De Amerikaanse dichter en schrijver Raymond Carver werd geboren op 25 mei 1938 in Port Angeles. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010
Happiness
So early it’s still almost dark out.
I’m near the window with coffee,
and the usual early morning stuff
that passes for thought.
When I see the boy and his friend
walking up the road
to deliver the newspaper.
They wear caps and sweaters,
and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.
They are so happy
they aren’t saying anything, these boys.
I think if they could, they would take
each other’s arm.
It’s early in the morning,
and they are doing this thing together.
They come on, slowly.
The sky is taking on light,
though the moon still hangs pale over the water.
Such beauty that for a minute
death and ambition, even love,
doesn’t enter into this.
Happiness. It comes on
unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,
any early morning talk about it.
Photograph of My Father in His Twenty-Second Year
October. Here in this dank, unfamiliar kitchen
I study my father’s embarrassed young man’s face.
Sheepish grin, he holds in one hand a string
of spiny yellow perch, in the other
a bottle of Carlsbad Beer.
In jeans and denim shirt, he leans
against the front fender of a 1934 Ford.
He would like to pose bluff and hearty for his posterity,
Wear his old hat cocked over his ear.
All his life my father wanted to be bold.
But the eyes give him away, and the hands
that limply offer the string of dead perch
and the bottle of beer. Father, I love you,
yet how can I say thank you, I who can’t hold my liquor either,
and don’t even know the places to fish?
Raymond Carver (25 mei 1938 – 2 augustus 1988)
De Amerikaanse schrijver en journalist John Gregory Dunne werd geboren op 25 mei 1932 in West Hartford, Connecticut. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010
Uit: Nothing Lost
„Then, to reinforce my point, I drop in Henry James. Although in the academic slum where Osceola Community is resident, The Golden Bowl is not exactly required reading. (Due diligence requires me to admit that I never actually finished it — I was bored by the Ververs — but I did see the movie and thought the actor who played Prince Amerigo not unattractive.) Anyway, James once wrote in an essay I saw quoted on the Net that the power to guess the unseen from the seen, to trace the implication of things, to judge the whole piece by the pattern — that constitutes experience.
Henry James, I tell them, would have made a great criminal attorney. That would no doubt send him spinning in his grave, and it makes those of my students who know who he was (four, perhaps five, no more) laugh nervously.
I know most of the principals in the story I am about to tell, and a number of the walk-ons as well. I am even, as you will find out soon enough, a minor character. Some of the carnage that ensued I witnessed. Some of it was told to me. On the record, off the record, who cares now? Some of the principals did not realize they were telling me. Sealed audiotapes. Film, as in “Film at 11.” I went to the printed record, voluminous if you know where to look. Court transcripts. Discussions in chambers with a court reporter present. Proceedings of the South Midland Bar Association. Testimony before the Judiciary Committee of the State Legislature. Interviews in the legal journals.“
John Gregory Dunne (25 mei 1932 – 30 december 2003)
De Britse schrijver, criticus en politicus Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton werd geboren in Londen op 25 mei 1803. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010
Uit: A Strange Story
„In the year 18– I settled as a physician at one of the wealthiest of our great English towns, which I will designate by the initial L—-.
I was yet young, but I had acquired some reputation by a professional work, which is, I believe, still amongst the received authorities on the subject of which it treats. I had studied at Edinburgh and at
Paris, and had borne away from both those illustrious schools of medicine whatever guarantees for future distinction the praise of professors may concede to the ambition of students. On becoming a member of the College of Physicians, I made a tour of the principal cities of Europe, taking letters of introduction to eminent medical men, and gathering from many theories and modes of treatment hints to enlarge the foundations of unprejudiced and comprehensive’ practice. I had resolved to fix my ultimate residence in London. But before this preparatory tour was completed, my resolve was changed by one of those unexpected events which determine the fate man in vain would work out for himself. In passing through the Tyro, on my way into the north of Italy, I found in a small inn, remote from medical attendance, an English traveller seized with acute inflammation of the lungs, and in a state of imminent danger. I devoted myself to him night and day; and, perhaps more through careful nursing than active remedies, I had the happiness to effect his complete recovery.“
Edward Bulwer-Lytton (25 mei 1803 – 18 januari 1873)
De Amerikaanse schrijver, filosoof en essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson werd geboren in Boston, Massachusetts op 25 mei 1803. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2007 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010
Uit: Nature
„In the woods, is perpetual youth. Within these plantations of God, a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years. In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befal me in life, – no disgrace, no calamity (leaving me my eyes), which nature cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground, – my head bathed by the blithe air and uplifted into infinite space, – all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball. I am nothing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or particle of God.
(…)
To speak truly, few adult persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood. His intercourse with heaven and earth, becomes part of his daily food.“
Ralph Waldo Emerson(25 mei 1803 – 27 april 1882)
Standbeeld in de Free Public Library, Concord
De Mexicaanse dichteres en schrijfster Rosario Castellanos werd geboren in Mexico-stad op 25 mei 1925. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009 en ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010
The Other
Why pronounce the names of gods, stars,
froth of an invisible ocean,
pollen from the most distant gardens?
If life aches us, if each day comes
tearing us apart, if each night
falls convulsed, assassinated.
If the grief of an unknown person
grieves us, but he is
always present, and is the victim
and the enemy and love and all
that we need in order to be whole.
Never say that the darkness is yours,
don’t drink joy down with a single swallow.
Look about you: there is the other, there is always the other.
The air he breathes chokes you,
what he eats is your hunger.
He dies with the purest half of your death.
Vertaald door Julian Palley
Rosario Castellanos (25 mei 1925 – 7 augustus 1974)
Zie voor onderstaande schrijvers ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2010.
De Canadese dichter en schrijver Alain Grandbois werd geboren op 25 mei 1900 in Saint-Casimir, Québec. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009.
De Albanese dichter en schrijver Naim Frashëri werd geboren op 25 mei 1846 in Frashër. Zie ook mijn blog van 25 mei 2009.