Swaddling
The
medical rationale in seventeenth-century England: the limbs of a child were
tender and could easily bow or bend, taking diverse shapes. There was also the
popular fear that unless restrained an infant might tear off its own ears,
scratch out its eyes or break its legs. Modern studies have shown that
swaddling is convenient for adults, since it slows down the infant’s heartbeat,
induces longer sleep and makes for less crying. Russian infants to this very
day are still swaddled.
Suffer Your Way Off This Earth
When
one of Vas. Vas. Rozanov’s brothers died suddenly in his sleep, a female
relative was horrified, not because he had not been shriven and received last
rites from the church, but because he had not suffered. “How hideous that is,
to die without having agonized your way into the other world, without having
expiated your sins in pain, without having suffered!”
Rozanov, A
Dark Visage
Old Irish Prayer
Dear
Lord, please send me a quick and painless death.
Nope.
Sorry, homosapien. You want to die right with the Lord, you got to agonize your
way into Death, and the more lengthy and drawn-out the suffering is, the better
the Lord feels about it.
To
follow this logic to its conclusion, we can justify the existence of nursing
homes. These way stations to Death, havens for the useless and superannuated,
allow for the proper agonizing and suffering that is a prerequisite for
entering the Other World.
[excerpted from the book by U.R. Bowie: Here We Be. Where Be We?]
Isaac Levitan, "Moonlit Night," 1888
V
Устало все
кругом, устал и цвет небес,
И ветер, и река, и месяц, что родился,
И ночь, и в зелени потусклой спящий лес,
И желтый тот листок, что наконец свалился.
Лепечет лишь фонтан средь дальней темноты,
О жизни говоря незримой, но знакомой...
О, ночь осенняя, как всемогуща ты
Отказом от борьбы и смертною истомой.
d
Literary
Translation/Adaptation
V
d
Note From Internet (ВИКИТЕКА)
Примечания
Впервые - РО, 1890, № 2, стр. 623.
А. А. Фет. Вечерние огни. Серия «Литературные
памятники» Издание подготовили: Д. Д. Благой, М. А. Соколова. М., «Наука», 1981
Авторизованный текст — в письме к К. Р. от 28
августа 1889 г. (ПД), в котором Фет писал: «В настоящее время наступили
неприятные холода, у нас совершенно преждевременные; но дня два тому назад была
изумительная осенняя ночь, вызвавшая у меня следующие строки…» (ПД).
Авторизованный текст стихотворения имеется также и в письме к Полонскому от 26
августа (ПД), в котором поэт сообщал, что написал его «третьего дня». 31
августа Полонский ответил Фету: «…Отменою борьбы — это не ясно: ночь, как и все
на свете, как и я, грешный, никакой борьбы отменить не может, — я бы сказал
проще: „своею тишиной и смертною истомой“ <под строкой Полонский делает
сноску: "даже, по-моему, лучше: отсутствием борьбы">. Тут нужна
тишина, — нужна для того, чтобы ты слышал, как лепечет фонтан» (ПД). В ответном
письме от 4 сентября 1889 г. Фет подробно объясняет смысл двух последних строк:
«…В предыдущем стихе указывается не на сладость или приятность осенней ночи, а
на её всемогущество. Чем же высказывается это всемогущество? Всемогущество
может высказываться только активно, а не пассивно <...> Чем же у меня
ночь доказывает свое всемогущество? Она и сама заражена и меня квасит смертною
истомой. Это не шуточное дело. Чем неё ещё она проявляет свое действие? Тишина
её может быть прелестным её качеством, но не воздействием на меня. Живой, я с
утра до вечера сижу в борьбе пожирания одного другим, и вдруг, открывая балкон,
я поражен, что ночь не принимает, не допускает к себе этой борьбы, и чувствую,
что если и я попаду в неё, то она и во мне убьет это чувство борьбы. Ты
совершенно справедливо заметил, что отменять или подтверждать может только
существо сознательное, а не ночь или что-либо тому подобное, но оттенок нужной
мне мысли сохранит другое слово: отказом от борьбы. Слабый столик может заставить
меня целый час простоять с подносом с фруктами или с бумагами к докладу,
отказываясь удержать эти предметы на своих хилых ножках. Между тем, никакая
философия не воспретит мне сказать: этот стол, стул отказался мне служить. И
потому, с твоего разрешения, ставлю: „Отказом от борьбы“» (ПД). 1 октября
Полонский писал: «По-моему, и ты попал прямо в точку, заменивши слово отменою —
отказом от борьбы» (ПД). Печатается с исправлением даты 1890 г., указанной в
ВО, на 1889 г. В журнале датируется «24 августа 1889», что подтверждается
письмами Фета к Полонскому и К. Р.
