Versindaba » W.H. Auden
Louis Esterhuizen. Die skaam woede van ‘n vroeëre maaksel
Bykans alle digters ken daardie gevoel: die louwarm gloed van verleentheid wanneer jy na jou vroegste skryfsels kyk en besef hoe lomp jy met jou skryfwerk omgegaan het; die drif was dalk daar, saam met die ‘fantastiese’ idee, maar helaas, die tegniek om gestalte te gee aan dié idee het toentertyd nog ontbreek …
Presies hieroor het The Atlantic onlangs ‘n ellelange analise gepubliseer, met WH Auden en sy jarelange (en vergeefse) pogings om een van sy mees beroemdste gedigte te misken: “September 1, 1939” is one of W. H. Auden’s most famous and oft-quoted poems. Its images of futility and despair in the face of violence, of the inevitable destruction and sacrifice of yet another war have such a universal immediacy that they’ve been revived time and time again, whenever sudden bloodshed rears its head. Perhaps the most quoted line of all is the one that closes the poem’s penultimate stanza: ‘We must love one another or die’.”
Afgesien daarvan dat Auden in sy leeftyd dié gedig herhaaldelik verwerk het, het hy hom uiteindelik daarvan gedistansieer en geweier om verdere toestemming te gee dat dit in antologieë opgeneem word. In die voorwoord tot sy versamelde gedigte (wat in 1965 verskyn het), het hy dit soos volg gestel: “”Some poems which I wrote and, unfortunately, published, I have thrown out because they were dishonest, or bad-mannered, or boring.” Volgens Auden is ‘n oneerlike gedig die volgende: “A dishonest poem is one which expresses, no matter how well, feelings or beliefs which its author never felt or entertained. Youth may be forgiven when it is brash and noisy, but this does not mean that brashness and noise are virtues.”
En daardie reeds genoemde reël het hy herhaaldelik probeer verbeter; uiteindelik die “or” vervang na “We must love one another and die” en toe die hele gedoente uit moedeloosheid laat vaar gedig inkluis.
Die vraag wat egter volgens The Atlantic na vore dring, is die volgende: “But are we bound by Auden’s own evaluation of his work, and are we somehow wrong if we seek out-and even dare to enjoy-words that he doesn’t believe in any longer? If he didn’t want to see the poem, should we turn from it as well? The question is an old one, long predating Auden’s famous revisions and recastings: The decision to unwrite, in a manner of speaking, certain moments of past work-and the subsequent split of popular opinion on the justifiability of that choice. When it comes to such arguments, who is right? Who is justified? Why does it matter-and what does it even matter, in the modern age where it’s no longer an easy thing for the past to simply disappear?”
Inderdaad. Hierna volg ‘n heel omvattende uiteensetting van soortgelyke insidente in die geskiedenis van die letterkunde; van Homerus na James Joyce en Hemingway, van Chaucer tot Gerald Manley Hopkins. En nog vele ander; die meeste waarvan die vroeëre tekste nie net misken is nie, maar vernietig is weens verskillende redes.
En volgens The Atlantic se essayis is dít die belangrike verskil tussen Auden se optrede en soveel ander voorbeelde: “For, here is the crucial difference. Auden didn’t pull a Nabokov or a Kafka, requesting that his originals be burned (of course, this isn’t a perfect comparison. Nabokov and Kafka’s works remained unfinished, while Auden’s was done-and yet, Auden argued that one never actually finishes a poem; one only ever puts it aside). We should remember that Auden’s instructions to Edward Mendelson had an important caveat. ‘I once asked him what he wanted done with the poem, what I should do as his literary executor,’ Mendelson recalled on the occasion of what would have been Auden’s 100th birthday. ‘And he thought for a moment and said, ‘I don’t want it reprinted during my lifetime.’ That ‘during my lifetime’ is key. Auden didn’t want anything destroyed. He just didn’t want to see it, to have it haunt him, taunt him, even, in his advancing age.”
Mmm … maar die vraag bly hom na vore dring: Moet die digter se skroomvalligheid of skaamte deel word van die leser se plesier aan die teks? Ten sterkste het Joseph Brodsky byvoorbeeld gevoel dat “September 1, 1939” hoegenaamd nie verdien om geïgnoreer te word nie; trouens vir hom was dit so ‘n belangrike gedig dat hy ‘n hele lesing, wat later in sy essay-bundel Less Than One opgeneem is, afgestaan het: “Brodsky considered (this poem) a masterpiece, and urging his listeners on with the hope that they would develop the same sentiment toward this poem as the one that prompted it into existence-one of love. And this, despite agreeing with Auden that that damned line was quite problematic. “
Miskien sou Auden in later jare self meer toegeeflik gewees het teenoor hierdie vroeëre maaksel van hom; dalk selfs gehoor gegee het aan die woorde wat hy in nog ‘n beroemde vers van hom, “In Memory of W. B. Yeats,” geuiter het: “The words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living.”
