Writing: After the work of planning and establishing structure, the book went off to a new start from a different unexpected angle, nothing to do with the plan at all. I am surprised and pleased, what is there makes sense, though I have the feeling of being bogged down at the moment. Never mind, important to keep on keeping on.
Israeli visitor, Remembrance Day for the Fallen with the Embassy and the rest of the Wellington community - her brother was a pilot who was killed, intense grief, trying to do my best. Old feeling of betrayal of Herzl's dream.
A friend came to see me and said: I have recurrent dreams where I dream that I am nothing, I have achieved nothing, my life made no difference to anyone.
She was upset.
But it is true, I said, we both laughed out loud, and that was it.
Last night, she slept without dreaming.
The usual stuff: "Life is fleeting, an autumn leaf carried away on a dancing stream..." (Not a quote, but it might be).
Wednesday, 11 May 2011
Monday, 2 May 2011
On reading the Todesfuge at the Holocaust Memorial Ceremony
At the Holocaust Memorial ceremony last night, the programme cover said in big words Compassion and Re.....(can't remember the Re... word right now - forgetting words happens more frequently: during the week-end, forgot the word 'parsnip' for a while. I stood and stared at the parsnip and only the p came back. The rest of the word absented itself for a couple of hours).
The Holocaust is not about Compassion and Re..... (I'll add the Re word when it comes back, at the end of this post), which were one might say, significantly lacking at the time. Restrained myself from prefacing my reading by mentioning that even if the 12 000 Righteous Gentiles had been double the number, that is 24 000, and even if each of them had saved 10 Jews - which most did not, though a few saved thousands - only 240 000 Jews would have been saved. Reminded myself that 'He who saves the life of one person, it is as if he had saved the entire world." (Who said that?)
Someone whose opinion I value said I read Celan's poem 'appropriately', the best compliment that evening - some people came to tell me I'd read well. The poem seemed to take over, and there was the intent silence of attentive people. Several people had previously turned down the opportunity to read that poem, too difficult to read, they said, no punctuation.
I am glad that it ended up being me. A duty fulfilled. It was a bit of a battle to get it into the programme - another poem by a Holocaust Survivor was suggested, about a credo about belief in human goodness. I responded that it was 'powerfully optimistic' whereas Celan is not a comfortable read (Hah!). But then the Holocaust was not a comfortable event.
Still waiting for Re... to reappear.
The poem about a survivor's belief in human goodness (Alexander Kimel) was read last, after several poems and songs which were full of grief. That felt like the right place for it, a positive thought to go home with.
Added the next day: the Re... word was Resilience.
The Holocaust is not about Compassion and Re..... (I'll add the Re word when it comes back, at the end of this post), which were one might say, significantly lacking at the time. Restrained myself from prefacing my reading by mentioning that even if the 12 000 Righteous Gentiles had been double the number, that is 24 000, and even if each of them had saved 10 Jews - which most did not, though a few saved thousands - only 240 000 Jews would have been saved. Reminded myself that 'He who saves the life of one person, it is as if he had saved the entire world." (Who said that?)
Someone whose opinion I value said I read Celan's poem 'appropriately', the best compliment that evening - some people came to tell me I'd read well. The poem seemed to take over, and there was the intent silence of attentive people. Several people had previously turned down the opportunity to read that poem, too difficult to read, they said, no punctuation.
I am glad that it ended up being me. A duty fulfilled. It was a bit of a battle to get it into the programme - another poem by a Holocaust Survivor was suggested, about a credo about belief in human goodness. I responded that it was 'powerfully optimistic' whereas Celan is not a comfortable read (Hah!). But then the Holocaust was not a comfortable event.
Still waiting for Re... to reappear.
The poem about a survivor's belief in human goodness (Alexander Kimel) was read last, after several poems and songs which were full of grief. That felt like the right place for it, a positive thought to go home with.
Added the next day: the Re... word was Resilience.
Thursday, 28 April 2011
On apology and victimhood
On Yom Kippur, it is traditional to apologise to those whom you may have offended during the past year. As an exercise, someone I know decided to apologise to everyone he knew in his congregation. Since he was an active person within the community, this meant apologising to a great number of people.
He found to his dismay that all those he apologised to felt that he had indeed offended them, and acknowledged his apology as their due, rather than dismissing it with a wave of the hand, which is what he had anticipated. He found the experience was so devastating that he had to stop before completing his mission.
