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Today is the anniversary of the birth of one of my favorite writers, Hermann Hesse. Over the years I've read lots about his irrelevance, about his rise in popularity during a time of wild-eyed, romantic enthusiasm, which has since dimmed in what I believe he would characterize as the shadow of lost dreams. He always considered himself a poet first and foremost and we have only 3 slim volumes of verse in English. In recent years, I have reread the major works and am happy to report that, unlike the wild-eyed romantic enthusiasm of an entire generation, they have not dimmed. He lived through tumultuous times and here is a short poem of his, translated by the incomparable James Wright, that captures the dark times through which we are currently passing as well as it does his own:
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Evil Time
Now we are silent
And sing no songs anymore,
Our pace grows heavy;
This is the night, that was bound to come.
Give me your hand,
Perhaps we still have a long way to go.
It's snowing, it's snowing.
Winter is a hard thing in a strange country.
Where is the time
When a light, a hearth burned for us?
Give me your hand!
Perhaps we still have a long way to go.
Hermann Hesse
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For more on Hesse, with a short, brilliant poetry excerpt, check out today's Writer's Almanac. Pictured at the beginning of this post is one of the excellent covers for Hesse's works by Milton Glaser.
best,
Don
----------------------------------------------------year's end--
the bell of my death place
tolls too
Issa
translated by David Lanoue
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Some very sad news in the world of books; Cody's Books, a staple of the Berkeley, CA, scene for over 50 years closed its doors last week.
Cody's announcement from their webpage ...
Followed by some very ominous news in the world of books: amazon.uk starts to strong arm publishers for larger profit margins (the Times headline, by the way, is all wrong: Hachette is the largest publisher in the UK). Neil Gaiman, ever the voice of moderation in the real world, theorized that its time to start pointing our links elsewhere for book information and I believe he is right, at least until this thing gets straight. Actually, he was just speaking for himself (and one can only imagine the sales he generates from his online journal with all the fine recommendations he makes), but his is an excellent example to follow.
This will remind folks who have been warning about the ever beneficent google what might happen if they decided to start wielding their power in a whole scale negative way. I've always been a proponent of amazon (and not particularly prone to online paranoia) and a supporter of independent shops in my buying habits but this gives one pause, indeed.
Not only is the wolf at the door: we appear to have invited him in for dinner.
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spotting wolf shit--
the grass
is so cold
Issa
translated by David Lanoue
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best,
Don
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