De Indische schrijfster Kiran Desai werd geboren op 3 september 1971 in New Dehli. Zie ook mijn blog van 3 september 2008.en ook mijn blog van 3 september 2009.

 Uit: The Inheritance of Loss

„All day, the colors had been those of dusk, mist moving like a water creature across the great flanks of mountains possessed of ocean shadows and depths. Briefly visible above the vapor, Kanchenjunga was a far peak whittled out of ice, gathering the last of the light, a plume of snow blown high by the storms at its summit.
Sai, sitting on the veranda, was reading an article about giant squid in an old National Geographic. Every now and then she looked up at Kanchenjunga, observed its wizard phosphorescence with a shiver. The judge sat at the far corner with his chessboard, playing against himself. Stuffed under his chair where she felt safe was Mutt the dog, snoring gently in her sleep. A single bald lightbulb dangled on a wire above. It was cold, but inside the house, it was still colder, the dark, the freeze, contained by stone walls several feet deep.
Here, at the back, inside the cavernous kitchen, was the cook, trying to light the damp wood. He fingered the kindling gingerly for fear of the community of scorpions living, loving, reproducing in the pile. Once he’d found a mother, plump with poison, fourteen babies on her back.
Eventually the fire caught and he placed his kettle on top, as battered, as encrusted as something dug up by an archeological team, and waited for it to boil. The walls were singed and sodden, garlic hung by muddy stems from the charred beams, thickets of soot clumped batlike upon the ceiling. The flame cast a mosaic of shiny orange across the cook’s face, and his top half grew hot, but a mean gust tortured his arthritic knees.
Up through the chimney and out, the smoke mingled with the mist that was gathering speed, sweeping in thicker and thicker, obscuring things in parts—half a hill, then the other half. The trees turned into silhouettes, loomed forth, were submerged again. Gradually the vapor replaced everything with itself, solid objects with shadow, and nothing remained that did not seem molded from or inspired by it. Sai’s breath flew from her nostrils in drifts, and the diagram of a giant squid constructed from scraps of information, scientists’ dreams, sank entirely into the murk.”

 
 Kiran Desai (New Dehli, 3 september 1971)

 

De Uruguayaanse schrijver, essayist en journalist Eduardo Hughes Galeano werd geboren op 3 september 1940 in Montevideo. Zie ook mijn blog van 3 september 2008. en ook mijn blog van 3 september 2009.

Uit: Memory of Fire

„For a long time Alvarado contemplated his beaten enemy, his body slashed open, the quetzal feathers sprouting from his arms & legs, the wings broken, the triple crown of pearls, diamonds & emeralds…

The children seated in a circle around the poet will ask: “& all this you saw? You heard?”

“Yes.”

“You were here?” the children will ask.

“No. None of our people who were here survived.”

The poet will point to the moving clouds & the sway of the treetops.

“See the lances?” he will ask. “See the horses’ hooves? The rain of arrows? The smoke? Listen,” he will say, & put his ear against the ground, filled with explosions.

& he will teach them to smell history in the wind, to touch it in stones polished by the river, & to recognize its taste by chewing certain herbs, without hurry, as one chews on sadness“.

 
 Eduardo Galeano (Montevideo, 3 september 1940)

 

De Amerikaanse schrijfster en literatuurwetenschapster Alison Lurie werd geboren op 3 september 1926 in Chicago, Illinois. Zie ook mijn blog van 3 september 2007 en ook mijn blog van 3 september 2008 en ookmijn blog van 3 september 2009.

Uit: Foreign Affairs

„Though patience is held to be a virtue most appropriate to women, especially aging women, Vinnie has always particularly disliked waiting for anything, and never does so if it can be avoided. Now, for instance, she elbows her way deftly past less experienced passengers who are searching for their seat numbers or are encumbered with excess luggage or with children, excusing herself in a thin pleasant voice. By crossing through the galley to the far aisle and back again between two rows of seats, she outflanks a massed confusion of obvious rubes with carry-on bags labeled sun tours. In less time than it takes to read this paragraph she has made her way to a window seat near an exit in the nonsmoking section, pausing only to extract the London Times and British Vogue from a magazine rack. (Once the plane is airborne, the stewardess will distribute periodicals to all the passengers, but those Vinnie prefers may vanish before they reach her.)
Following her usual procedure, Vinnie slides into her place and unzips her boots. In stocking feet she climbs onto the seat and opens the overhead locker; since she is barely over five feet tall, this is the only way she can reach it. She removes two pillows and a loose-woven blue blanket, which she drops onto the center seat beside her handbag and her British periodicals, thus tacitly claiming this space if—as is likely in midweek and mid-February—it hasn’t been assigned to anyone. Then she arranges her worn wool-lined raincoat, her floppy beige felt hat, and her amber-and-beige Liberty-print wool shawl in the locker, in such a way that only the rudest of fellow passengers will attempt to encroach upon them. She slams the locker shut with some difficulty, and sits down. She stows her boots under her own seat along with a carton of duty-free Bristol Cream sherry, and puts on a pair of folding slippers. She arranges one pillow beside her head and wedges the other between her hip and the arm of the chair. Finally she smooths her crisply cut graying hair, leans back, and with a sigh fastens the seatbelt across her tan wool sweater and skirt.“

