavafys death, it appeared in the 1935 posthumous
collection of his work, published in Alexandria, that established the
so-called canon). Five additional unpublished poems appeared for
the first time in 1981, judiciously edited by Renata Lavagnini, in The
Unpublished Drafts of Five Poems on Julian the Apostate, Byzantine
and Modern Greek Studies, vol. 7, pp. 55-88. In the same issue (pp.
89-104), G.W. Bowersock offers a perceptive and authoritative commentary on the five poems and on the group as a whole in his The
Julian Poems of C.P. Cavafy. He shows, among other significant things,
how keen Cavafy was to be historically accurate. He also demonstrates
that in the Julian poems Cavafy concerned himself with a rather small
number of topics from the range of those that were possible... Julians
childhood, Julian at Antioch, and Julians death, and that the common denominator for every single one of the poemswhat links the
principal motifs togetheris Christianity (p. 101). Bowersock sees the
14. Though Beaton tells us that Cavafy did not use irony to debunk
certain attitudes and characters, what other implication can one draw
from Beatons view that one level of the poets irony undermines the
whole epitaph so that we see that its purpose is merely to flatter
and the sentiments expressed no more than the current fashion at an
obscure middle-eastern court?
15. See chapter 5, fn. 3.
16. See The Silence of Hermippos: Greece in the Poetry of Cavafy,
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, no. 3 (1977), p. 109.
17. In his note to the poem in Collected Poems, Savidis suggests that
the poems Hermippos may be the grammarian of the time of Trajan
and Hadrian (A.D. 98-138), but the time of the poems discourse has to
remain speculative.
18. Beaton gives this poem an interesting reading, but he fails to establish sufficient distinction between the poet and his speaker. The poem
is a dramatic monologue, and the speaker, when he calls Alexander of
Selefkia one of our better sophists, identifies himself as a Greek of
the diaspora. He is thus limited in his point of view by both the particular historical context and the implications of his diaspora Hellenic
identity. I have two specific quibbles. What Beaton sees as the poets irony at Herodiss expense is based on Herodis supposedly being
content, as it appears he is, to enjoy his luck and to be followed
only. Herodis may or may not have been content to enjoy his luck.
The speaker simply tells us that tactful () Herodis answers the
sophist Alexander by saying that instead of sending the Greeks back to
Athens to hear Alexander speak, Herodis will return with them, presumably because they will not return without him. And it is the diaspora speaker, observing the scene from the perspective of someone living
in Alexandria, Antioch, or Beirut, who offers the expression the Greeks
(the Greeks!). Beaton tells us that the repetition implies not admiration but incredulity. The repetition does indeed suggest incredulity
on the speakers part, but it also suggests thereby his implicit admirationperhaps now fadingfor the Athenians in that the Athenians of
the speakers day (not of the classical past, because the poem nowhere
indicates that the speaker is interested in the Greeks of the classical
golden age, and of the classics textbooks) are depicted by him as
at-homeness with the operations of sex and the city, his poems are
immediately persuasive and would probably hold up well enough if
translated into prose. Cavafy, in fact, could have altered Wilfred Owens
famous apologia for his war elegies (The poetry is in the pity) and
have boasted of his own achievement, The poetry is in the plotting.
The truth of this is evident in the work already available in English,
but to rest the case for Cavafy on what are essentially prose virtues
still sells the poetry short. And this is why Stratis Haviaras decision
to maintain a general metrical consistency in his versions had a fundamental rightness to it and has produced such deeply satisfactory
results. In his translators listening post, his bilingual ear picks up the
iambic pace of the Greek, measures it in two minds, and more or
less keeps step with it in English. Haviaras is himself a poet, so he is
at home in his medium and stays equidistant from metronome and
monotone. His verse is not on overdrive, but it is still propelled and this
sensation of being borne forward by more than character and content
is crucial to its success.
Sexual desire, political ambition, artistic need: Cavafy has a singular
apprehension of how these forces make themselves felt in individual
lives. Their inexorability both enthralls and dismays him, and one of the
things that gives the poetry its rare steadiness is his ability to penetrate
past circumstance into what is sensed as fate sensed not only by the
poet but by his protagonists and his readers also. Everywhere in these
poems there is reverie and hedonism, irony and antiquarianism, but we
can never identify the poet himself as a pure and simple daydreamer
or hedonist or ironist or antiquarian. Even so, the plane of regard is
not over-elevated: the human predicament here is presented neither
as divine comedy nor fully blown tragedy, but is seen from a viewpoint
located somewhere between Olympus and Gethsemane.