Вариант строки 8: Отменою борьбы и смертною
истомой. [Письма (ПД)].
Bobby Lee Goosey
An Imprecation, To Be
Used in Addressing Political or Religious Fanatics Worldwide
Bullock ballocks,
Bullocks’ ballocks,
Great big bleeding bloody randy
Bullock ballocks,
And dogmerds,
Stinking filthy dogmerds,
To you.
[From Bobby Goosey’s Handbook of Best Imprecations]
ЛИХОРАДКА
— Няня, что-то
всё не сладко, —
Дай-ка сахар мне да ром.
Всё как будто лихорадка,
Точно холоден наш дом…
— Ах, родимый, Бог с тобою:
Подойти нельзя к печам!
При себе всегда закрою, —
Топим жарко, знаешь сам.
— Ты бы шторку опустила…
Дай-ка книгу… — Не хочу…
Ты намедни говорила,
Лихорадка… Я шучу!..
— Что за шутки! Спозаранок,
Уж поверь моим словам,
Сёстры, девять лихоманок,
Часто ходят по ночам.
Вишь, нелёгкая их носит
Сонных в губы целовать!
Всякой болести напросит,
И пойдёт тебя трепать.
— Верю, няня! Нет ли шубы?..
Хоть всего не помню сна, —
Целовала крепко в губы…
Лихорадка ли она?
1847
Blok Verses on Wall in Holland
d
Literary
Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie
Sergei Yesenin
(1895-1925)
Не жалею, не
зову, не плачу,
Все пройдет, как
с белых яблонь дым.
Увяданья золотом
охваченный,
Я не буду больше
молодым.
Ты теперь не так
уж будешь биться,
Сердце, тронутое
холодком,
И страна
березового ситца
Не заманит
шляться босиком.
Дух бродяжий! ты
все реже, реже
Расшевеливаешь
пламень уст
О, моя утраченная
свежесть,
Буйство глаз и
половодье чувств!
Я теперь скупее
стал в желаньях,
Жизнь моя, иль ты
приснилась мне?
Словно я весенней
гулкой ранью
Проскакал на
розовом коне.
Все мы, все мы в
этом мире тленны,
Тихо льется с
кленов листьев медь…
Будь же ты вовек
благословенно,
Что пришло
процвесть и умереть.
Сергей Есенин/ 1921
d
Literary
Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie
I don’t complain, nor call for help,
nor wail;
All will dissolve: white haze on apple
trees.
Enveloped in life’s gilded rot,
travail,
My youth will waft away into the
breeze.
O heart, when chilly winds assail you
daily,
You’ll beat with far less vigor and
panache;
And you won’t gallivant barefooted
gaily,
Down pathways all in birch and glee awash.
Ah, my vagrant spirit! So seldom now
forthrightness
Will stir my lips to rants of wrath
coarse-grained;
Woe, my lost and long-lamented
ripeness,
Dimmed eyes, high waters of my
feelings waned!
All wishes now are meagre, skimpy, muted,
Is this my life, or something dreamed
or spawned?
As if on steed rose-pink and fleet,
sure-footed,
I galloped through a mist as daylight
dawned.
We all of us live in a world that’s
finite,
While maple leaves of copper-red stain
sky . . .
Surely we’ve been blessed in timeless
starlight,
For having had this chance to bloom
and die.
