tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53365097653865321272024-02-19T05:11:10.458-08:00WorldWar2poetryMichael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.comBlogger38125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-89913643835418121962020-11-08T08:32:00.006-08:002023-02-25T12:18:47.763-08:00Remembrance 2020 <p><b> <span style="font-size: large;"> The Role of World War 2 Poetry </span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4tzR4l8LSpKKKTSHkb-RtxZtagjiDg-Erp_PF6SjNTN0QZ-SCC7Q4HYCdsCKHQCUkA2EjlY3MxFXP-e_E14INlzOI-n1xh7Pqg03tku5yn3c_wFEF5RHopc8nQBHALWraabghLkmKbSs/s780/6thAirdivnormandybriefing.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="573" data-original-width="780" height="294" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4tzR4l8LSpKKKTSHkb-RtxZtagjiDg-Erp_PF6SjNTN0QZ-SCC7Q4HYCdsCKHQCUkA2EjlY3MxFXP-e_E14INlzOI-n1xh7Pqg03tku5yn3c_wFEF5RHopc8nQBHALWraabghLkmKbSs/w400-h294/6thAirdivnormandybriefing.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></b></div><p></p><p><br /><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span>Men of the 22nd Independent Parachute Company 6th Airbourne Division receive briefing just before D Day 1944, courtesy of 'Wikipedia' </p><p><br /></p><p><i>As remembrance week begins in 2020, and find that the commemorations that usually attend will not be happening due to the Covid 19 emergency, felt it was time to share a few thoughts. For this post I am focusing on Britain. </i></p><p>Issues arise from admitting to having a keen interest in World War 2 poetry. Some times people think that they have misheard you, or that you have made a typo, and ask 'Don't you mean World War 1'? Another factor is the danger of starting a competition with World War 1 poetry. Certainly there is little evidence that World War 2 poets thought that they were improving on or usurping World War 1 poetry. And neither does this blog, which serves the same purpose as Siegfried Sassoon's poignant lines in his 1919 poem <i>Aftermath:Have you forgotten yet?...Look up, and swear by the green of the spring that you'll never forget. </i>In fact many World War 2 poets felt inspired by the World War 1 poets -with exception of Alan Ross who preferred W H Auden to Owen and Sassoon, whose poetry he found 'dull' . <a href="https://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.com/2016/12/sassoon-re-appraised-by-world-war-2.html" target="_blank">To read more ....</a></p><p>Certainly British World War 1 poets are granted more status than those from World War 2. Considered to be reliable witnesses or even daring truth tellers concerning the true nature of modern warfare. Their poetry and recollections are held to be more trustworthy than those of the authorities who declared war in the first place. The work of the World War 1 poets, some of it already written and published, along with their emerging war memoirs, grew in influence from the late 1920's onward. Particularly shaping the 'Disenchantment' view of World War 1 which arguably still holds sway. Even historians from this century who have tried to argue that World War 1 was a just war don't seem to have succeeded, against those who felt that Britain should have stayed neutral or that the price of victory was simply too high in loss of men and resources. </p><p>Vernon Scannell born 1922, who served in the North Africa campaign, deserted, was soon caught and jailed , then released to serve in the Normandy campaign of 1944 , wrote in this poem <i>The Great War</i>.</p><p>(Extract) </p><p>"Whenever the November sky</p><p>Quivers with a bugle's hoarse, sweet cry,</p><p>The reason darkens; in its evening gleam</p><p>Crosses and flares, tormented with, grey earth</p><p>Splattered with crimson flowers,</p><p>And I remember</p><p>Not the war I fought in</p><p>But the one called Great</p><p>Which ended in a sepia November</p><p>Four years before my birth. "</p><p>Vernon Scannell is a favourite poet of mine, exploring the themes of both love and war. Could write the most wonderful observations about English provincial life in the second half of the 20th century. He was prone to binge drinking and violence towards his partners. At the time of VE Day, Scannell was back in an army base in Britain, still recuperating from his Normandy wounds. He immediately absconded without waiting for the official demobilisation process to start, went on the run for years but finally caught. </p><p>In one later biographical work 'Argument of Kings', Scannell describes his service with the 51st Highland Division during the Normandy campaign in most harrowing terms. His regiment were fighting near the village of Touffreville on 10th June 1944. </p><p><i>John looked down and saw that the front of Hughie's battle dress had disappeared. It had been driven inwards into his chest so that there was a great dark cave of blood and slivers of bone.....though he did direct one quick glance at Hughie's face ....The face looked like the face of all the dead. There eyelids were not shut but the pupils had swivelled up beneath them so that the eyes looked like those of a blind man.</i></p><p>Scannell's regiment arrived in Normandy on 10th June 1944. At this time a young soldier serving with Scannell who had boasted earlier about killing Germans, broke down when faced with the reality of warfare. </p><p><i>He was making wordless, bleating sounds from which every now and then an identifiable phrase would surface and when this happened the words were recognised as a frightened infant's cry for its mother.</i></p><p>There seem many reasons why Scannell's writing on serving in Normandy campaign are not highlighted. The fact that the campaign was fast moving rather then ending up static trench warfare, the view that World War 2 is largely held to be a just war, that the horrors of a Third Reich victory are just too much to stomach. In other words the Normandy campaign to dislodge the Germans was considered to have more meaning and purpose than say the first day of The Somme. </p><p>That is why the work of Vernon Scannell, who could report back with the eye of a poet, is so vital. Because the Normandy campaign was a victory by so many different terms of reference, it is easier to forget what it cost. </p><p>And Scannell's <i>Walking Wounded</i> published in a collection of the same name from 1965, is a classic. Written in 1962 Scannell recalled leaving Touffreville in 1944, so battle weary that he briefly fell asleep whilst marching, Shortly afterwards Scannell saw a convoy of ambulances, being followed by a column of casualties who were to have their wounds dressed and sent back into battle. </p><p>In another autobiography <i>The Tiger and the Rose, </i>Scannell depicted these men as seemingly possessing</p><p> <i>A symbolic power; they were the representatives, not only of the military victims of war but of suffering and innocent people everywhere and at all times, trapped in the skeins of historical necessity.</i> </p><p><i>Walking Wounded </i></p><p>(Extract) </p><p>"A humble brotherhood,</p><p>No one was suffering from a lethal hurt,</p><p>They were not magnified by noble wounds,</p><p>There was no splendour in the company.</p><p>And yet, remembering after eighteen years,</p><p>In the heart's throat a sour sadness stirs;</p><p>Imagination pauses and returns</p><p>To see them walking still, but multiplied</p><p>In thousands now. And when heroic corpses </p><p>Turn slowly in their decorated sleep</p><p>And every ambulance has disappeared.</p><p>The walking wounded still trudge down that lane,</p><p>And when recalled they must bear arms again. "</p><p> </p><p><b>Works consulted </b></p><p>'The Tiger and the Rose- An Autobiography ', Vernon Scannell, Hamish Hamilton, 1971,</p><p>'Argument of Kings-An Autobiography' Vernon Scannell, Robson Books, 1986</p><p>'Walking Wounded-The Life & Poetry of Vernon Scannell', James Andrew Taylor, Oxford University Press, 2013</p><p>The War Poets Association webpage on <a href="http://www.warpoets.org/conflicts/world-war-ii/vernon-scannell/" target="_blank">Vernon Scannell </a></p><p>Other blogs by Michael Bully </p><p><a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">A Burnt Ship </a> 17th century related war and literature.<br /></p><p><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> New blog inspired by Charles Dickens & 'dark' Victoriana started 2023<br /></p><p><a href="https://1685monmouthrebellion.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Monmouth Rebellion</a> Not particularly active at present<br /></p><p><a href="https://13thcenturyhistory.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">13th century history </a> Not particularly active at present <br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-73242060179251779922020-07-26T10:41:00.004-07:002023-02-25T12:20:34.558-08:00Remembering Paul Celan 1920-1970 <i><span style="font-size: large;">All those names burnt with the rest - 'Alchemical' </span></i><br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b3/Grave-Paul-Celan.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b3/Grave-Paul-Celan.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<i>Photo of the grave by Paul Celan by Martin Ottman shared by Wikipedia creative licence </i><br />
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Have to admit that I am not a great one for anniversary commemorations, but with Paul Celan, will make an exception. The year 2020 sees both the centenary of his birth and the half centenary year of his death<br />
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<b>Some background</b><br />
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Paul Celan's upbringing and young adulthood were crucial to his work.<br />
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Celan was born on 23rd November 1920 as Paul Antschel ,into a German speaking Jewish family in Czernowitz Bukovina , Romania. Bokovina was part of the Autstro-Hungarian empire and ceded to Romania after the Treaty of Versailles. Around 4% of the population of the new Romania were Jewish. By the late 1930's their position within Romania deteriorated. Viewed with suspicion by the authorities, Jews were despised by the right wing social revolutionaries, the Iron Guard who had quite a sizeable following. In 1940, Romania was forced to cede Bukovina to the Soviet Union on 28th June 1940. In September 1940 a right wing coalition took power,-which included the Iron Guard- and weeks later a German military mission came to Romania. On 20th November 1940, Romania formerly joined the Axis powers. On 21st January 1941, the Iron Guard staged a successful rebellion and a gruesome pogrom against Jews began in Bucharest.<br />
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Romania took back control of Bukovina following the launch of Operation Barborosa in June 1941. More pogroms took places in Romania, most notably at Iasi in July 1941, instigated by the Iron Guard.<br />
On the 27th June and 28th June 1942 the Jews of Bukovina were rounded up -Celan's parents among them- and interned by the Romanian regime, who by now had taken control of the region of the Ukraine between the rivers Dniester and Bug to establish the province of Transnistria. Many Jews were deported to the area, or died on the way or were simply murdered where they lived. Celan initially avoided arrest by hiding in a friend's house. Jews imprisoned in Transnistria were sometimes sent into German custody on the other side of the River Bug. His mother was later shot after becoming too ill to work, whilst Celan's father died as a prisoner, possibly from typhus.<br />
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The grief of his parents death and what would now be called 'survivors guilt', along with his Celan's own experiences, haunts his work.'Aspen Tree' is stark and moving. The reference to the Ukraine indicates that Celan seemed to have established that his mother was killed somewhere in Transnistria.<br />
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<b>Aspen Tree</b><br />
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Aspen tree, your leaves glance white into the dark.<br />
My mother's hair never turned white.<br />
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Dandelion, so green is the Ukraine.<br />
My fair-haired mother did not come home.<br />
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Rain cloud, do you linger at the well?<br />
My soft-voiced mother weeps for all.<br />
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Rounded star, you coil the golden loop.<br />
My mother's heart was hurt by lead.<br />
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Oaken door, who hove you off your hinge?<br />
My gentle mother cannot return.<br />
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translated by John Felstiner from 'Second World War Poems', chosen by Hugh Haughton.<br />
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Another possibility was that his mother fell ill, was amongst a transport of Jews who were to be sent across the River Bug and was shot as she would not survive the journey. Another poem by Celan 'Nearness of Graves' open with the lines<br />
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'Still do the southerly Bug waters know,<br />
Mother, the wave whose blows wounded you so ?'<br />
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<b>The Life of Celan</b><br />
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Celan had some awareness of how severe the threat of Nazism was. He supported the Republican cause during the Spanish Civil War , and 1938 travelled to Paris to study medicine. His biography details on the <a href="https://www.poemhunter.com/paul-celan/biography/">Poemhunter</a> website states that he travelled through Berlin during Kristallnacht in1938. Celan was studying literature and languages back in Romania by 1939. Following his parents internment Celan was arrested and worked as a forced labourer When the Soviets took over the country, Celan worked in a psychiatric hospital caring for Soviet airmen in Bucharest, and had some poetry published. It was at this point he took the name Paul Celan. In 1947 he left Romania, and headed for Vienna then settled in Paris in 1948. Here Celan became a translator, a lecturer and made contact with other poets, particularly <a href="https://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.com/2018/07/nelly-sachs-1891-1970-chorus-of-rescued.html">Nelly Sachs</a> . Celan attracted a following in Germany and in 1960 was awarded the Georg Buchner Prize, one of the most prestigious German literary awards.<br />
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Arguably Celan's most famous poem is 'Deathfuge' , about concentration camp inmates being serenaded with music before being led off to execution. Its so haunting because it has the rhythm of an upbeat song.<br />
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<b>Deathfuge /'Todesfuge ' (first verse) </b><br />
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" Black milk of daybreak, we drink it at evening<br />
we drink it midday and morning we drink it at night<br />
we drink and drink<br />
we shovel a grave in the air where you won't lie too cramped<br />
a man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he writes<br />
he writes when it grows dark to Deutschland your golden<br />
hair Margareta<br />
he write it and steps out of doors and the stars are all<br />
sparkling he whistles his hounds to stay close<br />
he whistles his Jews into rows has them shovel a grave in the<br />
ground<br />
he commands we play up for the dance ...."<br />
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translated by John Felstiner from 'Second World War Poems', chosen by Hugh Haughton.<br />
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<b>Death </b><br />
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On 20th April 1970, Paul Celan took his own life by drowning in the Seine. Though Celan's work is so rooted in the poetry of the Holocaust, there has to be enough space given to look at his other writing. To me, it would be too tragic if his whole life and work was completely defined by the Holocaust. Found a poem -'This Evening Also'- via Poemhunter , the translator is not credited.<br />
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<b>This Evening Also </b><br />
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more fully,<br />
since snow fell even on this<br />
sun-drifted, sun drenched sea,<br />
blossoms the ice in those baskets<br />
you carry into town.<br />