It is not a gods eye view, nor is it altogether brimming with the tears
of things human. He neither says Father, forgive them! nor What
fools these mortals be! There is an indeflectible, locked-on quality
to Cavafys gaze, and what he gazes at he goes towards, calmly and
clear-sightedly, more coroner than commentator, equally disinclined
to offer blame or grant the benefit of the doubt. Its as if everything
enters the mirror and is held there, rather as the beauty of the tailors
Seamus Heaney
Glanmore, March 2004
Seamus Heaney, Foreword. In: C.P. Cavafy, The Canon. Translated from
the Greek by Stratis Haviaras, Hermes Publishing, 2004
Seamus Heaney
Foreword
Constantine Cavafys poems survive translation better than most.
One reason for this is the sheer interest of their content: homoerotic
amours in exotic settings, the dooms of tyrants, the various crossed
destinies of sophists and drifters and soothsayers his treatment of
such matters is enough to convince a non-Greek readership of his
genius. Because of their psychological and political acuity, their unfazed
str.229
str.230
str.232
str.254-255
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/c-p-cavafy
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/100491/Constantine-P-Cavafy
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/kafavis.htm
str.255
str.251-252
A VI?
Ispljusnuvi boju iz ae
premazao sam sliku svagdana.
Na zdjeli pihtija se pokazae
kose jagodice okeana.
Sa krljuti na limenoj ribi
proitah novih usta vijesti
a vi, nokturno
da l mogli bi
na flauti oluka izvesti?
<1913>
EVO VAM!
Kroz sat odavde u istu uliicu
na ovjeka e vae mlohavo salo istei,
a ja vam otvorih tolikih stihova katuljicu,
ja, pravi rasipnik bescjenih rijei.
Evo vi, gospon, u brku kupus je vama
od supa nedokusanih, nedojedenih, u stvari.
Izioh na trg,
i kvart zapaljeni
natakoh na glavu, ko klaun periku.
Ljudima je strano, jer iz usta meni
trzaju se noge nesavakanom kriku.
Al nee da me osude, ni da me oblaju,
cvijeem e moj trag prekrit, ko prorokov ba.
Svi ti, s provaljenim nosevima, znaju:
ja sam pjesnik va.
Kao krma straan va strani sud mi je!
Mene samog kurve, kroz gorua zdanja,
na rukama e ko svetinju pronijet
da pokau bogu u znak opravdanja.
I bog zaplakae nad mojom knjiicom!
Ne rijei gruda od greva slita;
nebom sa stihovljem mojim pod miicom
trat e , zadihan znancima ih itat.
<1914>
HIMNA SUDIJI
Veslaju Crvenim morem robijai
muno na galiji. O Peru
rik njin sindirsko rzanje nadmai
o domaji svojoj se deru.
O raju Peru je taj rik Peruanev,
Gdje su ptice, tanci i snae,
Gdje nad vijencima cvjetova narane,
Baobab do neba sezae.
Ananas, banane! Radosti ta gruda!
Zaptiveno s vinom posue.
No evo ne zna zato i otkuda
Na Peru su naprli se!
I ptice su, tance, Peruanke njine
Okruili paragrafi namah.
Oi suca par su limenki to sine
Iz jame s pomijama.
I narandasto-plav paun dopade
Ispred njegova oka, stroga
Poput posta, i rep paunov ostade
Trenutano bez perja svoga.
A uz Peru vidi letjet dilj prerije
Ptiice takve kolibrije;
Sudac ih pohvata perje i paperje
Kolibriima jadnim zbrije.
I nema ni jedna dolina sad visa
Odkud vulkanski dim iskae.
Sudija na svakoj dolini napisa:
Dolina za nepuae.
U jadnome Peru ak i pjesme moje
Pod zabranom su: muen bie!
Sud ree: Te to su u prodaji, to je
Takoe alkoholno pie.
I polutar drhti od sindirskog zvna.
U Peruu besptije, bezljue...
Tek, zlobno skriti pod zbirke zakona,
ive turobne se.
OBLAK U PANTALONAMA
TETRAPTIH (odlomak)
To je bilo,
bilo sred Odese.
Misao vau,
to mata na mozgu razmekalom
ko tust lakej pruen na zamaen divan,
draiu okrvavljenom srca traljom
sit u se iznasprdati, bezobrazan i kivan.
Evo i veer
tmurna decembarska,
s prozora ode
i u stravu nonu
grabi.
Njeni!