At this point I must explain that this man is loved by the congregation. He is a sensitive and caring person.
Despite our efforts to be kind and loving, it seems that we cannot live together without hurting each other. It is like holding a new-born baby - take care of its head - and when meeting another person - take care of their heart. We are so fragile, so very fragile, the slightest touch leaves a mark, a bruise, which we nurse and brood over. We live together, constantly bumping and rubbing up against each other. It is unavoidable.
Thinking about this man's experience, I hypothesize furthermore that it is possible that most people originally had no conscious grievance. His apology might suggest to them that they had missed something, that they had been wronged - and so they obliged by immediately remembering a situation involving him when events might have turned out more favourably, when things turned out to what they view as their disadvantage. Such a situation is easy to find, even, sometimes, with a slight shifting of perspective, easy to manufacture. It is enticing to produce the goods required: the temptation to assume the victim position proved too strong to resist. A victim after all is pure and faultless, one might almost say perfect.
This connection between victimhood and the sense of being an elevated sort of being explains the attractiveness of the situation: by apologising to someone, we offer them the chance to inhabit the realm of the injured innocent, the realm of the angels, while all that is bad and wrong resides within us. They are good and we are bad, they are right and we are wrong, they are the light and we are the darkness.
It would seem that this temptation is to be resisted, for while we may be injured, we are rarely innocent.
Furthermore, when you think about it, cultivating a feeling of aggrievedness creates a world full of reasons to feel aggrieved. One is reminded of the joke where a mother gives her son two ties for his birthday. When he next visits he is wearing one of them and she asks: "And what is wrong with the other one?"
What is wrong? What is wrong! Notice the typical expression - the other one. The fault lies in the other.
Never this one here, it is never us. One is always looking beyond oneself for what is wrong. This is where an apology is the right action: the only wrong we need to be concerned with is the one we have committed ourselves. Apologising to people teaches us how easily they are hurt, where and how we may have gone wrong.
Something wrong can always be found. Take an ordinary experience like drinking coffee in one of Wellington's coffeeshops. The service may be too slow, the coffee too cold, too sweet, too weak, too expensive, the cup too big, too small, unwieldy, the cafe too dirty, too noisy, too full, too empty, we can go on and on, our creativity is immense. We emerge from this practice displeased with our place in the world, disgruntled.
An Orthodox Jew told me that Jewish practice requires one to say on average 100 blessings a day. This is another creative practice: find what is good, what to be grateful for, and learn the fine art of contentment.
He found to his dismay that all those he apologised to felt that he had indeed offended them, and acknowledged his apology as their due, rather than dismissing it with a wave of the hand, which is what he had anticipated. He found the experience was so devastating that he had to stop before completing his mission.
At this point I must explain that this man is loved by the congregation. He is a sensitive and caring person.
Despite our efforts to be kind and loving, it seems that we cannot live together without hurting each other. It is like holding a new-born baby - take care of its head - and when meeting another person - take care of their heart. We are so fragile, so very fragile, the slightest touch leaves a mark, a bruise, which we nurse and brood over. We live together, constantly bumping and rubbing up against each other. It is unavoidable.
Thinking about this man's experience, I hypothesize furthermore that it is possible that most people originally had no conscious grievance. His apology might suggest to them that they had missed something, that they had been wronged - and so they obliged by immediately remembering a situation involving him when events might have turned out more favourably, when things turned out to what they view as their disadvantage. Such a situation is easy to find, even, sometimes, with a slight shifting of perspective, easy to manufacture. It is enticing to produce the goods required: the temptation to assume the victim position proved too strong to resist. A victim after all is pure and faultless, one might almost say perfect.
This connection between victimhood and the sense of being an elevated sort of being explains the attractiveness of the situation: by apologising to someone, we offer them the chance to inhabit the realm of the injured innocent, the realm of the angels, while all that is bad and wrong resides within us. They are good and we are bad, they are right and we are wrong, they are the light and we are the darkness.
It would seem that this temptation is to be resisted, for while we may be injured, we are rarely innocent.
Furthermore, when you think about it, cultivating a feeling of aggrievedness creates a world full of reasons to feel aggrieved. One is reminded of the joke where a mother gives her son two ties for his birthday. When he next visits he is wearing one of them and she asks: "And what is wrong with the other one?"
What is wrong? What is wrong! Notice the typical expression - the other one. The fault lies in the other.