Graag wil ek egter vanoggend se betoog sluit met ‘n langerige aanhaling oor die onderwerp; gevolg deur die gedig waaroor dit hier handel. Oordeel dus maar self of Auden se skaam woede jeens dié maaksel van hom geregverdig is, al dan nie.
“A work need not be the same for author and reader alike, especially the longer the time that passes between them. If a work doesn’t feel true, it will lose its steam-and perhaps the best proof of the universality of something like “September 1, 1939” is how often it has been called upon during its lifetime, to help us understand violence and humanity, war and responsibility, love and guilt.
Tags: September 1 1939, W.H. Auden
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In die kol reklame
Robert Graves het by geleentheid die volgende opmerking gemaak: “There’s no money in poetry, but then there’s no poetry in money, either.” Dit wil egter nou voorkom asof dié uitspraak die afgelope tyd ernstig onder druk geplaas word deur die Britse reklame-agentskappe. So gebruik McDonald’s die volgende reëls uit ‘n gedig van Rolf Harris: “The Gothy types and scoffy types and like-their-coffee-frothy types were just passing by.” Nog ‘n voorbeeld is Pete Postlethwaite wat die volgende poësie kwytraak in ‘n advertensie vir Cathedral City cheddar kaas: “On the A47 it’s cheese with cucumber / It’s lunchtime for her as the rest of us slumber.”
Volgens The Guardian se berig is daar sommer ‘n horde ander instansies wat begin het om poësie in te span vir reklamedoeleindes. Hieronder tel die AA, Waitrose, Center Parcs en Prudential.
Maar hoe voel die digters hieroor? Liverpool se beroemste digter, Roger McGough, het die volgende te sê gehad: “It doesn’t always please me. It’s like when you hear music used in an advert and you feel it has degraded it. But as long as the poems are used respectfully, I think it can be OK. Center Parcs used Leisure by William Henry Davies, and Waitrose used Keats’s To Autumn. I wrote a poem for a Prudential ad campaign, but Adrian Mitchell said he wouldn’t do it. Verse has always been used in adverts – memorable language and the expectancy of rhyme are powerful – but it has to be used respectfully.”
Nick Toczek, wie se gedig deur Prudential gebruik is, het sy bereidwilligheid tot misbruik soos volg gemotiveer: “Shakespeare would have thought commercialism was worth it. Populism is good. The more language matters to people the better. Look how Auden sold after Four Weddings and a Funeral. But there is a line – I would have reservations about the politics of doing a poem for McDonald’s, for example. But my Prudential poem is still the most recognised of all my poems. It took me 20 minutes to write, was broadcast 5,000 times and earned me £5,500.”
Die reëls wat deur Prudential gebruik is, lees soos volg: “Our kids, who’ve grown and flown the nest, / Now only phone us to request / More cash on loan, their tone depressed.”
Nou ja, toe. Laat ons nie die krag van die poëtiese woord of frase onderskat nie!
Nuwe plasings op die webblad is Bernard Odendaal se resensie oor Lucie Möller se bundel Watermerke, en ook Carina Stander wat op haar blog een van haar gunsteling aanhalings uit die boek Women who run with wolves, met haar lesers deel.
Ten slotte – my kar staan alweer gepak om môre-oggend baie vroeg die pad na die noorde aan te durf. Hierdie is dus die laaste Nuuswekker tot kort voor die nuwe jaar … Graag wil ek en Marlise dan van hierdie geleentheid gebruik maak om elkeen van ons Versindaba-besoekers en -deelnemers die allermooiste Kerstyd toe te wens.
As toegif vanoggend, nié DJ Opperman se bekende “Kersliedjie” nie, maar ietsie op ‘n meer persoonlike vlak: Marlise se pragtige “Kersoggend” , met die hoop dat Kersdag vir jou en jou geliefdes ook ‘n tyd van stille vreugde sal wees … (Terloops, as verdere leesprikkel kan jy gerus Willem Jan Otten se “adventessay”, asook sy vertaling van T.S. Eliot se gedig “The Journey of the Magi”, hier op De Contrabas te lese kry.)
Nuuswekker hervat weer volgende week.
so stil begin die dag –
op die horison ‘n silwer ketting
van heuwels ingekurwe
met die roerlose landskap
enkele vlietende vlerke van voëls
gevurk oor ‘n wingerd
soos die stiltes
tussen note van ‘n fluit
tussen die gespierde bene
van ‘n enkele donker boom
rus die tjello van ‘n oggendson
en die dun strykstok van ‘n wolk
halveer die strale van lig
van klanklose klank
so stil begin die dag
(c) Marlise Joubert (uit: Lyfsange, 2001: Protea Boekhuis)
Tags: Nick Toczek, Roger McGough, W.H. Auden