The Isle of the Dead

1883

All day I have been listening obsessively to Rachmaninoff's symphonic poem "The Isle of the Dead", the composer's response to the famous painting by the idiosyncratic Swiss painter Arnold Böcklin. Rachmaninoff was obsessed with and terrified by death, and his music is mournful and doom-laden enough. Böcklin's intentions were perhaps somewhat different. He did not give the painting its title, and declared that he painted in order to make people dream: “Just as it is poetry's task to express feelings, painting must provoke them too. A picture must give the spectator as much food for thought as a poem and must make the same kind of impression as a piece of music. Who would ever have been able to anticipate the effect of music before having heard it? Painting should pervade the soul in the same way, and as long as it does not do this it is nothing more than a brainless handicraft. There is no end to the poetry of the beautiful.”

I have indeed dreamt long over these depictions of what seem, in my gloomier moments, ideal places of exile. If it is not, after all, a tomb-island, it would make a perfect retreat. I have left off the customary titles so as not to impede the dreaming.

1878


1886

In every dream home a heartache

Since childhood I've been fascinated by abandoned houses, and I dream of them frequently. Here are some magnificent examples from Russia, which would once have made fine settings for the stories of Tolstoy or Chekhov. It's extraordinary how these houses have sat empty and slowly decaying, perhaps since 1917, while the world has rushed on. So many human projects that could not be sustained, lost in time.

Siesta, or the Joys of Tigerloafing

Frederick Arthur Bridgman, The Siesta, 1878

In my lengthy search for a suitable image to accompany my translation of Govoni's "Peonies", failing to find a satisfactory painting of that flower, I began to look instead at odalisques, and gradually became somewhat obsessed with the motif of languidly reclining woman, so favoured by 19th century painters. I find this work especially soothing; the mild play of light and shade, the harmonious array of complementary colours, the glimpse of lush mediterranean greenery. I could spend days on this sofa, provided some discreet familiar to regularly refill pipe and teapot. Perhaps the monkey would oblige.

I can no longer read novels

Many years ago a dear friend of mine, a poet, declared that he did not read many novels. They were, in his words "dilute poetry". I was not at that time inclined to agree with him, but of late I find a great weariness creeps over me at the thought of reading fiction, a weariness which becomes overwhelming on actually opening a novel and reading a first line. I find myself much in accord with this passage from André Breton's 1924 Manifesto of Surrealism:

...the realistic attitude, inspired by positivism, from Saint Thomas Aquinas to Anatole France, clearly seems to me to be hostile to any intellectual or moral advancement. I loathe it, for it is made up of mediocrity, hate, and dull conceit. It is this attitude which today gives birth to these ridiculous books, these insulting plays. It constantly feeds on and derives strength from the newspapers and stultifies both science and art by assiduously flattering the lowest of tastes; clarity bordering on stupidity, a dog’s life. The activity of the best minds feels the effects of it; the law of the lowest common denominator finally prevails upon them as it does upon the others. An amusing result of this state of affairs, in literature for example, is the generous supply of novels. Each person adds his personal little "observation" to the whole. As a cleansing antidote to all this, M. Paul Valéry recently suggested that an anthology be compiled in which the largest possible number of opening passages from novels be offered; the resulting insanity, he predicted, would be a source of considerable edification. The most famous authors would be included. Such a thought reflects great credit on Paul Valéry who, some time ago, speaking of novels, assured me that, so far as he was concerned, he would continue to refrain from writing: "The Marquise went out at five." But has he kept his word?

If the purely informative style, of which the sentence just quoted is a prime example, is virtually the rule rather than the exception in the novel form, it is because, in all fairness, the author’s ambition is severely circumscribed. The circumstantial, needlessly specific nature of each of their notations leads me to believe that they are perpetrating a joke at my expense. I am spared not even one of the character’s slightest vacillations: will he be fairhaired? what will his name be? will we first meet him during the summer? So many questions resolved once and for all, as chance directs; the only discretionary power left me is to close the book, which I am careful to do somewhere in the vicinity of the first page. And the descriptions! There is nothing to which their vacuity can be compared; they are nothing but so many superimposed images taken from some stock catalogue, which the author utilizes more and more whenever he chooses; he seizes the opportunity to slip me his postcards, he tries to make me agree with him about the clichés:

The small room into which the young man was shown was covered with yellow wallpaper: there were geraniums in the windows, which were covered with muslin curtains; the setting sun cast a harsh light over the entire setting... There was nothing special about the room. The furniture, of yellow wood, was all very old. A sofa with a tall back turned down, an oval table opposite the sofa, a dressing table and a mirror set against the pierglass, some chairs along the walls, two or three etchings of no value portraying some German girls with birds in their hands – such were the furnishings. (Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment)