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sand<br />
you demand in return<br />
for the last<br />
rose back home<br />
this evening also wants to be fed<br />
out of the trickling hour.<br />
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<b>Sources </b><br />
<b><br /></b>Poemhunter entry for the <a href="https://www.poemhunter.com/paul-celan/poems/">poetry of Paul Celan </a><br />
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The Holocaust Encyclopedia <a href="https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/romania">Entry for Romania </a><br />
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Spring Magazine on English Literature, <a href="http://springmagazine.net/V2/n1/11_Paul_Celan.pdf">Trauma and its Traces in the Poetry of Paul Celan</a> by Semanti Nandi<br />
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'Poetry of the Second World War- An International Anthology' edited by Desmond Graham ,Chato & Windus, London 1995<br />
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'Second World War Poetry ', Chosen by Hugh Haughton, ,Faber & Faber, London 2004<br />
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<b>Other Blogs by Michael Bully</b><br />
<b><br /></b><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana launched February 2023<br />
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<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.com/">A Burnt Ship </a> 17th century War and Literature blog<br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-71971557646043516262020-06-12T12:11:00.001-07:002023-02-25T12:22:06.242-08:00'That Devil and His Claws'- The War Poems of Gavin Ewart <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> A Reluctant War Poet ?</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR8_z-Y0FY4lgGDzW4Qz0BjAot_ryONK_cbUA1EFtxmxEOggKMSCL_I8cK0vON9NLH4cqgVRZ3Wpq-hx1E0ZbTRM3qFvIC9GYZ4eVDrWX6eV3IhZaj_xpAp6KL2s-s_kV223YMdJOYNIc/s1600/The_British_Army_in_Sicily_1943_NA4561.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="799" data-original-width="800" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR8_z-Y0FY4lgGDzW4Qz0BjAot_ryONK_cbUA1EFtxmxEOggKMSCL_I8cK0vON9NLH4cqgVRZ3Wpq-hx1E0ZbTRM3qFvIC9GYZ4eVDrWX6eV3IhZaj_xpAp6KL2s-s_kV223YMdJOYNIc/s320/The_British_Army_in_Sicily_1943_NA4561.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The British Army in Sicily 1943 <b>NA4561 </b>Courtesy of Wikipedia ( Image in Public Domain)</span><br />
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<i> Its' hard for an old man,</i><br />
<i> who's seen wars</i><br />
<i> to welcome that devil</i><br />
<i> and his claws </i><br />
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'Three weeks to Argentina'<br />
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The above lines were written by a World War 2 veteran as the 1982 Falklands War began : Gavin Ewart ( 1916- 1995) was educated at Wellington College then at Cambridge Univeristy. At the age of seventeen he had a poem published in the highly esteemed literary magazine 'New Verse' . Ewart's success at writing poetry continued, at the age of twenty three his first poetry collection was published in 1939.<br />
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When war broke out, Ewart became an officer in what he later described as a "Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment engaged on the air defence of factories and airfields in the UK " - an experience he called the most boring period of his life. Ewart saw active service as an officer in the Royal Artillery during the North Africa Campaign in 1942, then in Italy, being posted to a mobile operations room, travelling the west coast of Italy by motorbike. Ewart returned home to England in May 1946.<br />
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Then followed a period from 1946- 1964 when Ewart had no poetry published and was not particularly active on the literary scene. The poet Peter Porter has been credited with encouraging Ewart to return to poetry, and a new collection of his work appeared in 1966. It is striking how the War seemed to have quelled his enthusiasm for writing poetry. However , four of Ewart's poems appeared in 'I Burn for England- An anthology of the poetry of World War II' from 1966 . In 1972 Ewart stated that<br />
" I don't think that any 'great' poetry came out of the Second World War ( except for <i>The Unquiet Grave </i>which .....seems to me to fill the bill for anyone who is looking 'for the great war poem') "<br />
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To give this work its full title -<i>The Unquiet Grave; a Word Cycle </i>by 'Palinurus' - was a book written by the critic and editor Cyril Connolly. George Orwell reviewed it in January 1945, and noted the book's "dominant tone ,a refined rather pessimistic hedonism ." Hard to conceive of <i>The Unquiet Grave </i>being a poem.<br />
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Several years ago I wrote an article 'No More War Poets Anymore ', which the Siegfried Sassoon Fellowship rejected for publication in their magazine 'Siegfried's Journal'. One question raised therein was who meets the definition of a 'war poet' ? Gavin Ewart wrote poetry whilst in uniform, but as we have seen , he was a young published poet before World War 2, and the subject of war only inspired a small amount of his work. Yet what is most intriguing is the range of aspects of war covered : <br />
<i><br /></i>Looking at the Ewart's published war poems there looms a lighthearted feel that readers of War Poetry tend not to appreciate; 'Officers Mess' makes catty comments about the officers and their wives present, with one party guest collapsing after his beer is spiked with gin. Another 'Oxford Leave' , first published in the anthology ' More Poems from the Forces ' (1943) , concerns a drunken night out ending with<br />
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<i>It takes the loves and the parties but nostalgically in the brain</i><br />
<i>And even in the Army, their memories remain</i><br />
<i>And these are real people, not the distortion of dream,</i><br />
<i>And though one might not believe it, they' re all of them </i><br />
<i> what they seem</i><br />
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Gavin Ewart would later become famous for writing love poems , some quite erotic. His collection 'Pleasures of the Flesh' 1966 was banned by W H Smiths' shops when it first appeared, and this sonnet is particularly touching.<br />
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<i>We make mistakes, my darling, all the time,</i><br />
<i>Love, where we are not wanted, sigh alone,</i><br />
<i>Simply because our passions are not tame.</i><br />
<i>No fairy story dragons to be slain,</i><br />
<i>Our living difficulties are not so simple.</i><br />
<i>Huge effort cannot bring a love to birth,</i><br />
<i>The future offers no instructive sample</i><br />
<i>Of what's to come up a warlike earth </i>......<br />
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First appearing in 'Poems from the Forces -A Collection of Verse-edited with an introduction by Keidrych Rhys ,' from 1941, the poem hints that Ewart realised that being stationed in Britain would not last. And that how ever powerful love is, it can not shield one from the uncertainties generated by a world at war.<br />
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And Ewart could write some quite striking and harrowing lines about the actual nature of War ..such as these lines written in April 1945 whilst serving in Italy<br />
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<i><b>War Dead</b> </i><br />
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<i>With grey arm twisted over a green face</i><br />
<i>The dust of passing trucks swirls over him,</i><br />
<i>Lying by the roadside in his proper place,</i><br />
<i>For he crossed the ultimate far rim</i><br />
<i>That hides from us the valley of the dead.</i><br />
<i>He lies like used equipment thrown aside,</i><br />
<i>Of which our swift advance can take no heed.</i><br />
<i>Roses, triumphal cars- but this one died.</i><br />
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<i>Once war memorials, pitiful attempt</i><br />
<i>In some vague way regretfully to atone</i><br />
<i>For some lost futures that the dead had dreamt,</i><br />
<i>Covered the land with their lamenting stone-</i><br />
<i>But in our hearts we bear a heavier load;</i><br />
<i>The bodies of the dead beside the road.</i><br />
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<i><b>Sources Consulted </b></i><br />
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Have consulted the 'Poetryarchive.org' <a href="https://poetryarchive.org/poet/gavin-ewart/">entry for Gavin Ewart</a> for biographical details.<br />
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Quotes from the second and third paragraphs are from Gavin Ewart's self written biographical notes at the end of the anthology 'The Poetry of War 1939-1945, New English Library, 1972<br />
<i><br /></i>George Orwell quote from review of 'The Unquiet Grave' , 'The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell Volume 3 'As I Please' 1943-1945.<br />
<i><br /></i><i><b>Poems</b></i><br />
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<i>Would liked to have gone to The Poetry Library to consult more of Gavin Ewart's work, but alas not possible at the moment. </i><br />
<i><br /></i>'Three Weeks to Argentina ' appears in the collection 'The Young Pobble's Guide to His Toes' , Hutchinson , 1985<br />
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'Sonnet' originally appeared in 'Poems from the Forces -A Collection of Verses by serving members of the Navy, Army, and Air Force, edited with an introduction by Keidrych Rhys ,' Routledge , 1941<br />
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'Oxford Leave' originally appeared in 'More Poems from the Forces -A Collection of Verses by serving members of the Navy, Army, and Air Force, edited by Keidrych Rhys ,' from 1943<br />
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'Officers Mess' , 'Oxford Leave' and 'Sonnet ' from 'I Burn for England-An anthology of the poetry of World War II', Selected and Introduced by Charles Hamblett, First Publishing, 1966.<br />
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'War Dead' appears in 'The Voice of War-Poems of The Salamander Oasis Trust' , Michael Joseph Ltd, 1995<br />
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<b>Other Blogs by Michael Bully</b><br />
<br /><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana launched February 2023<br />
<br />
<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.com/">A Burnt Ship</a> 17th century war and literature.<br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-79069459341798880432020-04-16T09:59:00.002-07:002023-02-03T11:35:42.828-08:00The Life and Death Orchestra <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-large;">Songs for the Betrayed World </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;"> '</span><span style="font-size: large;">When the Music Stops- What happens then'?</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWxUXeHOYs6vPo6irHzCbX8_6lQSDWXGNUvQPaz-SL0hGRV4ybyh-0ViNKjj-wpkwZbICrwOdllcmSOJvWZdqB_7m8U0UP6aCfuZmyAOiwPCT5kiiBUdpqquByevhdEcnDSrWaFqPDtdE/s1600/Buchenwald_Ohrdruf_Corpses_60630.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="645" data-original-width="959" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWxUXeHOYs6vPo6irHzCbX8_6lQSDWXGNUvQPaz-SL0hGRV4ybyh-0ViNKjj-wpkwZbICrwOdllcmSOJvWZdqB_7m8U0UP6aCfuZmyAOiwPCT5kiiBUdpqquByevhdEcnDSrWaFqPDtdE/s320/Buchenwald_Ohrdruf_Corpses_60630.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"> P</span><span style="font-size: x-small;">hoto of bodies at Buchenwald-Ohrdruf taken by Colonel Park O Yingst: </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> United States Holocaust Museum # 60630 in Public Domain</span><br />
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The work of The Life and Death Orchestra in commemorating the Holocaust is both impressive and innovative Two projects worthy of note are firstly the CD 'Songs for the Betrayed World' (2000) .Composed by Bill Smith & Bim Sinclair and credited to the 'The Life & Death Orchestra Featuring Angi Mariani & Herbie Flowers', the CD interprets both Holocaust related poetry and prose . The poets featured include Yehuda Amichai, Tadeusz Borowski, Czeslaw Milosz, Zbigniew Herbert, Hilda Schiff, Elie Wiesel, and Adam Zych. The music is quite something else, strangely alluring. Elements of cabaret, early tango, brooding Jazz, with the occasional uplifting track such as 'Us Two ' whilst ' Never' confronts the whole horror of the Death Camps and the loss of faith in the benevolence of humanity . After a few listens to the work of The Life and Death Orchestra, strange to find oneself singing along to some of their songs. But challenging, thoughtful , and it is great to have a focus on lesser known work.<br />
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And then there is the opera 'This Way for the Gas Ladies and Gentlemen' , partly based on Tadeusz Borowski's recollections of being a prisoner in both Dachau and Auschwitz as published in 1947 : Borowski (born 1922) had been writing poetry whilst living underground during the German occupation, associated with the Resistance, and was arrested on 25th February 1943. His partner Maria Rundo, a Resistance fighter was also taken , and she was sent to Birkanau. Both survived, were re-united and married in 1946, living in Warsaw then travelling to France and Germany and back to Poland. Borowski turned to Communism, and to writing about his experiences as a prisoner. In 1951 he died in unexplained circumstances most likely by suicide,after learning that a friend has been arrested and tortured by the new Communist regime of Poland.Some of Borowski's most remarkable work concerns the love poetry he wrote whilst in the camps.<br />
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The Sun of Auschwitz (extract) Tadeusz Borowski<br />
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" I remember<br />
your smile as elusive<br />
as a shade of the colour of the wind,<br />
a leaf trembling on the edge<br />
of sun and shadow, fleeting<br />
yes always there. So you are<br />
for me today,in the seagreen<br />
sky, the greenery and<br />
the leaf-rustling wind. I feel<br />
you in every shadow, every movement<br />
and you put the world around me<br />
like your arms. I feel the world<br />
as your body, you look into my eyes<br />
and call me with the whole world"<br />
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(Translation that appears in 'The Auschwitz Poems' 1999)<br />
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The CD ' Songs of the Betrayed World ' interpretation can be listened to <a href="https://www.lifeanddeath.org/holocaustmp3/index.htm">Here</a><br />
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A personal favourite is Paul Celan 's 'Deathfuge' . The bitter ironic lyrics lend themselves well to a song and can be heard <a href="https://www.lifeanddeath.org/newmp3/deathfugue.mp3">here</a> Reminds one of Brecht and Weill. Paul Celan (1920-1970) was from a German Jewish family who were living in Romania . Celan was had to serve 18 months forced labour before escaping, his parents both died in the camps. A poet, translator and lecturer in Paris after the War ended, Celan took his own life in 1970 after a severe bout of depression.<br />
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'Deathfuge' (extract)<br />
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"Black milk of daybreak we drink it at evening<br />
we drink it at midday and morning we drink it at night<br />
we drink and we drink<br />
we shovel a grave in the air there you won't feel toocramped<br />
A man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he writes<br />
he writes when it grows dark to Deutschland your golden<br />
hair Margeurite<br />
h<i>e</i> writes it and steps out of doors and the stars are all<br />
sparkling he whistles his hounds to come close<br />
he whistles his Jews in rows has them a shovel a grave<br />
in the ground<br />
he orders us strike up and play for the dance. ....."<br />
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(Translation as appears in 'The Auschwitz Poems' ,1999)<br />