Never this one here, it is never us. One is always looking beyond oneself for what is wrong. This is where an apology is the right action: the only wrong we need to be concerned with is the one we have committed ourselves. Apologising to people teaches us how easily they are hurt, where and how we may have gone wrong.
Something wrong can always be found. Take an ordinary experience like drinking coffee in one of Wellington's coffeeshops. The service may be too slow, the coffee too cold, too sweet, too weak, too expensive, the cup too big, too small, unwieldy, the cafe too dirty, too noisy, too full, too empty, we can go on and on, our creativity is immense. We emerge from this practice displeased with our place in the world, disgruntled.
An Orthodox Jew told me that Jewish practice requires one to say on average 100 blessings a day. This is another creative practice: find what is good, what to be grateful for, and learn the fine art of contentment.
Monday, 4 April 2011
'Juedische Winterhilfe'
Those are the words at the top of the page: I am starting again, reading a bundle of photocopies of 1930s newsletters in German, in Gothic print - an emotional experience, delving into what is both precious and fertile. I am writing a reconstruction of the past, something to be examined and understood.
About twenty years ago, I visited an old lady who was a therapist and she said to me, Last year at this time you were also depressed - what is it about November that upsets you so much?
At that time I did not know, but now I am sure.
I must follow up on that little CD too.
I am unable to read anything else now.
About twenty years ago, I visited an old lady who was a therapist and she said to me, Last year at this time you were also depressed - what is it about November that upsets you so much?
At that time I did not know, but now I am sure.
I must follow up on that little CD too.
I am unable to read anything else now.
Tuesday, 22 March 2011
Living in the 21st century
I am so glad I live now: the wonderful local City Library - this city is neither very large nor very rich, on an international scale - stocks most of the books I want to read. Researching translation, I found both Umberto Eco and Lawrence Venuti on their shelves. I am most grateful.
There are many other things to be grateful for, this is the one for today. Found another book on translation which I have not read yet but which promises well, Edith Grossman, Why translation matters. Found it between the two others, it is also physically a beautiful object, made with care. Ah, care!
There are many other things to be grateful for, this is the one for today. Found another book on translation which I have not read yet but which promises well, Edith Grossman, Why translation matters. Found it between the two others, it is also physically a beautiful object, made with care. Ah, care!
Monday, 21 March 2011
Saying more about what is gone
Up on time this morning, still dark, exercises, Zen, breakfast with the news (Japan's misery, Libya's misery), load washing machine, remove and fold dry washing from line, tidy up kitchen, Skype phone call with a sister whose birthday it is today. Answer varied emails.
Finally, at last, to the dining room, taken over for the purpose of planning the novel.
The stickies I used on Friday to work on a plan for the novel have curled away from the large sheets of thick paper which are supposed to provide a panoramic view. These stickies had previously curled away from the back of the door in my study, I thought it was the door, but it is the stickies which are the problem. They are small and white. I wrote on them in four colours, one per main character.
Went to the local supermarket, some auxiliary shopping - milk, bread, fruit etc. - but in the end they don't stock Stickies, they're not sure what they are. Finished shopping, checked out the local Post Office which doubles up as a stationery store, yes they have some - not the usual ones, these may be more expensive. Bought 300, larger, light yellow.
Drive home, two full bags heaved onto the kitchen bench, everything put away, make cups of tea for two, enter the dining room again with my new stickies. The coaster from Amsterdam is waiting for my cup of tea. It is now 11:20 am.
An annoying stimulus has disappeared - something like a sound, an inner manifestation. I am in a quiet place and all is well, at last. I want to write. I can write.
Latest books: Chaim Potok, The Book of Lights (Heinemann, 1981) - not my favourite of his, that remains The Chosen, this one is partly autobiographical. As always a terrific tale-spinner, creates a world I find hard to emerge from, I am very susceptible- my preference is to read books such as these in one go, get them over with. Umberto Eco refers to such writing as 'para-literature'.
Most other people seem to enjoy them without becoming trapped. Missed the time slot for an important phone call. Upsetting, maybe for both of us.
Jose Saramago The Elephant's Journey (Harvill Secker, 2010) translated by the wonderful Margaret Jull Costa: enjoyable and whimsical, though at times a little formulaic. Maybe not so for someone who hasn't read his other books. One feels that Saramago is very old and a little child-like in his optimism. Is that what is wrong with this book - that there is no true evil in it? Saramago has written well about evil elsewhere - read his book Blindness, a masterpiece.