Alison Lurie (Chigaco, 3 september 1926)

 

De Russische schrijver Sergej Dovlatov werd geboren op 3 september 1941 in Ufa, in het zuiden van Rusland. Zie ook mijn blog van 3 september 2007 en ook mijn blog van 3 september 2008 en ook mijn blog van 3 september 2009.

Uit: Kurz ist das Leben (Vertaald door Eric Boemer)

„In ihrem Handtäschchen lag etwas, dass vom Umfang her nur etwas größer als der Miniaturbrowning für Frauen »Elita-16« war.

Regina Gasparjan stammte aus einer edlen russifizierten Familie. Ihr Vater war ein ziemlich bekannter Dozent des Stieglitz-Institutes. Als kommender Armenier beschäftigte er sich mit Kosmopolitismus. In den fünfziger Jahren schlug ihm der Forscher Čuev ein Album mit Reproduktionen von Degas in die Physiognomie.

Ihre Mutter war eine qualifizierte Übersetzerin. Kannte Kaškin. Traf sich mit Rita Kovalëva. Einen Monat lang begleitete sie Caldwell bei seiner Tournee durch den Kaukasus. Sie wurde wegen ihres komplizierten Charakters und als exotische östliche Schönheit gerühmt.

In ihrer Jugend war Regina eine typische sowjetische Schülerin. Nahm an Aufführungen teil. Spielte die Soja Kosmodejanskaja. Der Vater, unter Chruščëv rehabilitiert, nannte sie im Scherz »Sojka Komsomodejanskaja«.

Das Tauwetter brach heran. Im Haus des bekannten Künstlers Gasparjan versammelten sich junge Leute. Meistens Dichter. Hier fütterte man sie, und in der Hauptsache – man hörte sie geduldig bis zu Ende an. Unter ihnen befanden sich auch Lipskij und Brejn.

Alle waren ein bisschen hinter der schönen, belesenen und gut gebauten Regina her. Man widmete ihr Verse. Meist lustige, humoristische. Brejn schrieb ihr zu Beginn der Damanischen Krise aus Soči:

Wart’ auf mich, ich kehr’ zurück, wartest du nur sehr,
Warte, bis die Schwermut bringt gelbe Führer her …

Es begannen die siebziger Jahre. Das Tauwetter, wie sich die Journalisten der Emigration gerne ausdrücken, wurde vom Raureif abgelöst. Die besten Freunde gingen in den Westen.“

Sergej Dovlatov (3 september 1941 – 24 augustus 1990)

 

Onafhankelijk van geboortedata:

De Duitse dichter, schrijver en striptekenaar Lino Wirag werd geboren in 1983 in Pforzheim. Zie ook mijn blog van 3 september 2009.

Anti-Licht-Gedicht

Nächtig-dämmrig dichtes Nicht-Licht,
Das ein Schwarzloch in die Sicht sticht,
Dunkel-düstre Schummerstunde,
Tintenschwarze Schemenrunde.

Dreilicht, Zwielicht, Einslicht, Keinslicht,
Schwärze ist eine Gesteinsschicht,
Kohlpechzappenrabendunkel,
Koptisch finstres Mankelmunkel.

Mitternächtens, lichtlos-lauernd,
Schattenschläger, formlos-kauernd,
Friedhofsgänger, haltlos-schauernd,
Rottenregen, endlos-dauernd.

Gräber, Grüfte, Leichensteine,
Mausoleen, Steingebeine,
Urnen, Kreuze, Totenmale,
Ehrenstätten, Funerale,

Ziehen schwer durch mein Gemüt,
Wenn mein Aug’ die Dinge sieht,
Die mein Ofenrohr verschmutzen:

Ich sollte doch mal wieder putzen.

Lino Wirag (Pforzheim, 1983)