I am in no mood to admit that the mind is interested in occupying itself with such matters, even fleetingly. It may be argued that this school-boy description has its place, and that at this juncture of the book the author has his reasons for burdening me. Nevertheless he is wasting his time, for I refuse to go into his room. Others’ laziness or fatigue does not interest me. I have too unstable a notion of the continuity of life to equate or compare my moments of depression or weakness with my best moments. When one ceases to feel, I am of the opinion one should keep quiet. And I would like it understood that I am not accusing or condemning lack of originality as such. I am only saying that I do not take particular note of the empty moments of my life, that it may be unworthy for any man to crystallize those which seem to him to be so. I shall, with your permission, ignore the description of that room, and many more like it.

Peonies

paraphrase from the Italian of Corrado Govoni

Peony, exaggerate rose, rose
Dionysiac, rose in crinolines
Rose proud as a princeling
Posing in the mirror

Odalisque bathing nude
And voluptuous, between mirrors
In precious majolica vases
Impassive as a Grand Eunuch

Rose pregnant with red (O
Dimpled womb of ecstasy!) your faint scent
Spreads like the fresh, cool feeling

Of a languid twilight, roseate
After the rain, when a cock crows;
Or of a placid crystal mirror.

--DTH

l'Atelier de Georges Braque

"In Art there is only one thing that counts; the thing you can't explain."

Atelier II, 1949

"We will never have repose. The present is perpetual."

Atelier V, 1949-50

"It is the unforeseeable that creates the event."

Atelier VI, 1950-51

"I don’t do as I want, I do as I can."

André Breton. L'union libre (1931)

Ma femme à la chevelure de feu de bois

Aux pensées d'éclairs de chaleur

A la taille de sablier

Ma femme à la taille de loutre entre les dents du tigre

Ma femme à la bouche de cocarde et de bouquet d'étoiles de dernière grandeur

Aux dents d'empreintes de souris blanche sur la terre blanche

A la langue d'ambre et de verre frottés

Ma femme à la langue d'hostie poignardée

A la langue de poupée qui ouvre et ferme les yeux

A la langue de pierre incroyable

Ma femme aux cils de bâtons d'écriture d'enfant

Aux sourcils de bord de nid d'hirondelle

Ma femme aux tempes d'ardoise de toit de serre

Et de buée aux vitres

Ma femme aux épaules de champagne

Et de fontaine à têtes de dauphins sous la glace

Ma femme aux poignets d'allumettes

Ma femme aux doigts de hasard et d'as de coeur

Aux doigts de foin coupé

Ma femme aux aisselles de martre et de fênes

De nuit de la Saint-Jean

De troène et de nid de scalares

Aux bras d'écume de mer et d'écluse

Et de mélange du blé et du moulin

Ma femme aux jambes de fusée

Aux mouvements d'horlogerie et de désespoir

Ma femme aux mollets de moelle de sureau

Ma femme aux pieds d'initiales

Aux pieds de trousseaux de clés aux pieds de calfats qui boivent

Ma femme au cou d'orge imperlé

Ma femme à la gorge de Val d'or

De rendez-vous dans le lit même du torrent

Aux seins de nuit

Ma femme aux seins de taupinière marine

Ma femme aux seins de creuset du rubis

Aux seins de spectre de la rose sous la rosée

Ma femme au ventre de dépliement d'éventail des jours

Au ventre de griffe géante

Ma femme au dos d'oiseau qui fuit vertical

Au dos de vif-argent

Au dos de lumière

A la nuque de pierre roulée et de craie mouillée

Et de chute d'un verre dans lequel on vient de boire

Ma femme aux hanches de nacelle

Aux hanches de lustre et de pennes de flèche

Et de tiges de plumes de paon blanc

De balance insensible

Ma femme aux fesses de grès et d'amiante

Ma femme aux fesses de dos de cygne

Ma femme aux fesses de printemps

Au sexe de glaïeul

Ma femme au sexe de placer et d'ornithorynque

Ma femme au sexe d'algue et de bonbons anciens

Ma femme au sexe de miroir

Ma femme aux yeux pleins de larmes

Aux yeux de panoplie violette et d'aiguille aimantée

Ma femme aux yeux de savane

Ma femme aux yeux d'eau pour boire en prison

Ma femme aux yeux de bois toujours sous la hache

Aux yeux de niveau d'eau de niveau d'air de terre et de feu.

:: I would very much like to translate this poem but unfortunately some key words like "fesses" and indeed "femme" lack pleasing equivalents in English. Perhaps I will attempt a sort of paraphrase...