Looking up, 2. Evening on the aerial.Just at the moment I am reading two books, each by an old friend. One, a novel, is on tape, the other an autobiography, is bound between hard covers. Let it never be thought that I am departing from my long held belief, that at my stage of life, one should read only for pleasure. Both books, in their quite different ways, are written with skill and elegance. Both have a strong narrative pull, and I am much enjoying the experience. It is too early to form a judgement about them, if judgement is required, but to read the completed work of someone I know well, is something new - so different from the editing of articles and works in progress, which my job used to require.
Forgive a second example of the work of Louis D'Antin Van Rooten. I have to read it several times aloud before I make the Mother Goose connection:
Raseuse arrête, valet de Tsar bat loups
Joues gare et suite, un sot voyou.
The explanatory footnote to this unlikely scenario begins: "This is a description of an incident at the Russian Imperial court. A valet beats of some wolves, while the lady barber is asked to stop shaving the Tsar. The last three words chide the stupid oaf of a valet for interrupting so delicate an operation (haemophilia was a courge of the Imperial family)".
2 comments:
'Roses are red, violets are blue...'
it was the 'suite' that gave me the clue.
I very much like the way that picture, being in silhouette, loses all form and perspective.
The photograph has a curious and satisfying abstract appearence, as if we are seeing some piece of ornamental wrought-iron work on a plastered wall.
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