Yesterday raced through a slim volume entitled A Murder in Lemberg: Politics , religion, and violence in modern Jewish history, by historian Professor Michael Stanislawski of Columbia University. First of all, it is well written, a good pace, an enjoyable read. The murder takes place in 19th century Poland, the
brilliant Reform Rabbi is assassinated by an Orthodox Jew. (Documentation of evil in various forms). The brilliance of the Rabbi is not sufficiently substantiated for my liking, but the positive outcome of reading the book - from the point of view of the one I am writing myself - was learning about the ways in which certain practices changed between the Orthodox and the newer forms of Judaism. Also: with his description of contemporary Lemberg, Professor Stanislawski bears witness in a powerful way to the destruction and disappearance of Eastern European Jewry, a topic of which much more might be said.
Finally, I am about to finish a short book on the theory of translation: Umberto Eco's Mouse or Rat? Translation as Negotiation, (Phoenix, 2003) from his lectures at the University of Toronto in 1988. I also started Lawrence Venuti's The Translator's Invisibility, a History of Translation (2nd edn.,Routledge, 1995, 2002). I have to prepare a translator's statement of principle for the translation I have just finished, and this reading is supposed to give me the required insight and jargon.
Eco's book is engrossing: it would be satisfying for anyone who has lived in several languages. I started Venuti's book because I couldn't get hold of an article of his which encapsulates his theory. Maybe I'll try harder: the book is too much work for my purpose. There is a reference by Eco to another Venuti article which I'll follow up.
For my edification, am continuing to read No Time to Lose, by Pema Chodron (Shambhala, 2005). Slow work, like building a brick wall, or putting a jigsaw puzzle together. Every now and then, a sense of having achieved/understood something new. But mostly one has to carry on, a little doggedly.
Finally, at last, to the dining room, taken over for the purpose of planning the novel.
The stickies I used on Friday to work on a plan for the novel have curled away from the large sheets of thick paper which are supposed to provide a panoramic view. These stickies had previously curled away from the back of the door in my study, I thought it was the door, but it is the stickies which are the problem. They are small and white. I wrote on them in four colours, one per main character.
Went to the local supermarket, some auxiliary shopping - milk, bread, fruit etc. - but in the end they don't stock Stickies, they're not sure what they are. Finished shopping, checked out the local Post Office which doubles up as a stationery store, yes they have some - not the usual ones, these may be more expensive. Bought 300, larger, light yellow.
Drive home, two full bags heaved onto the kitchen bench, everything put away, make cups of tea for two, enter the dining room again with my new stickies. The coaster from Amsterdam is waiting for my cup of tea. It is now 11:20 am.
An annoying stimulus has disappeared - something like a sound, an inner manifestation. I am in a quiet place and all is well, at last. I want to write. I can write.
Latest books: Chaim Potok, The Book of Lights (Heinemann, 1981) - not my favourite of his, that remains The Chosen, this one is partly autobiographical. As always a terrific tale-spinner, creates a world I find hard to emerge from, I am very susceptible- my preference is to read books such as these in one go, get them over with. Umberto Eco refers to such writing as 'para-literature'.
Most other people seem to enjoy them without becoming trapped. Missed the time slot for an important phone call. Upsetting, maybe for both of us.
Jose Saramago The Elephant's Journey (Harvill Secker, 2010) translated by the wonderful Margaret Jull Costa: enjoyable and whimsical, though at times a little formulaic. Maybe not so for someone who hasn't read his other books. One feels that Saramago is very old and a little child-like in his optimism. Is that what is wrong with this book - that there is no true evil in it? Saramago has written well about evil elsewhere - read his book Blindness, a masterpiece.
Yesterday raced through a slim volume entitled A Murder in Lemberg: Politics , religion, and violence in modern Jewish history, by historian Professor Michael Stanislawski of Columbia University. First of all, it is well written, a good pace, an enjoyable read. The murder takes place in 19th century Poland, the
brilliant Reform Rabbi is assassinated by an Orthodox Jew. (Documentation of evil in various forms). The brilliance of the Rabbi is not sufficiently substantiated for my liking, but the positive outcome of reading the book - from the point of view of the one I am writing myself - was learning about the ways in which certain practices changed between the Orthodox and the newer forms of Judaism. Also: with his description of contemporary Lemberg, Professor Stanislawski bears witness in a powerful way to the destruction and disappearance of Eastern European Jewry, a topic of which much more might be said.