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Finally Tadeusz Rozewicz poem 'Pigtail' , already covered by this blog for <a href="https://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.com/2020/01/holocaust-memorial-day-2020.html">Holocaust Memorial Day</a> also adapts well to music and The Life and Death Orchestra's version is available <a href="https://www.lifeanddeath.org/newmp3/pigtail.mp3">here </a><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-size: large;">Interview with Bill Smith via email April 12th 2020</span></i></b><br />
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<b>Have you had feedback from Holocaust survivors and/or from relatives of those who died in the Holocaust about the work of the Life and Death Orchestra?</b><br />
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When we first performed as the Life and Death Orchestra many survivors came in the audience. We have since met many survivors and their relatives and all were grateful for what we had produced.<br />
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<b>It is noticeable that you have used the written word of some writers who were not directly caught up in the Holocaust, such as Adrian Mitchell ( 1932-2008) and Adam Zych ( born 1945) . What would you say in response to those who claim that it is impossible to write adequately about the Camps, or war in general, unless the writer has had first hand experience?</b><br />
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I don't agree with that. If you believed that you would have no art. Adrian Mitchell writes from the heart and understands what happened. Adam Zych was one of the principal curators of the Auschwitz Museum and we went there to meet him. He's a great composer too.<br />
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<b>In the performance of the Opera in 2007, there is a section about Darfur , and also references to the Katyn forest massacre. The Opera shows Tadeusz Borowski's bitter disillusionment with Communism after surviving the German Death Camps. The CD has a track about the singer Victor Jara murdered by Chilean fascist in 1973. How far do you think that connections can be made with the Holocaust and other crimes against humanity?</b><br />
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The Holocaust was a unique occurrence in human history but I started to try to understand the evil that humans do so I think that there are links. Borowski and Daghani were not keen on Socialist realism !!!<br />
To quote Arnold Daghani "If impressionism is painting what you see and expressionism painting what you feel, socialist realism is painting what you are told to see and feel."<br />
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<b>If there is one poem about the Holocaust that you think that readers should read, what would it be ?</b><br />
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'Again ' by Kevin Carey and the book 'Night' by Elie Wiesel.<br />
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<b>What are the future plans for the Life and Death Orchestra? Any chance of staging 'This Way to the Gas..' again ?</b><br />
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We're very hopeful that we can stage the Opera again in a significant way in 2021. We are publishing the full life cycle of song so any orchestra can play the songs. We hope to do a Life and Death Orchestra in late 2021 featuring other composers as well.<br />
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<b>Do you think that the Allies could have intervened in some way by bombing some of the major death camps or the rail links to them?</b><br />
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Yes I do think that the Allies could have taken the genocide much more seriously and could have adopted measures to save millions......and the world looked on and the world looked away as we sing in our opera. Mainly our leaders !<br />
( Bill directed me to the following article from 'The Independent' of April 18th 2017 titled 'Allied forces knew about Holocaust Two Years Before The Discovery of the Concentration Camps <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/world-history/holocaust-allied-forces-knew-before-concentration-camp-discovery-us-uk-soviets-secret-documents-a7688036.html">Secret Documents Reveal '</a> )<br />
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<i>I wish to thank Bill for his time. </i><br />
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Felt appropriate to end with some lines from 'Again ' by Kevin Carey<br />
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"Since then My Lai<br />
Kampuchea, paralysis<br />
in the face of ethnic cleansing. If<br />
I have to say it. If I have to say it<br />
again<br />
I will say it again<br />
for there is no such thing as compassion fatigue<br />
only compassion forgetting. If I<br />
have to say it<br />
again."<br />
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( From the booklet that accompanies the CD 'Songs For the Betrayed World'. Originally from Kevin Carey's poetry collection 'Klaonica' -which is Serbo-Croat for 'slaughterhouse'. )<br />
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<b>Links</b><br />
<b><br /></b>The <a href="https://www.lifeanddeath.org/">Life and Death Orchestra </a> website<br />
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The <a href="https://www.lifeanddeath.org/links/index.htm">Links</a> page on The Life and Death Orchestra website provides a massive guide to Holocaust research and commemoration organisations.<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYe1CYGrIlg">Never </a> as performed by The Life and Death Orchestra in 2007<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67SLueAB1Lw">Us Two </a> as performed by The Life and Death Orchestra in 2007<br />
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Tracks from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xw5jqM7zYA&list=PLOgjcmYIWTIHEICIuBe2i4jmquklEdNDq">Youtube selection of Life and Death Orchestra tracks -audio </a><br />
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Culture Poland website page on <a href="https://culture.pl/en/artist/tadeusz-borowski">Tadeusz Borowski </a><br />
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'The Keep' archive page on <a href="https://www.thekeep.info/german-jewish-collections/">Arnold Daghani</a> ( Artist referenced above by Bill Smith)<br />
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<b>Recommended Reading </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
'Holocaust Poetry', anthology edited by Hilda Schiff ,St Martin's Press, 1995<br />
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'The Auschwitz Poem' anthology edited by Adam A. Zych, Auschwitz- Birkenau State Museum 1999<br />
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<b>Other blogs by Michael Bully </b><br />
<br /><br /><br />New blog launched 3rd February 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">BleakChesneyWold</a> Charles Dickens/ 19th century history <br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-9778558860606071612020-04-11T07:36:00.002-07:002023-02-25T12:24:26.129-08:00The poetry of George Macbeth and A War Quartet (1969) <span style="font-size: large;"> Too young to fight, too old to forget.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeVNsJUNZW7EKh-h4ZvomGRFHge1txnv5wNTXUXylXzBBPn9hKOHjkQT8VLKErENYt9S6H98X6vdSwT5ZWc4jD9m9Jk9yEZIyY4-2MM1c9ZgY7OOVsZk50nvDZBIhqm73rSVX0Ybc_CDA/s1600/Torpedoed_merchant_ship.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="433" data-original-width="700" height="197" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeVNsJUNZW7EKh-h4ZvomGRFHge1txnv5wNTXUXylXzBBPn9hKOHjkQT8VLKErENYt9S6H98X6vdSwT5ZWc4jD9m9Jk9yEZIyY4-2MM1c9ZgY7OOVsZk50nvDZBIhqm73rSVX0Ybc_CDA/s320/Torpedoed_merchant_ship.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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A U boat shells a merchant ship which has remained afloat<br />
after being torpedoed at the Battle of the Atlantic.<br />
<i>Public domain, courtesy of 'Wikipedia' </i><br />
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George Macbeth was born in Shotts, Lanarkshire, Scotland 1932. His father was a miner. The family moved to Sheffield when George was three , where he remained until attending New College, Oxford. Later to become a prolific poet , novelist, and poetry editor. ,Macbeth spent many years working for BBC, particularly wish such programmes as <i>Poets Voice</i> ( 1958- 1965) , <i>Poetry Now </i> ( 1965-1976) and <i>New Comment</i> (1959-1964). Associated with 'The Group', a loose alliance of poets based in London during the 1950's and 1960's whose work often tackled controversial subjects such as death, religion and war. In 1964, Macbeth was published in the 'Penguin Modern Poets' series along with Jack Clemo and Edward Lucie-Smith. He also read his work at the famous Poetry Olympics at the Albert Hall in 1965. Giving up broadcasting in 1976, Macbeth wanted to devote himself to writing. In 1992 he died from complications arising from motor-neuron disease.<br />
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I have recently read Jeff Nuttall ( 1933-2004 ) seminal work 'Bomb Culture' (1968) about the British Underground from 1956-1967. Nuttall's argument , borrowing heavily from Norman Mailer, was that the teenagers of the 1950 's were the first generation of young people who had to grow up with the knowledge that humanity could destroy itself into extinction via the use of the H-bomb. This led to a whole new sub-culture created by the young generation. Nuttall also felt that the use of nuclear weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki ensured that the older generation would be tarnished in the eyes of the young. The Bomb thus served as a complete break with the wars of the Past.<br />
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Interesting to see that George Macbeth, though only a year older than Nuttall, had a much more complex relationship with World War 2, George Macbeth's upbringing had seen some harrowing moments. A land mine dropped in an air raid detonated and wrecked the family home whilst George and his family sheltered under the stairs. A few months later, George Macbeth's father, who was serving as an air raid warden, simply did not come home from working during an air raid, and was never seen or heard of again. Effectively joining the 'missing' of World War 2.<br />
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Macbeth's poem 'The Creed', written upon realising that had reached the age of 46 ,mentions how World War 2 would forever be a presence in his life.<br />
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"Child of that sluggish war,<br />
As I am that will never die<br />
There will always be bombers there<br />
At the back of my burning head.<br />
And my father in uniform."<br />
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In 1969, George Macbeth published his most ambitious World War 2 poetry collection 'A War Quartet' The books cites quite an extensive bibliography and Macbeth makes it clear that the four poems are the product of dedicated historical research. The four poems depicted four turning points in World War 2; the Battle of El-Alamein , the Battle of Britain, ,the Battle of the Atlantic, and the Battle of Stalingrad. (These four poems are arranged out of historical sequence ).<br />
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On the cover of 'A War Quartet ' Macbeth advised that he wrote " For me, as for so many of my generation-too young to fight, too old to forget.The War was a formative event. and it remains an obsessive memory.To treat it as a dream-like trauma, rather than as lived experience may at worst provide a convenient filter, and at best a chance of insight."<br />
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The phrase 'a chance of insight' is intriguing. A historian's case against War Poetry having an influence on how a conflict is viewed, is often based on the notion that a poem will not explain why the war began or ended, in other words will not disclose why someone is serving in the ranks or caught up in an air raid. A poet's defence is that poetry records or recreates impression of crucial human experience. People turn to poetry in times of emotional intensity, to read out at a funeral, or wedding, or at an Remembrance event. For example Sassoon poem to the World War 1 dead - 'Aftermath' with the refrain 'Have you forgotten Yet' ? can say more in two minutes hard hitting language than a whole book on the subject ever could.<br />
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Yet the problem is that 'A War Quartet' doesn't quite work. One sort of admires Macbeth for attempting such an ambitious project. Particularly in 1969 when the Vietnam War was of a concern to the younger generation, he seemed to be going against the grain. In the seminal biography 'Walking Wounded-The Life and Poetry of Vernon Scannell 'by Andrew Taylor, Macbeth is portrayed as being hesitant to write about World War 2 due to the fact that he was not a combatant. Vernon Scannell, born ten years earlier in 1922, served in the North Africa campaign and the Normandy invasion, is shown to have encouraged George Macbeth to have written poetry about World War 2.<br />
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Firstly the Battle of El Alamein , which opens 'A War Quartet ' was part of the Desert War : This was the one campaign within World War 2 that was so covered by poets, many of them who actually fought there. Keith Douglas,Hamish Henderson, Edwin Morgan, Sorley Maclean, G S Fraser, George Campbell Hay. Great initiatives took also took place with organisations such as The Oasis Trust to encourage those in uniform to write whilst they served in North Africa.. George Macbeth's take on the Desert War doesn't seem add anything to what had been written before.<br />
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"So when, days later,we<br />
Looked back from Libya, saw the flowing line<br />
of turret after turret, fortress like<br />
As if a city stirred, such awkward tears<br />
Throttled us, that we blinked in strange grit, steamed<br />
Inside the famous metal, touched it felt<br />
Victory tangible.<br />
And those we killed,<br />
Or captured after so much turmoil, where was their star bound?"<br />
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Next section 'Autumn Victory' about a Battle of Britain shows an improvement, featuring bomber crews preparing for take off.<br />
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"In a blur<br />
of green and reaching leaves, hitting the wind,<br />
All plunged against their boundary, split and pulled,<br />
Easing the joy-stick to their mid-riffs, wings<br />
Gather of others' muscles, to quick fans<br />
Cloud-ramming, jubilant<br />
In a surge of air<br />
The sky flowered with fighters."<br />
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The main character, the pilot, visits London where he manages to find a woman serving as a WAAF for quick sex which is interrupted by an air raid. The pilot then wanders, stunned in the aftermath of the bombing<br />
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The next sequence is under the sea. Featuring a U boat commander who has to surrender to the Allies. Again the notion of the war just being some of perverse dream is raised . It manages to convey the claustrophobia of life on a U-boat<br />
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" A sort of morbid fear,<br />
Acute-sensed, looked over, swelled my body.<br />
Became an instrument, as if the sea<br />
Entered my blood, mixed with it.<br />
In strange salts<br />
Her monsters watched<br />
In my narrow bunk, awake<br />
Under the blue alarm light, I would like<br />
Listening to each miniature noise-pit flick<br />
of the gyro compass, an irregular click<br />
Like someone sharpening a pencil, control-noise<br />
Lifted or fallen.."<br />
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The final and shortest section of 'A War Quartet' concerns Stalingrad , and is written from a German point of view. Somehow just doesn't quite flow. In the introduction to 'A War Quartet, Macbeth cites the success of James Schevill's lyrical sequence 'The Stalingrad Elegies' from 1964 , based on the letters of German soldiers, to show that a poet does not need to be an eye witness to the events that they are writing about.<br />
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" After<br />