Vi ljubav na violinu meete.
Grubi ljubav na talambas stave.
A sebe, kao ja, izvrnuti neete
da samo jedne usne svud se jave.
Doete uiti se
iz primae, od batista
otmjena inovnica aneoske lige.
I koja spokojno usne svoje lista
ko kuvarka stranice kuvarske knjige.
Hoete li,
od mesa pobjesniu
i, ko nebo, tonove mijenjaju namah
hoete li,
njean besprijekorno biu,
ne muko, ve oblak u pantalonama.
Ne vjerujem da postoji cvjetna Nica!
Osam.
Devet.
Deset.
potrao.
I sada sa nova je dva
oajno plesati stao.
Na niem spratu buka se sasipa.
Gle, ivce
velike,
male,
mnoge!
svaki bijesno ipa
i ve
ivcima su se podsjekle noge!
No po sobi ko tinja se hvata,
otealo se oko iz tinje ne uspravlja.
Odjednom su zacvokotala vrata,
kao da gostiona
zub na zub ne sastavlja.
Ula si,
muei
rukavice od jelena,
odsjena ko n ti!
Znajte, rekla si tog trena,
ja u se udati!
E pa udajte se.
ta je bilo?
Ustrajau.
Vidite me spokojnim ko ikad.
Ko bilo
pokojnika.
Sjeate se?
Govorili ste:
Dek London,
ljubav,
strast
a ja vidjeh jedno:
vi ste okondom1
koju treba ukrast!
I ukrali je.
FLAUTA-KIMA
(Poema: odlomak)
Ljudi njue
vonja po peenju!
Doveli nekakve.
Bljetave!
Kaciga im eno!
Ne u izmama!
Recite nek se vatrogasci penju
s njenou uz srce zapaljeno.
Za sve vas,
koji se sviaste, il vam se sviae,
vas, u pilji due, ko ikone, na uvanju,
poput vinske, pri zdravici, ae
diem prepunu stihova lubanju.
Sam u.
Ko burad valjati pune suza oi u.
Dajte da o rebra oduprem se, grcam.
Iskoiu! Iskoiu! Iskoiu! Iskoiu!
Sruili su se.
Nee iskoiti iz srca!
Na izgorjelu licu
iz prsline usta
ugljenisani cjelovi itra.
Mama!
Moja pjesma susta!
Planuo je i hor kraj crkvice srca!
Nagorjele figure rijei i brojki
iz lubanje ko djeca bi
iz zapaljenog zdanija.
Tako je strah, da se
nebesa dograbi,
dizao
gorue ruke Luzitanije
2.
K ljudima drhtavim
u tiini stana
s pristanita hrli stooki sjaj zorin.
Posljednji krie,
bar ti danas
u stoljea izjaui o tome da gorim!
Sve ee mislim
nije li bolje
taka metka na koncu da je.
Za svaki sluaj,
ja danas
oprotajni koncert dajem.
Sjeanje!
Saberi u mozga sali
neiscrpne redove milih,
smijeh iz oiju u oi salij,
ukrasi no svadbama bilim.
Veselje lijte u put iz puti,
no nek bude nikad zaboravljenom.
Ja u da sviram danas na flauti,
na svojoj kimi sopstvenoj.
(prevod: Marko Veovi)
Biografija
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/370851/Vladimir-Vladimirovich-Mayakovsky
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/majakovs.htm
POSLIJE RASKIDA
Pred tri mjeseca nema vie
Samo to su meave prve
Na ovaj vrt, zatite lien,
Rijeile da se ostrve,
VRAPJA BRDA
Boris Pasternak
1917 - 1923
(1890-1960)
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/boris-pasternak
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/445952/Boris-Leonidovich-Pasternak
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/pasterna.htm
Mievi
ROMANSA LUNE, LUNE
U kovanici Cigani
plau gorko ridajui.
A nad lunom lahor bdije.
Lahor nad njom budno bdije.
A u kovanici plau,
i nariu, svi Cigani.
Vetar lunu uva, uva.
Vetar samo lunu pazi.
Mievi
LEPOTICA I VETAR
Damasu Alonsu
Uzbunjeni krikovima
dotre tri orunika,
ogrta im crn uz tijelo,
kapu namakl na oi.
Englez ponudi Cganki
zdjelcu topla mlijeka
i aicu borovice
koju Ljepojka ne pije.
I dok ona, plau, pria
svoj doivljaj toj eljadi,
krovne ploe od kriljevca
bjesomuno vjetar grize.