Finally, I am about to finish a short book on the theory of translation: Umberto Eco's Mouse or Rat? Translation as Negotiation, (Phoenix, 2003) from his lectures at the University of Toronto in 1988. I also started Lawrence Venuti's The Translator's Invisibility, a History of Translation (2nd edn.,Routledge, 1995, 2002). I have to prepare a translator's statement of principle for the translation I have just finished, and this reading is supposed to give me the required insight and jargon.
Eco's book is engrossing: it would be satisfying for anyone who has lived in several languages. I started Venuti's book because I couldn't get hold of an article of his which encapsulates his theory. Maybe I'll try harder: the book is too much work for my purpose. There is a reference by Eco to another Venuti article which I'll follow up.
For my edification, am continuing to read No Time to Lose, by Pema Chodron (Shambhala, 2005). Slow work, like building a brick wall, or putting a jigsaw puzzle together. Every now and then, a sense of having achieved/understood something new. But mostly one has to carry on, a little doggedly.
Monday, 7 March 2011
The Tao
So much has happened since January: Zen retreat - definitely no writing then - two issues of the Bulletin published, one visitor for ten days, another for one night, a book launch organised at Temple, two sermons written - there is something to show for the time spent, but I've not been writing here.
Am sporadically re-reading Per Pettersen's I curse the River of Time, third time round - I am sure that his book's message is clear to a literate Norwegian - as an outsider, I feel the need to research the hints that are there - the name of the ship, the films which impressed the main characters, the books they read. It is frustrating and satisfying at the same time - I'm spending a lot of time with it, contentedly. For some reason, the hopelessness of the main character, who drowns his gifts in alcohol, does not affect me. I am interested in how Pettersen manages to draw the reader into the book. It is a masterpiece.
Bought the Tao Te Ching in a swap of books at a 2nd hand bookstore; I'd lost the copy I'd bought in the 70s in Amsterdam, probably in that marvellous bookshop Au bout du monde...This not-so-new copy is ostensibly for P, who is discovering the Tao via his Chinese student, - they are discussing the Tao in English together, as an exercise in pronounciation, having finished Confucius' Analects during their first year. An interesting process.
I find this Tao Te Ching particularly beautiful, (translation by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English, with lovely photographs, Vintage Books, Random House, 1972) though P reports that Jian Liang does not always agree with the translation. My friend Helen was interested, so searched out a copy for her on the Web and came to realise that it must have been a popular edition, because copies are available all over the place.
This edition includes the Chinese, written in calligraphy and I spent several peaceful hours one afternoon absorbed in working out what the ideograms meant...except that I should be working.
So in a guilty surge of energy, finished the translation I was working on and sent it off for feedback. End of Stage One, the longest part. Now I have to wait to hear back.
Am sporadically re-reading Per Pettersen's I curse the River of Time, third time round - I am sure that his book's message is clear to a literate Norwegian - as an outsider, I feel the need to research the hints that are there - the name of the ship, the films which impressed the main characters, the books they read. It is frustrating and satisfying at the same time - I'm spending a lot of time with it, contentedly. For some reason, the hopelessness of the main character, who drowns his gifts in alcohol, does not affect me. I am interested in how Pettersen manages to draw the reader into the book. It is a masterpiece.
Bought the Tao Te Ching in a swap of books at a 2nd hand bookstore; I'd lost the copy I'd bought in the 70s in Amsterdam, probably in that marvellous bookshop Au bout du monde...This not-so-new copy is ostensibly for P, who is discovering the Tao via his Chinese student, - they are discussing the Tao in English together, as an exercise in pronounciation, having finished Confucius' Analects during their first year. An interesting process.
I find this Tao Te Ching particularly beautiful, (translation by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English, with lovely photographs, Vintage Books, Random House, 1972) though P reports that Jian Liang does not always agree with the translation. My friend Helen was interested, so searched out a copy for her on the Web and came to realise that it must have been a popular edition, because copies are available all over the place.
This edition includes the Chinese, written in calligraphy and I spent several peaceful hours one afternoon absorbed in working out what the ideograms meant...except that I should be working.
So in a guilty surge of energy, finished the translation I was working on and sent it off for feedback. End of Stage One, the longest part. Now I have to wait to hear back.
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