the fire-war from the air, the snow-war from<br />
The ground<br />
<br />
Settle in cellars, bombs<br />
Mines and grenades expended, we came down to guns<br />
Duelling.<br />
Each had heroes, men<br />
Who never wasted fire<br />
The was the month<br />
Of the sniper.<br />
We had a crack one under tin<br />
A hundred years off.<br />
In six days, he ruled<br />
The area we could walk in, pinned our lives<br />
With quadrant fire<br />
Then, in a fit of risk<br />
Lifting a mitten on a stick, he lost<br />
Full Secrecy....."<br />
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<b>NOTES & LINKS</b><br />
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George Macbeth's Collected Poems '1958-1982 'has been out of print for many years.<br />
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'A War Quartet ', George Macbeth, was originally published by Macmillan in 1969, and reprinted twice in 1970, then seems to have fallen out of print. Both 'Collected Poems' and 'A War Quartet ' were available on Amazon Co UK last time I checked.<br />
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Tribute to George Macbeth from <a href="https://oldedwardians.org.uk/nlc/personal/GeorgeMacBeth.html">King Edward VII school Sheffield </a><br />
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Feature on George Macbeth from <a href="https://thehighwindowpress.com/2017/10/24/george-macbeth-poet-aplogist-and-enfant-terrible/">High Windows Press</a><br />
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<b>Further work by Michael Bully</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> </b>Charles Dickens / 'dark' Victoriana<br />
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<b><a href="https://13thcenturyhistory.blogspot.com/">13th century history blog </a></b><br />
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<a href="http://aburntship.blogspot.com/">A Burnt Ship</a> 17th century war and literature blog<br />
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<br /></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-21489785979653314882020-03-05T08:10:00.002-08:002023-02-25T12:25:51.741-08:00Capel-le-Ferne by Greg Harper <span style="font-size: large;">World War 2 featured in song lyrics</span><br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Battle_of_Britain_Memorial_Pilot.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="800" height="241" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Battle_of_Britain_Memorial_Pilot.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="font-size: x-small;"> <span style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222;">Statue of seated pilot at the Battle of Britain Memorial Capel-le-Ferne, Kent UK</span></span><br />
<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="font-size: x-small;"> Shared by <a class="new" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Detraymond&action=edit&redlink=1" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #a55858; text-decoration-line: none;" title="User:Detraymond (page does not exist)">Detraymond</a> via Wikpedia Creative Commons Licence</span><br />
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I have been aiming to write about how World War 2 has been covered in contemporary song lyrics. There is of course a debate whether or not song lyrics can be defined as 'poetry' and I am not going to attempt to resolve this.<br />
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Anyhow. one track I have recently discovered is 'Capel-Le- Ferne' by Sussex singer songwriter, Greg Harper from an album titled 'Well Spun Lies' , and is about a former Battle of Britain pilot reminiscing.Greg has kindly agreed to allow me to reproduce the lyrics in full.<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">CAPEL-LE-FERNE</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 14px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">I remember that summer a long time ago</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">The waiting and the weather wondering if they’d show</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Flying high over white cliffs over fields and sand</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Looking down and protecting this green pleasant land</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 14px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Now they ask was it exciting well you must’ve been so proud</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A swooping and a soaring way up in the clouds</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Mister how many did you get how many did you kill</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">But me I think of lost friends I’m thinking of them still</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 14px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">But if you ask me I’ll tell you</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">It felt just like dancing</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Dancing on air</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A dance for survival</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A dance of despair</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A life on the edge</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Living life to the full</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">For death or glory</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Oh glory so cruel</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 14px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">So I stand on the white cliffs at Capel-le-Ferne</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">There’s a band and a fly past how the years have flown</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">As I stand in the crowd there I feel so alone</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Well the few they get fewer and soon we’ll be gone</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 14px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">But if you ask me I’ll tell you</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">It felt just like dancing</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Dancing on air</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A dance for survival</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A dance of despair</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">A life on the edge</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Living life to the full</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">For death or glory</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "merriweather" , "georgia" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px;">Oh glory so cruel</span><br />
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Works well both as a poem and a song. I asked Greg via email for further background to the song:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"At the beginning of July 2010 I visited the Battle Of Britain memorial site at Capel-le-Ferne, Kent. It was just a couple of days before the annual ceremony, which is held to mark and remember the start of the battle. As I stood there on the cliff edge looking towards France, I tried to imagine what the remaining members of the Few might be thinking each time they attended the event over the years. What thoughts did they have as the dignitaries spoke, as the band played and the flypast went over their heads? My song Capel-le-Ferne is what I imagine they might have been thinking, on that day, and maybe every other day for the preceding 70 years. Now in March 2020, 10 more years on, only two of them remain "</span><br />
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To hear the track on line go to <a href="https://gregharpermusic.com/audio">Greg Harper Music Audio webpage</a> and look for the 'Well Spun Lies' album. 'Well Spun Lies' also features another superb track relating to World War 2, 'November Sky,' about the bombing of Coventry on 14th November 1940.<br />
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<b>Links</b><br />
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<a href="http://www.gregharpermusic.com/">Greg Harper's website </a><br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4dMjePQYbw">Youtube video of the track 'Capel-Le-Feme' </a><br />
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Other blogs by Michael Bully<div><br /></div><div><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana launched February 2023 <br />
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<a href="https://13thcenturyhistory.blogspot.com/">13th century history </a><br />
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<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.com/">A Burnt Ship </a> ( Poetry and other writing relating to 17th century warfare)<br />
<br /></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-10400124256154164672020-01-26T07:45:00.001-08:002023-02-25T12:27:54.622-08:00Holocaust Memorial Day 2020 <br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> I felt that something had ended for Mankind</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1e2521; font-family: "playfair display" , serif; font-size: 16px;">“I felt that something had forever ended for me and for mankind,” Różewicz wrote, “something that neither religion nor science nor art had succeeded in protecting"</span><br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/Selection_on_the_ramp_at_Auschwitz-Birkenau%2C_1944_(Auschwitz_Album)_1b.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="800" height="227" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/Selection_on_the_ramp_at_Auschwitz-Birkenau%2C_1944_(Auschwitz_Album)_1b.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> Hungarian Jews arriving at Auschwitz 1944</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> In public domain ,courtesy of Wikipedia </span><br />
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In 1949, the German critic Theodor Adorno wrote the famous line ' After Auschwitz it is barbaric to write poetry' . The notion that the catastrophic impact of World War 2 was simply beyond poetry had been considered in such poems as Dylan Thomas' 'Refusal to mourn the death of a child by fire in London'.<br />
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"The majesty and burning of the child's death<br />
I shall not murder<br />
The mankind of her going with a grave truth<br />
Nor blaspheme down the stations of her breath<br />
With any further<br />
Elegy of Innocence and Youth. "<br />
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It's almost as if Dylan Thomas thought that trying to write poetry about the death of a child in an air raid could not be done, in fact would debase the tragedy. Adorno went one step further using the term 'barbaric' . Yet Polish poet Tadeuzs Rozewicz (1921- 2014) , who lived through the German occupation of Poland took an opposite view -"What I have produced is poetry for the horror stricken . For those abandoned to butchery . For survivors. " The view seems to be that writing holocaust poetry is somehow an act of human empathy, trying to acknowledge the suffering of those who perished or survived, carrying their trauma with them.. German Jewish poet Nelly Sachs, who managed to escape to Sweden and survive the War seemed driven to write about the Holocaust as if she had no other option . Her famous poem 'The Chorus of the Rescued' has the line " The worms of fear still feed upon us", as in being rescued she was committed to feelings of 'survivors guilt' and grief for all those she knew who failed to escape. ; <a href="https://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.com/2018/07/nelly-sachs-1891-1970-chorus-of-rescued.html">more</a> on Nelly Sachs can be found on a previous post.<br />
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To return to Rozewicz it is worth noting that besides being a poet, he was also a playwright, translator of Hungarian poetry, screenwriter and novelist. During World War 2 he served in the Polish Home Army. In his poem 'The survivor' ,Rozewicz hinted that after the holocaust, language had lost the ability to make value judgement "Virtue and crime weigh the same" . Yet from accounts of people who have visited Auschwitz , seeing possessions of prisoners can generate strong response. Can be a pile of shoes, a pair of glasses, knowing that their owners were systematically murdered. Rozewicz seemed to find such feelings in his poem 'Pigtail'<br />
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"When all the women in the transport<br />
had their heads shaved<br />
four workmen with brooms made of birch twigs<br />
swept up<br />
and gathered up the hair<br />
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Behind clean glass<br />
the stiff hair lies<br />
of those suffocated in gas chambers<br />
there are pins and side combs<br />
in this hair<br />
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The hair is not shot through with light<br />
is not parted by the breeze<br />
is not touched by any hand or rain or lips<br />
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In huge chests<br />
clouds of dry hair<br />
of those suffocated<br />
and a faded plait<br />
a pigtail with a ribbon<br />
pulled at school<br />
by naughty boys "<br />
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<i>The Museum, Auschwitz, 1948</i><br />
<i>Translated by Adam Czerniawski </i><br />
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Seems that Rozewicz found the language to write about Auschwitz but thought out his time as a poet could never write about beauty.<br />
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SOURCES<br />
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'Pigtail' is taken from 'Second World War Poems' chosen by Hugh Naughton, Faber and Faber 2004<br />
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Opening Quote by Rozewicz from review of his collected works <a href="http://www.ronslate.com/on-sobbing-superpower-poems-by-tadeusz-rozewicz-translated-from-the-polish-by-joanna-trzeciak-norton/">Sobbing Superpower</a><br />
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Quote by Adorno taken from the introduction to 'Holocaust Poetry ' anthology edited by Hilda Schiff<br />
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<a href="https://culture.pl/en/artist/tadeusz-rozewicz">Culture Poland website </a> English language page on Rozewicz is essential reading<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG6ysnsT8pU">Pigtails Poem read in English </a> with animation on You Tube uploaded 2009 by 'Dawid'.<br />
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OTHER NOTES<br />
<br /> Currently working on <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana bog launched February 2023<br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-26781062349920637742019-11-29T08:18:00.002-08:002022-06-07T12:49:03.020-07:00Alan Ross extract One <br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: x-large; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Alan Ross The Making of a Poet </span><br />
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<span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #54595d; font-size: 13.6px;">photograph </span><a class="external text" href="https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/search?query=FL+2837" rel="nofollow" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.6px; text-decoration-line: none;">FL 2837</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #54595d; font-size: 13.6px;"> from the collections of the </span><a class="external text" href="https://www.iwm.org.uk/" rel="nofollow" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.6px; text-decoration-line: none;">Imperial War Museums</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #54595d; font-size: 13.6px;"> (collection no. 8308-29) in the Public Domain , courtesy of Wikipedia and the IWM. </span></div>
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<i>In various blog posts I have written about the 'War at Sea' poetry of Alan Ross ( 1922- 2001) and am hoping to transform various fragments into a longer study. One disadvantage is that I have not been able to trace the copyright holder to his work. Please get in contact if you know who they are. </i><br />
