{"id":13152,"date":"2015-04-14T07:36:38","date_gmt":"2015-04-14T11:36:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/?p=13152"},"modified":"2015-04-14T09:43:53","modified_gmt":"2015-04-14T13:43:53","slug":"gunter-grass-1927-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/gunter-grass-1927-2015\/","title":{"rendered":"G\u00fcnter Grass (1927-2015)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"g\u00fcnter-grass-2012\"<\/a>Though best known as a novelist, artist & polemicist, Grass was also a poet. A good obit here<\/a>, an excellent article here<\/a>\u00a0& his last interview here<\/a> in the Guardian. Salman Rushdie tweeted: “This is very sad. A true giant, inspiration, and friend. Drum for him, little Oskar.” (See also Rushdie’s piece in The New Yorker<\/a>). I will reread some of the work, and watch Schl\u00f6ndorf’s \u00a0film version of “The Tin Drum.” Here some of his poems translated by Jerome Rothenberg, from the latter’s New Young German Poets<\/em> (City Lights, 1959):<\/p>\n

MUSIC\u00a0 <\/span>OUT OF DOORS<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

When the silence seemed to have been subdued,
\n<\/span>Aurelius came with the bone.
\nSee my flute and my white shirt,
\nsee the giraffe peering over the fence,
\nthat’s my kin that’s listening.
\nNow I’m going to beat down all those thrushes.<\/p>\n

When the yellow dog ran over the meadow
\nthe concert died out.
\nNobody ever found the bone after that.
\nThe notes were laid out under the chairs,
\nthe concertmaster raised his air-rifle
\nand shot down all the blackbirds.<\/span><\/p>\n

THE\u00a0 <\/span>OPEN WARDROBE<\/b><\/p>\n

The shoes are on the bottom.
\n<\/span>They stand in terror of a beetle
\nOn title way out,
\nOf a penny on the way back in,
\nOf a beetle and a penny on which they can step
\nTill it makes an impression.
\nOn top is the Kingdom of Headwear.
\nHead where it’s safe. Head nowhere.
\nImpossible feathers,
\nTell me the bird’s name,
\nWhere did his eyes roll
\nWhen he found himself trapped in so much color?
\nThe tiny white balls, asleep in the pockets,
\nAre dreaming of moths.
\nHere a button was lost,
\nThe snake in the girdle grew tired.
\nSorrowful silk,
\nAsters and other highly combustible flowers,
\nAutumn transformed to a dress.
\nEvery Sunday stuffed full of meat and the
\nSalt of ruffled panties.
\nBefore the wardrobe grows still, turns wooden,
\nA distant kin of the pine tree \u2014
\nWho’s going to wear your topcoat
\nSomeday when you’re dead?
\nMoving an arm through your sleeve.
\nAnd every movement so friendly?
\nWho will turn up your collar on top,
\nWill continue to stand in front of the pictures,
\nAnd be alone under the windy bell?<\/p>\n

NANA THE\u00a0 <\/span>DOLL: SKETCHES FROM HER DAILY LIFE<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

The Clock<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is playing with the minutes,
\nbut no one’s playing with the doll \u2014
\nunless the clock should take three steps
\nand then say, Nana, Nana, Nana, Nana …<\/span><\/p>\n

The Hairdresser<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is playing with the rain,
\nshe braids it, she covers her ears with its locks,
\nthen she pulls out a comb from a miniature box,
\nand combs the rain with the comb.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Full Moon in March<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll wakes up, the children are asleep,
\nthe moon’s entangled in the curtains,
\nthe doll helps out by shaking the curtains,
\nthe moon plays possum and the doll wakes up.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Humid Day<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll got a yardstick sent as a gift,
\nit was yellow so she played Hurricane.
\nWhen it bent she got lightning without any hitch,
\nbut making it thunder was really a bitch.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hydrophobi<\/i>a<\/p>\n

The doll discovered a hollow tooth,
\n<\/span>she dropped it into a glass.
\nThe glass blew up, but the tooth was safe,
\nso it bit the leg of a chair in half.<\/p>\n

Destiny<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is playing with a spider,
\n<\/span>the spider has a yo yo.
\nThe doll is yanking the line, this could give us all a rough time,
\nso much depends on a line.<\/p>\n

Spring<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is happy, celluloid!
\nthe roof drops water on her head
\nand makes a hole \u2014
\nthe doll is happy, celluloid!<\/span><\/p>\n

Autumn<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is playing with the market,
\ncurrencies and poplars quiver.
\nThe leaves drop down like colored bonds,
\nthe deutschmark’s up the river.<\/span><\/p>\n

At the Zoo<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll rode up to the zoo
\n<\/span>and stared an owl in the eye.
\nSince then the doll’s had mice on the brain,
\nif it only was pre-owlic times again.<\/p>\n

The Longest Song<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll is singing the carpet.
\nBut because the carpet has so many stanzas
\nthe doll will soon be hotter than that \u2014
\nwho knows the last line of the carpet?<\/span><\/p>\n

Careful Love<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll sat under the grownups’ bed and dug every sound.
\nWhen she decided to try it out with the rocking horse
\nshe kept on repeating, during the breaks:
\nBe careful what you’re doing, man, be careful what you’re doing!<\/span><\/p>\n

Lousy Marksman<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll was nailed on a piece of wood
\n<\/span>and bombarded with darts \u2014
\nbut none of them hit her
\nbecause she blinked.<\/p>\n

The Torso<\/i><\/p>\n

The doll wound up without any arms,
\nand after her legs had migrated too,
\n<\/span>she thought for a long time whether to stay in this country \u2014
\nwhen she stayed, well, she said, what could be better than Europe?<\/p>\n

Maturation<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll grew so tall she could look over the dresser.
\n<\/span>Each time the ball bounced she just couldn’t help feeling gay
\nwhere she was. The children down below refused to believe it:
\nthey never would have dreamed their doll would act that way!<\/p>\n

Doll’s Last Sermon<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

Now that the doll has spoken out, the weary slotmachines
\n<\/span>grow dumb, they stop rattling peppermints,
\nthe houses crumble to their knees
\nand turn devout \u2014 and all because the doll has spoken out.<\/p>\n

Afternoon<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The doll fell into the tea,
\ndissolved like sugar in that tea \u2014
\nand whoever drank her got all dolled up
\ntill everyone looked like everyone’s doll.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Memoriam<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

This doll will cost you a dollar ten \u2014
\nat that price she doesn’t look bad at all.
\nBut if you want prettier dollies,
\nthen you’ll have to pay more than a dollar ten.<\/span><\/p>\n

GASCO,\u00a0 <\/span>or
\nTHE\u00a0 <\/span>TOAD<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

In back of our town
\nthere’s a toad who squats on
\n<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0the gasworks
\nwhen he breathes in and out
\n<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0we can cook<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Though best known as a novelist, artist & polemicist, Grass was also a poet. A good obit here, an excellent article here\u00a0& his last interview here in the Guardian. Salman Rushdie tweeted: “This is...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,91,103],"tags":[1651],"class_list":["post-13152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-obituaries","category-poetry","category-translation","tag-gunter-grass"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13152"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13152\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13163,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13152\/revisions\/13163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}