U mesec od pergamina
Lepotica biju hita
vodozemnom putanjicom
od kristala i od bilja.
Tiina bez zvezda, bee
od brujanja jednolina,
pada tu gde more peva
svoju pono punu riba.
andarmi u snove tonu
na planinskim vrhovima
uvajui bele kule
nastanjene Englezima.
A cigani oni s vode
diu da im proe igra
grane bora zelenoga
i kuice od puia.
*
U mesec od pergamna
Lepotica biju hita.
Spaziv je digao se
vetar koji ne sp nikad.
Obnaen Kristofor sveti,
i nebeskih pun jezika,
gledajui to devoje
u odsutne gajde svira.
- Dete, pusti da te sknem,
da te vidim bez haljina.
Plavu ruu svog stomaka
otvori mi pred prstima.
*
Lepotica svoj def baci
i u beg se dade hitra.
Vetar-ljudina je pali
vrelim maem po leima.
Udvaja svoj umor more
Sjaj maslina blei biva.
Pevaju svirale tame
Ivanievi
ROMANCA MJESEARKA
Za Gloriju Giner i Fernanda de los Rios
Zeleno, to volim zeleno.
Zelen-vjetar. Zelen-grane.
Lau pusti na puni,
a i konja u planini.
Sa sjenom oko pasa
ona sanja na balkonu,
put zelena, zelen-kosa,
s oima od hladna srebra.
Zeleno, to volim zeleno.
Pod ciganskom mjeseinom
sve je stvari promatraju,
ali ona njih ne moe.
*
Zeleno to volim zeleno.
Velike ledene zvijezde
nadolaze s ribom sjene,
to otvara cestu zori.
Smokva tare povjetarac
vorovima svojih grana,
a planina, lupe maak,
jei svaki ljuti aloj.
Ali tko e doi? Otkud?
Ona vazda na balkonu
put zelena, zelen-kosa,
sanjari o gorku moru.
*
- Kume, hou da mijenjam
konja svog za njenu kuu,
svoje sedlo za zrcalo,
i svoj no za njen pokriva.
Kume, vuem se krvav
od dalekog klanca Cabre.
- Kad bih mogo, o moj mome,
mi bismo se pogodili.
Al ve nisam vie svoj,
moja kua moja nije.
- Kume, hou umrijeti
pristojno u svom krevetu,
elinome, elio bih,
na mekanim ponjavama.
Zar ne vidi mojih rana
od njedara sve do grla?
- Tri stotine tamnih rua
kouljom ti bijelom cvjeta,
ROMANCE SONMBULO
A Gloria Ginery a Fernando de los Rios
Verde que te quiero verde.
Verde viento. Verdes ramas.
El barco sobre la mar
y el caballo en la montana.
Con la sombra en la cintura
ella suena en su baranda,
verde carne, pelo verde.,
con ojos de fria plata.
Verde que te quiero verde.
Bajo la luna gitana,
las cosas la estan mirando
y ella no puede mirarlas.
*
Verde que te quiero verde.
Grandes estrellas de escarcha
vienen con el pez de sombra
que abre el camino del alba.
La higuera frota su viento
con la lija de sus ramas,
y el monte gato garduo,
eriza sus pitas agrias.
Pero quin vendr? Y por dnde...?
Ella sgue en su baranda,
verde carne, pelo verde,
sonando en la mar armarga.
*
- Compadre, quiero cambiar
mi caballo por su casa,
mi montura por su espejo,
mi cuchillo, por su manta.
Compadre, vengo sangrando,
desde los puertos de Cabra.
- Si yo pudera, mocito,
este trato se cerraba.
Pero yo ya no soy yo,
ni mi casa es ya mi casa.
- Compadre, quiero morir
decentemente en mi cama.
De acero, si puede ser,
con las sbanas de holanda.
No ves la herida que tengo
desde el pecho a la garganta?
-Trescientas rosas morenas
lleva tu pechera blazca.
Tu sangre rezuma y huele
alrededor de tu faja.
Pero yo ya no soy yo,
ni mi casa es ya mi casa.
- Dejame subir al menos
hasta las altas barandas;_
dejadme subir!, dejadme
hasta las verdes barandas.
Barandales de la luna
por donde retumba el agua.
*
Ya suben los dos compadres
haca las altas barandas.
Dejando un rastro de sangre.
Dejando un rastro de lgrimas.
Temblaban en los tejados
farolllos de hojalata.
Ml panderos de cristal
heran la madrugada.
Verde que te quiero verde,
verde vento, verdes ramas.