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Th work of Alan Ross falls broadly into three categories, War, Cricket and his Indian childhood. Ross was born in Calcutta, was sent to school in England at the age of seven,though returned to India regularly until 1937. He was educated at Haileybury and then St John's College, Oxford joining the Royal Navy on his 20th birthday in 1942. Ross began his war service as an Ordinary Rating on the lower decks, on board destroyers, serving in an Arctic Convoy, then the North Sea. After two years Ross joined the staff of the 16th Destroyer Flotilla, later to become an Intelligence Officer.<br />
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Already getting published during World War 2 simply by sending poetry to magazines and anthologies- John Lehman was the first to publish him in 'Penguin New Writing. Lehman introduced Ross to a circle of writers and painters, and also to Osbert Sitwell. Ross was later to recall arriving in his sailor's uniform to attend a Sitwell soiree and having a quick conversation on the stairs with a man wearing a raincoat who was just leaving , who turned out to be E M Foster.<br />
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Once demobbed Alan Ross became a travel writer, cricket corespondent, magazine editor, author, and carried on writing poetry. Immersed in the charming literary world of the second half of the 20th century, his autobiographical writing is fragmented :Accounts of Alan Ross' naval service and its immediate aftermath can be found in his autobiographical 'Blindfold Games (1986); The book's title is from Rudyard Kipling's poem 'Tin Fish'<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;">"They play their grisly blindfold games</b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;">in little boxes made of tin."</b><br />
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One neglected collection of literary work that was published during Word War 2 is the 'Transformation' anthologies edited by Stefan Schimanski and Henry Treece. 'Transformation 2' (1944) listed contributors included poet and art critic Herbert Read, educationalist A.S.Neil. Richard Church, Stephen Spender, Morwenna Donnelly.....Henry Miller was the most well know writer. And an Alan Ross poem 'Waterfront' was included therein. The poem is not particular inspiring, a dreary description of humdrum port life being portrayed as some sort of awkward metaphor for a wider social malaise. Thankfully was not re-published. On the back cover of 'Transformations ' Ross was acknowledged </div>
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<i>Was born in 1918 and educated in India and Oxford. He is now serving in a destroyer' </i></div>
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Ross was in fact born in 1922. He was serving,as we have seen as an Ordinary Rating and now being published alongside Spender and Read. Certainly an achievement for a 'War at Sea' poet. </div>
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Alan Ross reflected on his attitude to War in 1975 in the introduction to a collection of his past poetry 'Open Sea'<br />
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"Reading the poems again, I am aware that they show no particular distaste for, or reaction against, the idea of war. They simply assume its particular necessity, an attitude I neither questioned at the time nor do now. The boredom, the misery and the waste were part of a larger experience that remains in many incidents, as vivid to me as when it took place."<br />
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Ross went on to say<br />
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"I can think of no one I served with who resented the reasons for the war against Nazi Germany, however intolerable they may have found the reality."<br />
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I think it is the great American scholar Elizabeth Vaniver who warned against the 'privileging of the anti-war voice' when looking at war poetry. Certainly Ross was to experience the full onslaught of war at the Battle of Barents Sea, at the age of 20, and write about it in an epic poem 'J.W.51B'<br />
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Another anthology of World War 2 writing is 'Leaves in the Storm- A book of Diaries' edited by Stefan Schimanski and Henry Treece' , published in 1947. Alan Ross contributed a prose extract titled Arctic Convoy , about his time on board HMS ONSLOW<br />
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"AM ENGAGING THE ENEMY. Sea tilts over the bows, the wake zig-zags fiercely, time is contracted, a pin point. Far on the starboard horizon, the convoy turns south; a smoke-screen is put up like a wall by a destroyer, spouting grey belches like a train. Suddenly orange is flung from the port quarter, long lean tongues forked from the enemy's mouth, soundless, in shafts of belched colour like a bridge striving to reach out and across. Like whales flicking, spouts of silky water explode in plumes, soundless. Again the orange tongue unleashes itself, flashing in flamingo streams of flame. World is become electric, power-wrecked, three feathers of water explode across the smoke, a low driven note."<br />
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ENDS<br />
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Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-57251061294223808722019-08-13T12:56:00.001-07:002022-06-07T12:47:44.235-07:00Leon Zdzislaw Stroinski 1921- 1944 'Warsaw' <br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Leon Stroinski- Poet of the Warsaw Uprising </span><br />
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Leon Zdislaw Stroinski was born in Warsaw in 1921, and died fighting in the Warsaw Uprising on 16th August 1944. A collection of his prose poetry was destroyed in the fighting. In 1963 a collection titled 'Okno' ( 'Window') was published, containing 9 poems, 11 prose poems, a short story, and two polemical pieces' , and republished in 1982.<br />
This post, more than anything, is an appeal for further information about his work. Hugh Haughton in his 'Second World War Poems', ( Faber & Faber 2004) , featured the prose poem 'Warsaw' , translated by the poet Adam Czerniawski , who was born in Poland in 1934,<br />
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<b> Warsaw </b><br />
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" During the building of the barricades, the Vistula, brimming with reflections of forests, birds and white roads line with poplars, rose at first like a mist, then like a stiff cover of a book.<br />
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In its shade at dawn caretakers come out with huge frayed brooms to sweep up the the tears which have collected during the night and lie thickly in the streets.<br />
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Already. the market women, extended to the edge of sunlight, recommend potatoes grown on graves.<br />
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And on the horizon of the street, across the roar of grenades lying in the curves of cobblestones,the soul of the city has been moving for months.<br />
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The reflection of her face, too difficult to comprehend, has left a trace on the twisted faces of ruins as on the handkerchief of St Veronica.<br />
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Those who will cone in the far, far future wanting to decipher them, drawing their cold-blue hands across features taut like strings, and who with careless fingers will poke the moan of those dried up in crevices-<br />
will burst in prayer or blasphemy.<br />
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Here my country has come together from decimated forests and villages turned into a dog's howl. It persists in the whisper of mechanised armour.<br />
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We had to wait through so much blood and pathos in order to build from the silence of ruined monuments such a vault over a city of jazz and death.<br />
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Now lemurs from Gothic temples are thick on roofs of trams and terrify insurance officials on their way home.<br />
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The dead wander beneath the pavements and pound on bucklers which give a hollow sound, while at evening in double rows of whispers they walk arm in arm with the living, and you can tell them part only by skilfully folded wings, which nevertheless stick out on their backs like humps.<br />
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But in daytime huge stone capstans hum, and only around noon, when folk sit down to lunch and it's a bit quieter, can you hear more distinctly the heavy rhythmical tread of God's steel-shod boots. "<br />
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Translated by Adam Czerniawski, 'The Burning Forest -Modern Polish Poetry', 1988.<br />
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<i>I have not been able to trace the copyright holder of this poem- if anyone owns the right, please get in contact and would be delighted to give them all due credit. </i><br />
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Another poet who died during the 1944 Uprising was Krzystof Kamil Baczynski ( born 1921) who was killed fighting the Germans on 4th August 1944. Have not been able to find anything by him in English but <a href="https://culture.pl/en/artist/krzysztof-kamil-baczynski">Culture.Pl website</a> has a fascinating page about his life, but no extracts from his poetry.<br />
Anna Swir was a military nurse during the Uprising, and came within an hour of being executed but was spared, and lived until 1984. The Chicago based <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/anna-swir">Poetry Foundation</a> has a useful biographical page on her, and links to some of her poems.<br /><br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-9453237323744354492019-06-11T11:01:00.004-07:002023-09-27T14:04:02.349-07:00Miklos Radnoti (1909 -1944) <br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Miklos Radnoti -'Flame must rise above death and autumn' </span><br />
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Miklos Radnoti in 1930, courtesy of Wikpedia.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><b> Peace, Horror</b><br />
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When I stepped out through the gate,it was just ten o'clock<br />
A baker stepped by on gleaming wheels, a song on his lips.<br />
A plane droning high overhead and the sun up, it was ten,<br />
And my dead sister came into my mind and with that they were all<br />
Flying above me-those whom I love and who are not alive-<br />
Darkly across the sky, a host of the silent dead.....<br />
Then a jolt, and a shadow crumpled against the wall.<br />
Silence. The morning came to a halt on the stroke of ten;<br />
Hovering over the street- and a certain horror. (1938)<br />
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Miklos Radnoti was born into a Hungarian Jewish family in 1909 .Radnoti's first collection of poetry 'Pagan Invocation' , was published in 1930. Two others followed in 1931, and 1933. In 1934 Radnoti moved to Budapest and started writing for a literary magazine titled <i>Nyugat </i>. Cultural life in Hungry began to reflect contemporary cultural tensions, Radnoti was firmly aligned with the more Left-leaning writers and artists of the day whilst German economic domination and political influence was growing. Radnoti still had collections of poetry published and married his school sweetheart Fanni Gyarmati, and a lot of his poetry was inspired by her.<br />
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A fair amount of his poetry featured eerie premonition of what calamity was going to befall Hungary. Radnoti avidly followed the Republican cause in Spain. In 1936 he brought out a collection titled ' Keep Walking, you the Death Condemned' . The poem of the same name was also a strange premonition of Radnoti's own fate<br />
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"Keep walking, you, the death-condemned'<br />
In front, the dark trees ranged in line<br />
Topple towards you; bushes hide<br />
A cat and the chill wind. The road<br />
Turns white with fear, arching its spine.<br />
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Shrivel away now, autumn leaves!<br />
Shrivel, oh terrifying world!<br />
Cold hissing from the sky is harsh,<br />
And on stiff, rusty blades of grass<br />
The shadows of wild ducks are hurled ....."<br />
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A series of repressive measures were passed in Hungary from 1930- 1941, instigated by Admiral Horthy's regime. Types of employment were banned to Radnoti as a Jew , but worst was the fact that Jews were forced to register to join a forced labour system. Hungary became more aligned with the Axis, even declaring war on the Soviet Union in 1941, and sending troops to take part in the invasion. Radnoti was called up for three months in 1940 for labour service, and for ten months in 1942-1943 Shortly after this term, Radnoti converted to the Roman Catholic faith. In 1944 he was deported to Yugoslavia to serve with other Jews in building roads for the German occupiers. By then Germany had assumed control of Hungary.<br />
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In September 1944, the Germans had to evacuate the Balkans following the advance of the Red Army and the growing confidence of Tito's partisans. The Hungarian Jewish labourers,who were partly guarded by Hungarian soldiers, were made to join a forced march back into Hungary. Cold weather, near starvation, damaged health, and exhaustion led to many casualties. Around the 8th November 1944 , near the town of Gyor, Radnoti was amongst 21 sick and exhausted Jewish labourers who were separated from the main column. The following day, near the town of Abda, the Jews were made to dig a ditch, then shot one by one.<br />
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After the War, the bodies were exhumed. It was discovered that Radnoti had hidden a notebook of his poetry in his coat. In 1948, a posthumous collection of poetry was published.<br />
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Ultimately Radnoti's work was inspired by Jewish culture, with a growing Christian influence, Anti-Fascism, reverence for nature, an instinctive humanitarian viewpoint, with a haunting fatalism. A feeling that however hopeless his predicament must have seen as a Jew with liberal-Left views, trapped in central Europe dominated by the Axis, Radnoti was never going to abandon his idealism.<br />
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However harrowing Radnoti's war poetry could be, thought that it was fitting to end with some lines that showed that Radnoti was poet who wrote about love. And this must not be forgotten. Here are the final three verses of 'Autumn Begins Restlessly'... written in August- September 1941.<br />
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" The landscape falls asleep<br />
Death lovely in his white glide<br />
Settle on the countryside.<br />
The sky cradles the garden.<br />
Look; in your hair's and autumn leaf that's golden,<br />
Above you, branches weep.<br />
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Ah but your flame must rise above death and autumn<br />
And raise me love, love, along with you.<br />
let the wise thing be to love me today-<br />
Be wise and kiss me, hungry for dreams too.<br />
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Joyfully love me, do not leave me, fall<br />
With me into the dark sky sleep creates.<br />
Let's sleep. Out there the thrush is well asleep.<br />
The walnut, falling on fallen leave piled deep,<br />
makes no harsh sound. Reason disintegrates."<br />
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<b>Sources</b><br />
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<i>Poetry</i><br />
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<a href="http://thehypertexts.com/Mikl%C3%B3s_Radn%C3%B3ti_Hungarian_Poet_Poetry_Tanslator_Bio.htm">Some English translations of Radnoti </a><br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-au00cItu3o&t=83s">Dame Judi Dench </a> reciting Miklos Radnoti poem from (Exiled Hungarian ) director Robert Vas' film 'My Homeland' from 'Youtube'.<br />
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<i>Books </i><br />