Bobby Lee Goosey
Whatever Wherever
--You know where we’re headed? You know where we’re going?
You know where we’re bound? Know where?
--No, where? You know where?
--Yes. I know where we’re headed and I know where we’re
bound and I know where we’re going. You don’t know where?
--No, where? . . . Oh, there . . . Nowhere . . . Well,
anyway, I hope we all like it when we get there. It might be a wonderful place,
Nowhere. Yes, I think it might be just fine. It doesn’t have to be anywhere to
be nice, does it? I believe I’ll like being there . . . or nonbeing . . .
[from the book titled Bobby Goosey’s Compendium of
Perfectly Sensible Nonsense]
У камина
Тускнеют угли. В полумраке
Прозрачный вьётся огонёк.
Так плещет на багряном маке
Крылом лазурным мотылёк.
Видений пёстрых вереница
Влечёт, усталый теша взгляд,
И неразгаданные лица
Из пепла серого глядят.
Встаёт ласкательно и дружно
Былое счастье и печаль,
И лжёт душа, что ей не нужно
Всего, чего глубо́ко жаль.
d
Bobby Lee Goosey
The Story of
Tergiversator Alligator and How He Changed His Name
One fine day in the Okeechobee Swamp, where the sun sparked
and glittered on the Spanish moss and slime, a teensy little alligator was born
(hatched). His mama and papa thought they would call him Al. Al Alligator. Then
they thought, no, they would call him Hal. Hal Alligator. Then they thought,
no, they would call him Cal. Cal Alligator. They mused and pondered and argued
things over, but they could not make up their minds. Mama said, “Okay, enough.
We’ll just name him after his Uncle Ter.” Whose real name was Tergiversator. So
they did, and that’s how he came to be called Tergiversator Alligator.
Tergiversator grew and he grew, and as he grew a certain
problem developed. Tergiversator tergiversated. Must have had something to do
with his name. Although Uncle Ter was never known to tergiversate. He (this
nephew of Ter) would sit at the breakfast table, fidgeting and twisting and not
eating—tergiversating—and his mama would say in exasperation: “Tergiversator!
You must stop that infernal tergiversating!” Then he would go to school and sit
at his desk—equivocating, fussing, fidgeting and twisting about—and his teacher
would say in exasperation: “Ter, how many times have I told you? We just can’t
have all that tergiversating in the classroom!”
Well, time passed, and Ter grew and he grew, and he grew and
he grew, and, finally, he grew into a big twelve-foot gator. A daddy alligator.
With a wife, Abigail Alligator and three sons: Al, Cal, and Hal. But through
all those years Tergiversator could never stop tergiversating. He got a good
job in computer-based sales, and he swam to work every day and he sat at his
desk in his cubicle and all day long worked hard, absentmindedly tergiversating
as he worked. His coworkers in general liked him, but they did not look kindly
on tergiversation. They stared askance at his cubicle and tried not to notice
how it quavered and fidgeted and shook. In their hearts of hearts they were
thinking, “How unpleasant to work at an office where, in one particular
cubicle, there’s all this tergiversation going on!”
One day, after working in that same business for
twenty-three years, sitting tergiversating in his cubicle, gazing at his
computer screen, Tergiversator suddenly wondered why he had never received a
raise and promotion. He asked to see his boss, a big mama alligator named
Maybelline Alligator, and Maybelline said, “I’m going to be honest with you, Ter,
I’m giving you the pure God’s truth, I aim to please, I’m going to be frank: we
just can’t have tergiversation in the upper echelons of our firm. Anyone, frankly,
with your long history of tergiversation just has no upward mobility here.
Sorry.” And Maybelline demoted Tergiversator to a lower position in the firm at
a worse salary. And he had to move to a more lowly, tighter, skimpier cubicle.
But how can I help tergiversating? forlornly thought
poor Ter, as he slowly wended his way home that day—fidgeting, fussing and
equivocating as he swam—through the slime and scum of the noisome swamp waters.
