[lit-ideas] April poetry: Wislawa Szymborska
- From: "Mirembe Nantongo" <nantongo@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 2 Apr 2005 19:19:20 +0100
Many thanks to Julie and Marlena for pointing out the poetry of Polish Nobel
Prize winner, Wislawa Szymborska. I had not read any of her poetry before
(although I meant to, I really meant to, way back when she won the prize in
1996...) and consider this a major discovery.
There is a shortish essay on her, with a terrific picture of her when she
was younger - she looks like someone one would really like to hang out
with - at this link:
http://info-poland.buffalo.edu/classroom/szymborska/grol.html
Excerpt: "Her poems are probing and complete messages. In attenuated,
sometimes even colloquial language, Szymborska raises original and
unsettling questions about human nature, the precariousness and sense of
human existence, about mankind's place in the universe. Her poetry is never
confessional or personal. She transforms her observations, issuing from
personal experiences, into poems of a general nature, touching upon the
universal or even the cosmic."
I am particularly struck by one of her poems "The End and the Beginning"
which talks about the emotional mechanics of post-war reconstruction. The
whole poem is here:
http://info-poland.buffalo.edu/classroom/szymborska/poetrybis.html
The second to last stanza reads:
"Those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing."
I like the way she describes this process of moving on - "giving way" - by
the generations that actually live a war experience, as a natural and
inevitable progression, and not as a cause for distress or a basis for
frenetic attempts to impose the imperatives of one's own experience on the
next generation.
And the last stanza:
"In the grass which has overgrown
reasons and causes,
someone must be stretched out
blade of grass in his mouth
gazing at the clouds."
Yes, every post-war period needs its poets, its dreamers. I wonder, do we
know who they are yet in the newest post-war places - places like Iraq, or
Afghanistan ..? I don't think I have heard any such voices yet.
All best and thanks again, MN
------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
Other related posts:
- » [lit-ideas] April poetry: Wislawa Szymborska