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'Foamy Sky- The Major Poems of Miklos Radnoti' Selected by Zsusanna Ozsvatha and Fredrick Turner, , Princeton University Press, 1992 is highly recommended. A superb collection of Radnoti's work from 1929- 1944 with a useful biography.<br />
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'Forced March-Selected Poems' by Miklos Radnoti, Translated from the Hungarian by Clive Wilmer and George Gomori. , Enitharmon Press , in association with the European Jewish Society, 2003. Also recommended...shorter collection than 1992's 'Foamy Sky' and a great introduction to Radnoti's life and work.<br />
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Fanni Gyamati died on 15th September 2014. The Daily Telegraph <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/10653903/Fanni-Gyarmati-obituary.html">Obituary</a> is well worth a read.<br />
<br /><br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-40520686646302865702019-05-19T11:15:00.001-07:002022-06-07T12:50:56.812-07:00Lidice poem - Cecil Day Lewis <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> Lidice Massacre </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBqlFCHhzjCZKd7bqO5rczgOjxnkDqZokMlLIQgWjGCqj51ocLvD5rOSY-lIqMHjmYqAQow3hIRYtVJpievs671le74U1153u6IWxw8_2mlR6JS4Ir4TsyRhk0WxlOQ0BFFM9l0g_7ZDY/s1600/Memorial_lidice_children_%25282007%2529-commons.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBqlFCHhzjCZKd7bqO5rczgOjxnkDqZokMlLIQgWjGCqj51ocLvD5rOSY-lIqMHjmYqAQow3hIRYtVJpievs671le74U1153u6IWxw8_2mlR6JS4Ir4TsyRhk0WxlOQ0BFFM9l0g_7ZDY/s320/Memorial_lidice_children_%25282007%2529-commons.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-size: 13.3px;"> </span><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-size: 13.3px;">Memorial to the children of Lidice in the park in front of the museum</span><br />
<span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-size: 13.3px;"> Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons</span><br />
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<i> <b> 'Lidice'</b></i><br />
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<i> Not a grave of the murdered for freedom </i><br />
<i>but grows seed for freedom-</i> Walt Whitman <br />
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" Cry to us ,murdered village while you grieve<br />
Ashes raw on history makes us understand<br />
What freedom asks of us . Strengthen our hands<br />
Against the arrogant dogmas that deprave<br />
And have no proof but death as their command<br />
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Must the innocent blood for ever to remedy<br />
These fantastic fits that tear mankind apart?<br />
The pangs we felt from you atrocious hurt<br />
Promise a time when even the killer shall see<br />
His sword is aimed at his own naked heart."<br />
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Cecil Day Lewis- From his collection, 'Word All Over' 1943.<br />
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C. (Cecil) Day Lewis ( 1904-1972) was one of the leading poets of the 'Auden' generation of the 1930's. Born in Ireland, Lewis studied at Oxford University. Served in the Home Guard, and worked in the Ministry of Information during World War 2. Later to become a professor of poetry at Oxford from 1951-1956, and a writer of detective stories. C. Day-Lewis was also Poet Laureate from 1968-1972.<br />
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A small collection of his work was published in 1941 under the title 'Where are the War Poets'? This was expanded for a revised volume of his poetry as 'Word All Over' and published in 1943.<br />
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His work has not really remained in favour compared with some of his associates such as W H Auden, Christopher Isherwood, Sir Stephen Spender. I can't find any collection of his work that was published after 1982. Few of Day-Lewis' poems have made it into World War 2 poetry anthologies. His most famous poem is probably 'Stand To', about his experiences in the Home Guard.<br />
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In December 1941, two Czech agents Jan Kubis and Joseph Gabiek, who were serving with Polish forces in Britain, were parachuted into Czechoslovakia. Their mission was to assassinate Heydrich, the SS commander of Bohemia and Moravia. The Allies including the Czech government in exile- were aware of the risk of reprisals but decided that Heydrich was simply too dangerous to be allowed to live. He was deemed to be particularly brutal even by Nazi standards, and one theory is that he was due to be dispatched to France, where he could have caused major damage to the Resistance there. On 27th May 1942, , the agents,who had managed to remain in hiding , attacked as Heydrich was being driven down a quiet street in Prague, following his usual routine from his villa to Prague castle, in an open top car.<br />
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The agents struck with a sten gun- that jammed- and hurled an anti tank grenade at the car, Heydrich was wounded and initially survived, but died in hospital on 4th June 1942 . Particles from the vehicle and various other fragments had contaminated his wounds.<br />
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Round up of alleged Czech resistance fighter began. Dozens died under SS interrogation, hundreds of people already in prison , both Jewish and Czech were executed. A particular example was made of Lidice , a village some twenty kilometres from Prague.<br />
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On 10th June 1942, the village was surrounded. Some accounts state that the SS took control, other that Czech police conducted the operation . All the women and children were taken to Kladno, where they were separated. 184 women were taken to Ravensbruk concentration camp, the 80 children to Lodz. Some of the children were taken to live with German families and to become 'Germanified', the rest were gassed at Chelmno Upon Nerr in Poland. 173 men -including youths as young as 16 were executed at the village.. The settlement was burnt, and its ruins bulldozed. The Germans brazenly announced the massacre to the world via a radio broadcast on 10th June 1942- even filmed the atrocity - and this was to become document 379 at the Nuremberg trial in 1945.<br />
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The Czech government in exile in London denounced the atrocity, along with Winston Churchill. A 'Lidice Shall Live' movement was launched in September 1942 in Stoke Upon Trent led by local MP Barnett Stross, with a great deal of support from Staffordshire miners.<br />
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The British authorities staged a film titled 'The Silent Village' (1943) , seeking the help of the South Wales Miners Federation, and the' people of the Swansea and Dulais valleys' . Parallels were drawn due to the fact that Lidice was partly a mining community. The village of Cwmgiedd was chosen for a filmed re-enactment.<br />
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The Frtiz Lang/Bertold Brecht movie, 'Hangmen Also Died from 1943, has been the first in a whole series of films about the assassination of Heydrich. Heydrich was the most senior Nazi to have been assassinated. The question of whether killing one mass murderer , knowing that the short term consequence would be savage reprisal, but saving more lives in the longer term, is one of the toughest moral dilemmas going.<br />
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Cecil Day Lewis poem is short, not particular complex or obscure. And virtually forgotten. The Lidice massacre is now largely remembered by films, starting as mentioned in 1943, ranging through to the Czech language film 'Atentat' ( 'Assassionation') from 1964, 'Operation Daybreak' (1975), 'Operation Anthropoid ' ( 2016), 'HHhH' (2017). However in the 1940's , poetry were written about the Lidice atrocity ......and the next blog post will look at other poetry.<br /><br />Links<br />
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<a href="https://www.radio.cz/en/section/books/the-literary-legacy-of-lidice">Radio Prague page on the 'Literary legacy of Lidice' </a> Very useful page<br />
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<a href="http://www.lidice-memorial.cz/en/">Lidice memorial </a> website maintained by the Cultural Ministry of the Czech Republic<br />
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<i>Youtube</i><br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E_Jd2c61E8&t=323s">Lidice -A Light Across the Sea</a> ( Excellent documentary about the 'Licide Shall Live' campaign from Staffordshire)<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=lidice+village">The Silent Village </a> ( 1943 film from Britain )<br />
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I wish to thank all fellow members of the <a href="http://ww2f.com/">World War II Forums</a> who posted on the recent 'Lidice' discussion thread.<br />
Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-5517750652917991592019-04-07T06:18:00.001-07:002020-04-04T23:41:24.915-07:00 Holocaust Diary of Renia Spiegel <br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> 'Think Tomorrow We Might Not Be' -Renia Spiegel</span><br />
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Soviet soldiers during the 1939 invasion of Poland<br />
courtesy, Wikimedia Commons<br />
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Think tomorrow we might not be </div>
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A cold,steel knife </div>
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Will slide between us, you see </div>
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But today there is still time for life </div>
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Tomorrow the sun might be eclipsed </div>
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Bullets might crack and rip </div>
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And howl, pavements awash</div>
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With blood, with dirty, stinky slag,pigwash</div>
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Today you are alive </div>
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There is still time to survive</div>
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Let's blend our blood</div>
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When the song still moves ahead</div>
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The song of the wild and furious flood</div>
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Brought by the living dead </div>
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my every muscle trembles </div>
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My body for your closeness fumbles </div>
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It's supposed to be a throttling game, this is </div>
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Not enough eternity for all the kisses</div>
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Translated from Polish by Anna Hide and Marta Dzuirosz, taken from Renia Spiegel's diary: Originally published in 'Smithsonian' magazine feature <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/hear-o-israel-save-us-renia-spiegel-diary-english-translation-holocaust-poland-180970536/">The Long-Lost Holocaust Diary of Renia Spiegel</a><br />
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<span id="docs-internal-guid-a464adb8-7fff-3f14-b75a-ea634e401312"><span style="font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> The above lines are from a diary that began on 31st January 1939, and written by a seventeen year old Jewish Polish girl by the name of Renia Spiegel on 7th June 1942 .</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">When the Germans invaded Poland on 1st September 1939, Renia was living with her grandparents at Przemzyl , 150 miles east from Krakow. Her mother was living in Warsaw, the whereabouts of the father was not know. Her younger sister Ariana was visiting Przemzyl. As the Germans attacked , the Russians moved into occupy the eastern part of Poland, including Premzyl. In June 1941, the rest of Poland fell to the Germans. In June 1942, Renia became romantically involved with a Jewish boy called Zygmunt Schwarzer, who had connections with the resistance. In July 1942, the ghetto at Premzyl was established, and deportations to the death camps were soon to follow. Zygmunt managed to get Renia and Ariana out of the ghetto. Ariana was placed with a sympathetic Christian friend, and Renia went into hiding with Zygmunt's parents. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Renia and Zygmunt's mother and father were discovered and shot by the Germans on 30th July 1942. Zygmunt appeared at the house shortly afterwards, to find that both his parents and his girlfriend were dead. He found Renia's diary and wrote the words " Three shots ! Three lives lost! All I can hear are shots! shots," as a last entry. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Meanwhile Renia's mother had taken a new identity in Warsaw and converted to the Roman Catholic faitth. After the war she left Poland with Ariana to live in New York. Zygmunt survived incarceration in both Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, to later study medicine. He later travelled to New York and passed on Renia's diary ( of around 700 pages) to Renia's mother in the 1950's. Eventually in 2012, Ariana's daughter arranged for a Polish publication. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Some extracts from the diary have already appeared from the 'Smithsonian' magazine. Fascinating reading. Renia wrote about the deportations of Jews from Russian occupied Poland to Siberia before the German invasion.Also the Soviet demand to abolish single sex education in January 1940, for being 'bourgeois' led to boys being admitted to Renia's school. Once the German occupation began,Renia wrote about the de-humanising experience of being Jewish and forced to wear a Star of David armband. But other aspects of a teenage girl's life appear such as romance, teenage cattiness towards schoolmates, torment when Renia thinks that Zygmunt has taken another girl to a party instead of her. Sexual desire also emerges as a theme in the diary. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">At times, in researching World War 2 poetry, just find a poem too difficult to remove from the context of its creation. Knowing that these lines were written by a Jewish girl, who was to be murdered just after her eighteenth birthday, it somehow seems irrelevant if a middle aged slob like myself from the 21st century- who has seen a lot of the good things in life- 'likes' or 'dislikes' what Renia wrote. Or starts to think I am being clever by over-analysing the poem, hoping to discover some hidden subtext that nobody else can spot. So I am letting the lines stand as they are. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">The extracts from the diary published already on line show that Renia wrote other poems. An English translation will appear in the Summer of 2019. A film about Renia Spiegel -'Broken Dreams'- should be completed in May 2019. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">NOTES AND SOURCES</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">As well as <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/hear-o-israel-save-us-renia-spiegel-diary-english-translation-holocaust-poland-180970536/">The Long Lost Diary of Renia Spiegel</a> article cited above from 'Smithsonian' magazine, the same publication has a <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/astonishing-holocaust-diary-hidden-world-70-years-resurfaced-america-180970534/">biographical article </a> about Renia's life. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> <a href="https://forward.com/culture/394032/why-renia-spiegel-is-being-called-the-polish-anne-frank/">'Why Renia Spiegel is called the Polish Anne Frank'</a> from 'Forward' magazine</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is now the <a href="http://www.reniaspiegelfoundation.org/">Renia Spiegel Foundation </a></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Wish to acknowledge the help of film director <a href="http://tomaszmagierski.com/">Tomasz Magierski</a> with this article. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">OTHER BLOGS</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is a companion blog to this one <a href="http://aburntship.blogspot.com/">A Burnt Ship </a> which is about war poetry and prose with a connection to the Stuart era. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is also the website <a href="http://worldwarpoetry.com/">Worldwarpoetry.com </a></span></span><br />
