De Zuid-Afrikaanse schrijver André Brink werd geboren op 29 mei 1935 in Vrede. Zie ook alle tags voor André Brink op dit blog.
Uit: A Fork in the Road
“IF I CLOSE my eyes and silently mouth the word dorp, what I conjure up. even now. sixty or more years later, is an image of wide dusty streets, the pavements overgrown with thorns (which we called, with good reason. duwweltjies, little devils), in a predictable grid around the tall spire of the Dutch Reformed Church, that sat brooding over the surrounding houses like a large and somewhat unwieldy hen with outstretched wings protecting her chickens. Twice on Sundays, and on Wednesday evenings for prayer meetings. the congregation would be summoned by the booming of the church bell, and men. women and children would respond — not so much out of conviction as because an empty place would undoubtedly invite ever-expanding circles of gossip rippling through town and district, possibly for weeks on end. After the Sunday service, having reviewed all the most recent news and scandals and secrets of the town, everybody would hurry back to the gargantuan meals prepared by black women on Aga or Dover stoves in kitchens as hot as the furnace of Nebuchadnezzar: roasted leg of lamb, and frikkadelle or meatballs, a joint of venison in winter, or chicken, perhaps a tomato stew on the side, and potatoes and sweet potatoes. yellow rice with raisins, beans and peas and carrots, stewed prunes and peaches. and quinces, pumpkin with cinnamon and sugar, gem squashes, possibly rhubarb. beetroot with sugar and vinegar, bean salad, followed by blancmange and yellow and green and red jelly, and a banana foam. maybe trifle or a vinegar or brandy pudding or roly-poly, or the custardy dessert our family knew as ‘My mad aunt’s sister’, with or without green fig preserve or quince jelly or the grape syrup called moskop61. all of it washed down with sweet wine. preferably muscadel or jerepigo. Afterwards, as grown-ups snored in a stupor of overindulgence. and giggling. viciously inventive children went about their arcane business while they were supposed to ‘rest’ on their beds or read edifying books, the same women would clear the tables and wash and stack the dishes, before carrying off the scraps to their own kids waiting in the ‘location’ (but only after the most tasty morsels had been scraped off for the chickens. the dogs and cats, and sometimes a pig wallowing in the backyard). Near the church would be two or three streets of shops with wide stoops: a pharmacy, two or three grocers recognisable by large posters advertising Big Ben or C-to-C cigarettes, Lyle’s Golden Syrup. Marmite, Elastoplast. Black Cat peanut butter. shoes, khaki overalls: butcher, baker. a café or two, an undertaker who might also sell books and newspapers and cover his customary suit of solemn black with a soiled white dustcoat to double as hairdresser, a Pegasus garage with handpumps, the bank. and some offices. one or two lawyers. And a hotel — Royal or Masonic or Commercial — with an off-sales where even before the official advent of apartheid separate entrances kept white and black decently segregated.”
De Amerikaanse dichteres Linda Pastan werd geboren op 27 mei 1932 in New York. Zie ook alle tags voor Linda Pastan op dit blog.
Nachtelijk
Als dieren nadenken
over de dood,
zullen de nachtelijke –
de lemuur bijvoorbeeld
of de wasbeer—
hem beschouwen als
een soort licht,
een schittering
in de toekomst,
een plek
waar roofdieren
zich wapenen met Gods
fluorescerend schild?
Zijn ze bang voor
een wildernis van licht
zoals wij bang zijn
voor het donker? ik slaap
met de lampen aan
in de andere kamer,
alsof je voor de gek houdt
wat voor ons ligt, uilvormig
of vooruitziend
als een vleermuis, die wacht
om me te smoren
in zijn nachtelijke vleugels.
Vertaald door Frans Roumen
Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 29e mei ook mijn blog van 29 mei 2020 en eveneens mijn blog van 29 mei 2019 en ook mijn blog van 29 mei 2018 en ook mijn blog van 29 mei 2016 deel 2.