After all, I am Tergiversator, and a Tergiversator quite naturally
tergiversates. Then a light flashed on in his mind: alls I gots to do is
change my name, and my lifelong sufferings will end. If I’m not Tergiversator,
then I won’t tergiversate! So, in a word, that’s just what he did. The next
day he wended his way through the noisome swamp waters—fidgeting and quavering,
tergiversating—to the offices of the civil courts, and there he legally changed
his name. And with that his tergiversations were done!
Now he sits at his desk, in his cubicle at work,
un-tergiversating, calmly working, gazing at his computer screen, un-tergiversating,
and his coworkers no longer complain, and it is rumored that now, after
twenty-five years on the job, he is due for a raise and promotion. And when he
sits at home at the supper table after work, his wife Abigail and his three sons
no longer complain; Abigail has stopped moaning, “Oh, Ter, will you please,
please stop driving me crazy with all that tergiversation?”
But she doesn’t have to moan anymore, because the
tergiversating is done, and she doesn’t call him Ter anymore, because he has a
new name. Guess what his new name is. Right. Salivator. When thinking
what he would rename himself, Tergiversator knew that this time he would not
make the mistake his parents had made. He would pick a normal, everyday
alligator name. Like he did for his own children, Al, Cal, and Hal. The swamps and
bogs are full of alligators with those common names. He asked everyone to call
him Sal, short for Salivator. So now the former Tergiversator Alligator is
Salivator Alligator (Sal for short), and his only problem is that sometimes fellow
alligators can’t keep him straight—since so many other Sals and Salivator
Alligators are swimming the noisome Okeechobee Swamp.
The recently promoted Sal Alligator sits at his desk at his
computer in his cubicle and he works, and salivates. And he sits at his supper
table at home, dining on fried chicken, grits and cornbread, and he chomps and
salivates. In other words, drools. And nobody says, “Salivator, please
stop that infernal salivating,” the way they used to say, “Please stop that
infernal tergiversating.” After all, salivation in an alligator—in other words,
drooling—is something quite natural, acceptable. All the other alligators
who swim in the noisome swamp waters perpetually salivate, not only the ones
named Salivator. All his co-worker alligators at the firm sit in their
cubicles, stare at their computer screens, and salivate. Quite acceptably. His
wife Abigail salivates incessantly—not just when dining. In other words, she drools,
as do his sons, Hal, Al, and Cal. All alligators drool.
So Salivator Alligator, the one who used to be
Tergiversator, lives on and salivates his way through his life. And he will go
on happily salivating away through the rest of his days in the lovely noisome swamp.
But never, ever again will he tergiversate.
d
[story from the book of miscellaneous balderdash, Bobby
Goosey’s Compendium of Perfectly Sensible Nonsense]
April 21, 2024 (revised from an earlier draft written in the
1970s or 1980s)
Bluestriped Fangblenny (Indonesia) Richard Zerpe Photo
The Conniving Wiles
of the Bluestriped Fangblenny
“The bluestriped fangblenny is a color-shifting fish that
lives in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Fangblennies hang out around so-called
cleaner fish; the latter make their living eating parasites and other types of
gunk that build up on the scales of larger fish. The relationship between cleaners
and their ‘clients’ is mutually beneficial: the smaller fish get a meal; the
larger get rid of a nuisance. Young fangblennies assume the coloration of a
cleaner fish; then, once a client draws near, the fangblennies remove not gunk,
but a chunk of the fish’s flesh. As Martin Stevens, an ecologist at the
University of Exeter and the author of Cheats and Deceits (2016) points
out, ‘Fangblennies are not only detrimental to the fish they attack, but also
to the real cleaner fish.’ Client fish naturally grow wary once they’ve been
bitten . . . [Fangblennies may be compared to] ‘gangsters running a racket.’”
Elizabeth Kolbert, “Fooled Again” (on strategies of
deception in the animal world), in The New Yorker, Apr. 3, 2023, p. 58.
Once fangblennied, twice wary. Great idea for a children’s
book: The Bluestriped Fangblenny Meets the Blue-Footed Booby
[excerpted from the book, Bobby Goosey’s Compendium of
Fascinating Facts]