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Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-79208819088999742862019-03-24T07:36:00.002-07:002019-03-24T13:17:00.404-07:00J F Hendry <span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;"> J. F. Hendry London Before Invasion: 1940</span><br />
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<i>Picture Graham Sutherland 'Wrecked Public House ' </i><br />
<i> Thank you to Tate Images for its use-reference N5735</i><br />
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<b> London Before Invasion</b><br />
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" Walls and buildings stand here still, like shells.<br />
Hold them to the ear. There are no echoes even<br />
Of the seas that once were. That tide is out<br />
Beyond the valleys and hills.<br />
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Days dawn and die while the city assumes a distance of stars.<br />
It is the absence of the heart<br />
In the ebbing seas of heaven,<br />
An ebbing beyond laughter and too tense for tears.<br />
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Now, imagination floats, a weed, on water's vacancy.<br />
Fates of women, lit with conscience of stone features.<br />
Flowers have a girl's irrelevance, and mind is no<br />
prescience.<br />
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Flood-tides returning may bring with them blood and fire,<br />
Blenching with wet panic spirit that must be rock<br />
May being a future tossed and torn, as slippery as wrack,<br />
All time adrift in torrents of blind war. "<br />
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Glasgow born J.F. (James Findlay) Hendry ( 1912- 1986), served in the Royal Artillery and Amy Intelligence. Most known in World War 2 poetry circles for his involvement in the 'New Apocalypse' movement' , following the anthology of the same name that Hendry edited with Henry Treece, that was published in 1939. Two more such anthologies 'The White Horseman' ( 1941) and ' Crown and Sickle'( 1944) were published. G.S Fraser, Norman McCaig, Vernon Watkins, were briefly associated them.<br />
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Opposed to the 1930's 'Auden Generation' , the ' New Apocalyptics' were short lived as a movement and its harder to find another group of poets who have attracted such unkind comments since the Georgians of the early 20th century. Andrew Sinclair sniped at Hendry and Treece for being 'leaders without a movement' , and denounced the poetry included in 'The White Horseman' for being " obscure, self conscious and adolescent'. Vernon Scannell accused them of promoting a " kind of zany automatic writing, most of which read like a drunken parody of Dylan Thomas" . George Orwell scoffed at them.<br />
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The New Apocalyptics were uninterested in the use of social realism within poetry. Mythological images prevailed in their work, with inspirations taken from nature, pre-industrial ages, the theories of Freud, 1930's surrealism, and Anarchism of the individualist variety. The movement itself was short lived, though their influence lasted for another decade with the growth of the Romanticism in the 1940's. By the 1950's, with the rise of The Movement poets and the Angry Young Men ( in both the theatre and in novels) , the work of the New Apocalypse seemed escapist and archaic. Henry Treece became better known in post war years for writing historical novels, particularly for young readers, and some quite delightful poetry such as 'The Magic Wood'.<br />
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J.F. Hendry had two poetry collections published during World War 2, 'The Bombed Happiness' (1942) 'The Orchestral Mountain' , neither attracted much attention. But Keidrich Rhys included several of J.F.Hendry's poems in his seminal anthologies. 'Poems from the Forces' (1941) and 'More Poems from the Forces' (1943) But J.F. Hendry carried on writing. J.F. Hendry's post war work included 'Fernie Brae' ( 1947), and 'Life of Rilke' (1982).<br />
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Recently found a collection of poetry titled ' Poems of Today -Fourth Series' published in 1957, and looking at the 'best' poetry from 1938-1957. This volume included just one J.F.Hendry poem 'The Churchillian Ode'. Reminds one initially of 17th century odes to Cromwell written by Andrew Marvell and John Dryden until they both embraced the Restoration . Or John Milton's sonnets dedicated to Sir Henry Vane the Younger and General Fairfax . Quoting from the first few lines.<br />
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<b> A Churchillian Ode</b><br />
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"The years grew tares for we did not tend them<br />
Time was eaten by moths in an age of gold<br />
And the sun eclipsed in a cloud of ignorance.<br />
The hours sprang holes as we stared, until now, the<br />
last,<br />
We clasp in our hands a sheaf of bluebells in place<br />
Of the rifle, and all our moment of laughter are<br />
frozen<br />
Amid flaming towns, their echoes chill as the shade of<br />
soul's vengeance.............."<br />
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There is a sort of awkward dreaminess with a bit of surrealism thrown in. 'London Before Invasion 1940' was written in 1940, published in his collection 'The Bombed Happiness' . This title was challenged by Andrew Sinclair as having implied "that there might be a liberation and joy in destruction." This issue appears within 'London Before Invasion 1940 " - that somehow the course of history was entering a phase where human emotion simply didn't matter: "An ebbing beyond laughter and too tense for tears"- whilst there is a terrible wait for the next tide to come rushing in again, bringing new horrors.<br />
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In wider contact, I doubt that a New Apocalyptic such as J F Hendry was justifying destruction or finding something aesthetically pleasing about an air raid. He was a poet caught up in war, trying to find a space for the individual, in a world where impersonal historical forces were ranging.<br />
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Quotes by Andrew Sinclair were taken from ' War Like A Wasp -The Lost Decade of the Forties'<br />
( 1989)<br />
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Quote by Vernon Scannell taken from 'Not Without Glory Poets of the Second World War' (1976)<br />
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Please take a look at the companion blog to this one <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a> , dealing with poetry & prose relating to 17th century warfare.<br />
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More articles about War Poetry can be found at <a href="https://worldwarpoetry.com/">worldwarpoetry.com</a><br />
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If anyone is on MeWe, have started <a href="https://mewe.com/join/warpoetry">the MeWe War Poetry Group</a> : Feel free to join.Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-26791723537767082862019-02-04T12:50:00.001-08:002023-02-03T11:43:53.662-08:00Wladyslaw Szlengel - Poet of the Warsaw Ghetto <span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"> Poem: A Small Station called Treblinka </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-134-0791-29A%2C_Polen%2C_Ghetto_Warschau%2C_Ghettomauer.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="505" data-original-width="796" height="203" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-134-0791-29A%2C_Polen%2C_Ghetto_Warschau%2C_Ghettomauer.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Ghetto" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #663366; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.3px; text-align: start; text-decoration-line: none;" title="w:Warsaw Ghetto">Warsaw Ghetto</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-size: 13.3px;">: Zelaznej Bramy (Iron Gate) Square </span><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-size: 13.3px;">, ghetto wall and Lubomirski palace</span></td></tr>
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Walyslaw Szlengel was born in Warsaw, between 1911-1914, the exact date is disputed. He is most known for using poetry to chronicle the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto uprising.<br />
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Writing poetry at an early age, Szlengel was already published in literary journals in 1930. It was not long before he was also writing songs and directing cabaret performances, solely in Polish. Some sources maintain that his father, who died in 1934, was a theatre director. Szlengel spent a few months towards the end of 1939 until the early part of 1940 in the town of Bialystock, which was in the Soviet occupied part of Poland but returned to Walicow Street, Warsaw, which in November 1940 was incorporated into the notorious Warsaw Ghetto.<br />
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The Warsaw Ghetto was the area where all Jews of the City were confined behind barbed wire fences and high walls as from November 1940. Jews from other parts of Poland and from Germany, along with Roma people were moved there with as many as 400,000 people being held there . Overcrowded accommodation, wretched conditions, with only an entitlement to starvation rations, as many as ten per cent of the population perished. Random killings by the Germans, public executions of those who fell foul of regulations, the sight of inhabitants expiring from illness or starvation, increased the terror and sense of despair. On 22nd July 1942, deportations by train began-supposedly on the grounds of 'resettlement; in the east - but the actual destination was the death camp at Treblinka, around fifty miles north-east of Warsaw. As many as 6,000 people could be moved out in a day.<br />
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Szlegnel carried on writing, and performing, managing to secure regular employment at the coffeehouse Cafe Sztuka in Lesno Street 2 . Vladyzslaw Szpilman accompanied various artists on piano including the popular singer Wiera Gran. Cafe Sztuka is portrayed in Ronan Polanski's 2002 film about Szpillman- 'The Pianist' . The weekly Cabaret night 'Life Journal' was organised by Szelngel and where possible satire was encouraged at the expense of the authorities. It seems that Szlengel was using both Polish and Yiddish by this point. However in Polanski's film, the subversive nature of the cabaret at Cafe Sztuka is missed, and one gets an impression of Jews who had money enjoying themselves in the Cafe, being supposedly oblivious to the suffering of the wider community. Cafe Sztuka was closed, most likely between 19th-22nd of July 1942.<br />
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Wladyslaw Szlengel and his wife were forced to work in a brush factory, but carried on organising literary evenings, and presenting further poetry The Ghetto population was gradually reducing due to deportation though the Nazis were prepared to leave 'productive' Jews working. In October 1942 Jewish Resistance groups merged together to form the organisation ZOB. Word reached them that the trains were in fact going to Treblinka , a death camp.<br />
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Having the Warsaw Ghetto largely full of younger and physically stronger people, who had no illusions of the dangers they were in, stimulated a number of skirmishes with Germans and those collaborating with them as from January 1943. When the Germans arrived to organise a final mass deportation resistance culminated in the magnificent Warsaw Ghetto Uprising that begun on 19th April 1943 and lasted until 10th May 1943. Wladyslaw Szlengel and his wife were shot by Germans when the house they were hiding in was stormed on 8th May 1943.<br />
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Though the Uprising was facing impossible odds, it is generally regarded as both an act of great heroism and defiance but also for inspiring the 1944 Warsaw Rising, showing that the Germans were by no means invincible and could be confronted.<br />
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I am pleased to be able to reproduce the Waldysaw Szlengel poem 'A Small Station Called Treblinka', reproduced here by kind permission of Halina Birenbaum from the website <a href="http://www.zchor.org/">http://www.zchor.org</a> which features a selection of his work in different languages on the site <a href="http://www.zchor.org/szlengel/szlengel.htm">Szlengel webpage </a><br />
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What makes the poem quite haunting is that it is written in the present tense, and though the station itself seems unremarkable, one can never purchase a return ticket. It is not known how widely circulated the poem was, but certainly resistance workers with in the Ghetto were issuing proclamations desperately trying to warn the remaining populace of the dangers they were in.<br />
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<div style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm;">
<b> Władysław Szlengel<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm;">
<b> 'A Small Station Called Treblinka<span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">'</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> On the line between Tluszcz and <st1:city><st1:place>War<span lang="EN-AU">saw</span></st1:place></st1:city></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> From the railway station <st1:city>Warsaw</st1:city> - East</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> You get out of the station</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and travel straight…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> The journey lasts</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> sometimes 5 hours and 45 minutes more</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and sometimes the same journey lasts</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> a whole life until your death …</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> And the station is very small</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> three fir trees grow there</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and a regular signboard saying</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> here is the small station of Treblinka...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> here is the small station of Treblinka...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> And not even a cashier</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> gone is the cargo man</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and for a million zloty</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> you will not get a return ticket</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> And nobody waits for you in the station</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and nobody waves a handkerchief towards you</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> only silence hung there in the air</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> to welcome you in the blind wilderness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> And silent are the three fir trees</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> and silent is the black board</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> because here is the small station of Treblinka...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> here is the small station of Treblinka...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> And only a commercial board</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> stands still:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> "Cook only by gas"</span><br />
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* Translated from Polish to Hebrew by Halina Birenbaum and from Hebrew to English by <st1:city>Ada</st1:city>Holtzman. Yehuda Poliker, son of an Auschwitz Holocaust survivor from <st1:city>Thessalonika,</st1:city> wrote music to the poem and it is featured on his album: "Ashes and Dust"</div>
