Habit of mind

'..the doubt of one who would rather walk in mystery than in false lights, who awaits that he may win, and who prefers the broken fragments of truth to the imposing completeness of a delusion.'

Saturn’s modern melancholy

'In an article Verlaine wrote at the same time as the publication of Poèmes Saturniens he attacked the Romantic idea of inspiration and of “life” and “human nature” and came out in favour of a poetry completely mastered, controlled and formal. Nor did he in his best work present “themes” that preceded and were external to the actual poems; as we read we feel that we are watching those poems materialize under his pen, just as Chopin’s Nocturnes come to life under his improvising fingers. Nevertheless, since this first book brought together some very early poems written in his collège days as well as his most up-to-date experiments, it is something of a grab-bag, and anything but consistent or programmatic.'

Roving thoughts

'It was a hot and suffocating day. The windows were all flung open, but there wasn’t even the hint of a breeze, not even the slightest wind coming in from outside. Chekhov sat at his writing desk, immersed in his thoughts. I gazed at his tired, mournful eyes, trying to make a sketch of his head tilting to one side. His mind was on his work, but his face looked drawn, and his features—it seemed to me— were dissolving into the air. He had a kind of curve in his spine, and his entire posture indicated that he was exhausted. He had lost a lot of weight, and he looked gaunt. His posture, including his tilted head, his tired face, the tense movements of his thick hands – all this asserted that this was a person listening to his inner voice, to a voice which a strong, healthy man would never hear, due to the process of the illness going on inside of him. It was very difficult for me to look upon the features of a person so very sick. Yet, at the same time, the experience was invaluable for the entire country. “Have you found anything worth painting?” he asked me about his portrait. I looked at his somber face and replied, “No. It does not look anything like what I wanted to depict. You seem too sad and tired in this portrait.” “Then let us leave it as it is. Please, do not change anything. The first impression is always the most truthful.”'

Constelaţii răsturnate

"Dropia magică, de o-nălţime amară şi o supleţe noptatică, întâlnită numai la seminţiile nomade, desfăcu larg aripile şi înaintă cu paşi siguri spre fântâna cu mir răsărită şi ea pe neaşteptate în micul vad al bălţii. O trupă de arici cu ţepii ascuţiţi făcu roată în jurul fântânii, gata să răspundă oricărui atac. Din surpări de timp, poate din constelaţii răsturnate, se auzi din nou glasul doamnei cu mantilă violet şi mănuşi albe: -E vremea ca puii de zeu egiptean să se arate. O privighetoare roşie începu un cântec fermecat în cuibul ei dintre trestii. Întrupaţi parcă din trilurile vrăjite sau răsăriţi din fântâna de mir, puii de zeu egiptean se înfăţişară în poiană: închipuiri de abur şi de lună. "

The Question is

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscover’d country from whose bourn

No traveler returns, puzzles the will

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all

incapabil de a voi

"...Dar nu merge. În opt ani de când m-am întors în România, decepţiune a urmat după decepţiune, şi mă simt atât de bătrîn şi atât de obosit, încât degeaba pun mâna pe condei să-ncerc a scrie ceva. Simt că nu mai pot, mă simt că am secat moraliceşte şi că mi-ar trebui un lung, lung repaus ca să-mi vin în fire..."

first autumn

Can I learn from what they taught the disheveled nature of mourning?
These images press together the very thing they are, the evening star

encouraging thought, an address where the ageless assemble,
that perfumed perfection mirrored in a spring rain

settling now on the limestone quarried near this spot. Their sweet
society sings and avows presence; though far off they are ever nigh.

++++++

2/5 dialog

Umbrele şi-au părăsit lucrurile cărora le aparţin. Ele nu mai aparţin decât după-amiezii târzii care a trecut.

“nuclear option”

Amazingly, some voices within the art establishment call for going with this “nuclear option.” British art critic Brian Sewell struck a blow for the sell outs in a recent BBC interview responding to the Cimam statement. “The art world is not sacred,” Sewell declaimed. If the choice is between selling off some art and cutting public services, then Sewell will take selling the art. Ever the critic, Sewell claimed that up to 800 paintings in the National Gallery of London alone “aren’t up to scratch”—just the tip of the iceberg of the vast storehouse of unseen art kept in museums around the world. “Why have a museum full of rubbish?” Sewell concludes. Of course, one man’s rubbish is another man’s treasure. Aside from the question of just how plentiful the art market would be for critically condemned “rubbish,” there lingers the question of who gets to label and then take out the trash.