Los dos compadres suberon.
El largo viento dejaba
en la boca un raro gusto
de hel, de menta y de albahaca.
Compadre! Dnde est, dime,
dnde est tu nina amarga?
Cuntas veces te esper!
Cuntas veces te esperara,
cara fresca, negro pelo,
en esta verde baranda!
*
Sobre el rostro del aljbe
se meca la gitana.
Verde carne, pelo verde,
con ojos de fra plata.
Un carmbano de luna
la sostiene sobre el agua.
La noche se puso intima
como una pequena plaza.
Guardias civiles borrachos
en la puerta golpeaban.
Verde que te quiero verde.
Verde vento. Verdes ramas.
El barco sobre la mar.
Y el caballo en la montana.
Mievi
NEVERNA ENA
Povedoh je ja do reke
mislei da devojka je,
al udata ona bee.
To bi nou Svetog Jaga,
i skoro po dogovoru.
Fenjeri su gasli se,
cvrc poeli da svetle.
Iza zadnjih gradskih kua
dotakoh joj grudi snene,
i one se rascvetae
kao zumbul grane nene.
utanje sam ja sluao
utirkane suknje njene,
kao kada komad svile
deset otrh kama see.
Kronje drvea bez sjaja
postajale su sve vee
Vdik pasa lajao je
u daljini iznad reke.
*
I proosmo kraj kupina,
trnja i trske zelene.
Ispod njene pune na tlu
tad napravh udubljenje.
Ja odvezah svoju manu.
Ona skide vel sa sebe.
Ja opasa s revolverom.
Ona jeleke svilene.
Niti smilje nit puev
nisu koe tako lepe,
ni kristali meseev
takvim sjajem ne trepere.
Noge njene beahu mi
kao ribe uplaene,
do pola jo uvek hladne,
a od pola sasvim vrele.
Najlepom sam od putanja
jezdio te noi cele,
na kbli sedefastoj
bez dizgina i opreme.
Ja ne mogu ponoviti
stvari koje ona ree.
Da obazriv budem pamet
nalae mi potenje.
Prljava od poljubaca
l od peska poe s reke.
A na vetar ljiljani su
potezali sablje bele.
Kao pravi Ciganin sam
vladao se celo vee.
Najzad sam joj poklonio
koaru od svile meke.
Al u nju se ne zaljubih
jer udata ona bee,
a ree da devojka je
kad povedoh je do reke.
Ivanievi
TUALJKA ZA IGNACIJEM
SNCHEZ MEJASOM
Mojoj dragoj prijateljici Encarnacion Lopez Julvez
l935.
4.
ODSUTNA DUA
Mojoj dragoj prijateljici Encarnacion Lopez Julvez
l935.
4.
ODSUTNA DUA
Ne pozna te ni bik, ni smokva,
ni konji, ni mravi tvoje kue.
Ne pozna te ni dijete, ni vee,
jer ti si mrtav zauvijek.
Ne pozna te ni hrbat kamena,
ni crna svila u kojoj se raspada.
Ni uspomena te tvoja nijema ne pozna,
jer ti si mrtav zauvijek.
Doi e jesen s trubama
grozdovima oblaka i skupljenim gorama,
al nitko nee htjeti da ti gleda oiju,
jer ti si mrtav zauvijek.
Jer ti si mrtav zauvijek,
kao svi mrtvi Zemljini,
kao svi mrtvi to se zaborave
u jednoj hrpi pasa ugaslih.
Nitko ne pozna. Ne. AI ja o tebi pjevam.
Pjevam za budue tvoj lik i tvoju dra.
Znamenitu zrelost tvoga umjetva.
Tvoju elju za smru i njenih usta okusu.
I tugu na dnu tvoje hrabre radosti.
Kasno e se roditi, ako se roditi uzmogne,
Andaluanin tako sjajan, tako bogat pustolovinom.
Ja pjevam njegovu skladnost rijeima to jauu
i pamtim jedan tuni lahor usred maslina.
Ya mi talle se ha quebrado
como cana de maiz.
*
Tres golpes de sangre tuvo
y se murio de perfil.
Viva moneda que nunca
se volvera a repetir.
Un angel marchoso pone
su cabeza en un cojin.
Otros de rubor cansado
encendieron un candil.
Y cuando los cuatro primos
Ilegan a Benameji,
voces de muerte cesaron
cerca de Guadalquivir.
Biografija
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/federico-garcia-lorca
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/225659/Federico-Garcia-Lorca
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/fglorca.htm