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On 2nd August 1943, a rebellion broke out at Treblinka itself, when a number of prisoners raided the armoury and organised a mass breakout. The Germans began to start dismantling Treblinka in the Autumn of 1943, and it had virtually fallen into disuse by the time the Red Army took the district in July 1944. Another reason to read the poem to ensure that the horror of Treblinka is remembered, along with Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and the mass breakout at Treblinka itself.<br />
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<b>Sources</b><br />
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<a href="http://www.zchor.org/szlengel/szlengel.htm">Wladyslaw Slegel- The Ghetto Poet </a><br />
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<a href="https://culture.pl/en/artist/wladyslaw-szlengel">Culture.PL -Polish Cultural website </a><br />
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<a href="https://themanhattanreview.com/vol15no2/carpenters/">The Manhatten Review </a><br />
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Background information on the Warsaw Ghetto by one of the Uprising's leading participants, Marek Edelman can be found <a href="http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/Holocaust/warsaw-uprising.html">here</a><br />
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<b>General News </b><br />
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Companion blogs<br />
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<a href="https://greatwaratsea.blogspot.com/">Great War at Sea Poetry Blog</a><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> new blog launched 2nd February 2023 Charles Dickens/ 19th century history<br />
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<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a> Stuart era War and Literature<br />
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<br /></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-84554303887730057282019-01-17T12:17:00.002-08:002019-01-25T12:05:58.209-08:00Sean Jennett Missing Poet from Faber &Faber <br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-large;">Sean Jennett</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">'Shelter Experiments' John Piper 1943 </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> <span style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #3f4040;">IWM ART LD 3859 in public domain courtesy of the IWM/</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #3f4040;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> Wikipedia Commons </span></span><br />
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I was recently reminded of the 'Earth Voices Whispering- An anthology of Irish War Poetry 1914-1945' edited by Gerald Dawes, published in 2008. It was intriguing to find poems by Sean Jennett included, who doesn't seem to have been included in any anthologies since 'Poetry of the Forties-introduced and edited by Robin Skelton' (1968) .<br />
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Also managed to locate Jennett's collection 'Always Adam' from 1943, from the National Poetry Library, at the Southbank Centre, which contains 51 poems, written from 1935 onward.<br />
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Sean Jennett, who worked for Faber & Faber' as a typographer during World war 2, who has been added to the ranks of 1940's 'neglected' poets. His Wikipedia entry consists of three sentences , maintaining that he was born in 1912- and died in 1981, wrote 'The 'Making of Books ' in 1951 and went on to write travel books. The British Library online catalogue confirms this, with 'The Making of Boooks' seeing several editions.<br />
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XXXVII<br />
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We talked of war with light and easy lips,<br />
jesting upon our action, this or that,<br />
if it came to the last, and while we chattered<br />
we drank our coffee in delicious sips<br />
and watched the soft, contented cafe cat.<br />
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But then the woman in the wicker chair<br />
cried Havoc! and suddenly I was afire<br />
because I saw, under the skirts of light,<br />
the corpses of our laughter and delight<br />
smashed and dismembered, bloodily bespattered<br />
across the red carpet....<br />
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And still the solemn stare<br />
of all the sleepy cats in Oxfordshire<br />
1937<br />
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One of the most interesting pre-war poems about World War 2 - if such a genre is possible. The strange reflection of an unreal sedate world detached from the reality of war that is about to strike them. The motif-'Cry havoc and unleash the dogs of war' from Shakespeare's 'Julius Caesar', was repeated in Beverley Nichols book 'Cry Havoc' from 1934, advocating Pacifism, a stance Nichols was later to reject.<br />
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XLII. AUTUMN 1940<br />
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The days were glorious- we remember that<br />
because the clear September of that year<br />
was good for bombers. We remember it<br />
because the sky screamed and we were mere<br />
items of wreckage in the ruined day,<br />
the half- face or the limbless or the dead.<br />
the convenient basis for the hero's fame,<br />
the rescued in the hospital bed.<br />
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I was the man in the collapsing tower.<br />
I was the body in the flooded shelter.<br />
I was the mad objector shifting stone,<br />
the conscious saint arising in his hour.<br />
I was the bomber, the breaker and the welder<br />
I was the shattered and the exulting son.<br />
1942<br />
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Strange understatement -September 7th 1940 is of course accepted as the first day of the London Blitz.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> News </span> <br />
Best wishes for 2019 to all Blog visitors from round the world . Have written an article on British World War 2 poetry for 'Everyone's War' , the magazine published by the <a href="https://war-experience.org/">Second World War Experience Centre</a>.<br />
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If anyone has joined MeWe.Com I have just started a <a href="https://mewe.com/join/warpoetry">MeWe War Poetry group </a><br />
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I am working on a further post for the companion blog to this one <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a> -devoted to 17th century war & literature.<br />
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And hoping to write a longer article on Timothy Corsellis for <a href="http://worldwarpoetry.com/">Worldwarpoetry.com</a><br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-78768942178775235312018-12-09T06:23:00.002-08:002023-03-12T14:10:31.026-07:00Timothy Corsellis <span style="font-size: large;">Timothy John Manley Corsellis </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> ( 1921-1941)</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span style="font-size: small;">Timothy Corsellis in 1938, in the Public Domain via Wikipedia </span></span><br />
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Was reminded of the work of Timothy Corsellis after finding two Youtube clips ( linked below) of the actor Timothy Bentinck reading two Corsellis poems '<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh4TVtl4swc"> Dawn after the Raid' </a>and '<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im2yk3Al8aE">Engine Failure'.</a> Also learnt that Timothy - most known as David Archer from BBC Radio 4's drama 'The Archers'- was named after Timothy Corsellis, and his father,Henry Bentinck was friends with Corsellis.<br />
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Born on 21st January 1921, Corsellis' father was a barrister-Douglas Corsellis - who lost an arm fighting in the Gallipoli campaign, and died in a flying accident in 1930. Attending Walmer School in Kent, Timothy Corsellis went on to study at Winchester College.<br />
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It is extremely difficult to offer much of an opinion concerning the work of someone who died at the age of twenty. All one can say is that his work that remains shows a great range of topics. The aforementioned 'Engine Failure' concerns RAF training, 'After the Raid' tackles the impact of an air raid on London. And Tim Bentinck's delivery is superb. 'There Is A Meeting Place in Heaven' is Christian themed. Corsellis also wrote a poem titled 'Stephen Spender' some two weeks before he died, in which he offers his impression of meeting Spender, most probably at the offices of 'Horizon' magazine in 1941.<br />
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Unlike many of his contemporaries, Timothy Corsellis declined to go to university when leaving Winchester College in 1938. He started work at Wandsworth Town Hall , and registered as a Conscientious Objector in April 1939. After the fall of Dunkirk, Corsellis asked to be removed from the list of Conscientious Objectors, and took up training with the RAF . However, Corsellis cited a conscientious objection to bombing civilian and felt unable to take up a post within Bomber Command. He received an honourable discharge from the RAF in early 1941 and worked was an Air Raid warden in London, seeing some of the most horrific sights of the Blitz.<br />
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In August 1941, Corellis joined the as 2nd officer Air Transport Auxiliary, which effectively meant flying planes from factories to various RAF bases. On 10th October 1941 , flying from Luton to Carlisle, Coresllis plane accidentally crashed near Dumfries, and he died instantly.<br />
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<i>Have shamelessly drawn on an article 'From Winchester to War: Timothy Corsellis ( 1921-1941) , which originally appeared on the <a href="http://www.warpoets.org/conflicts/world-war-ii/timothy-corsellis-1921-1941/">War Poets Association</a> website : Informed that this article was written by Helen Goethals. </i><br />
<i>The Winchester College at War website has a different timeline- linked below. </i><br />
<i>The Young Poets Network presents the <a href="http://ypn.poetrysociety.org.uk/workshop/the-timothy-corsellis-prize-2017/">Timothy Corsellis prize</a> for poetry written by those aged between 18-25 who are appraising World War 2 poets. Of course any initiative to introduce World War 2 poetry is much welcomed,and the latest new (2018) can be found <a href="http://ypn.poetrysociety.org.uk/workshop/the-timothy-corsellis-prize-2018/?fbclid=IwAR1UX0dMRkBc0w-ceNy11XGBEyPvAyotrt_kiJ_w07OGjQqRgDkempwVjfQ">here</a></i><br />
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The poem 'What I Never Saw' looks at the tedium of war in a most anti-heroic fashion, showing has a large part of war can be 'waiting for something to happen'.<br />
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<b>What I Never Saw (extract) </b><br />
<br />
What I never saw<br />
Were the weary hours of waiting while the<br />
sun rose and set,<br />
The everlasting eye turned upwards to the sky,<br />
Watching the weather which said,<br />
Thou shalt not fly'.<br />
<br />
We sat together as we sat at peace<br />
Bound by no ideal of service<br />
But by a common interest in pornography and<br />
a desire to outdrink one another<br />
<br />
<br />
War was remote;<br />
There was a little trouble in Abyssinia;<br />
Some of us came from Kenya and said<br />
'Why I was on the spot all the while<br />
And the Italians sprayed the roadsides with<br />
mustard gas'<br />
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Theirs were the stories of war.<br />
<br />
<br />
Then came the queuing, the recurrent line of<br />
pungent men<br />
Dressed in dirt with mud eating their trouser legs,<br />
The collar that is cleaner than the shirt<br />
And the inevitable adjectives.<br />
<br />
The papers ran out early today,<br />
There was no butter for the bread at breakfast,<br />
Nobody calls us at dawn<br />
We never strain or sweat,<br />
Nor do they notice when we come in late.<br />
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When I was civilian I hoped high,<br />
Dreamt my future cartwheels in the sky'<br />
Almost forgot to arm myself<br />
Against the boredom and the inefficiency<br />
The petty injustice and the everlasting grudges.<br />
The sacrifice is greater than I expected<br />
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Of course there is the irony of the last line 'The sacrifice is greater than I expected' when considering Corsellis' death in a military accident.<br />
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<b> "I" Always "I"</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b> </b>I passively acquiesce in the avalanche of death<br />
Under my breath I lose the sincere feeling<br />
That while hands are dealing in sin the soul is free.<br />
No harm to me, justifying the material deed<br />
With the new born seed of a higher emotion,<br />
A sudden devotion to a greater thing than imperial expansion<br />
<br />
"I" always "I" in this turmoil of souls;<br />
God above holds millions of lives in his arms<br />
Yet the word harm means only one thing to this mind<br />
Help me to find an idea successive to soliptic I!<br />
Let them all die; one day a bullet inscribed with<br />
name<br />
Shall find the same written upon my heart with shame.<br />
<br />
Why in the middle of complete conflagration<br />
Involving a nation, must the solipsist idea<br />
Rise? To conquer fear ? To hide from a wrangling soul<br />
The extinction of the whole? Give me part of God's<br />
unselfishness;<br />
From the centre of unrest make me realise<br />
That no man dies; not the souls that once spoke from<br />
behind gristle eyes.<br />
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From 'More Poems From The Forces' edited by Kheidrych Rhys, 1941<br />
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Have added this poem simply because it's so curious. It as if Corsellis is writing a philosophy essay, trying to make sense of a being young and caught up in war. Trying to find some greater meaning wrestling with solipsism- 'the self is all that can be known to exist' and as Christian Corellis is trying to reconcile his faith with whilst caught up in a 'complete conflagration'. I don't think that the poem has great literary merit- but as a section of war memoir it is fascinating.<br />
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<i>Thank you to Patrick Villa of the War Poets Association for pointing out a couple of errors in the original post- hopefully now corrected. </i><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Links </span><br />
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<a href="http://www.winchestercollegeatwar.com/archive/corsellis-timothy-john-manley/">Winchester College Tribute </a> <br />
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Timothy Bentinck reads <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh4TVtl4swc&feature=youtu.be">Dawn After The Raid </a> on Youtube<br />
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Timothy Bentinck reads <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im2yk3Al8aE">Engine Failure</a> on Youtube<br />
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<a href="https://poetrysociety.org.uk/competitions/timothy-corsellis-prize/">Timothy Corsellis Prize </a> page maintained by the National Poetry Society /Young Poets Network<br />
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<a href="https://www.cwgc.org/find/find-war-dead/results?firstName=Timothy%2B&lastName=Corsellis">Commonwealth Wargraves Commission </a> entry for Timothy Corsellis<br />
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<a href="http://www.warpoets.org/conflicts/world-war-ii/timothy-corsellis-1921-1941/">War Poets Association </a> page on Timothy Corsellis<br />
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<a href="https://www.justincroft.com/publication-of-an-antiques-roadshow-discovery-war-poet-timothy-corsellis/">Further poems found by Corsellis</a> Interesting blog post about further poems and notebooks by Timothy Corsellis that were featured on BBC Antiques Roadshow in 2012.<br />
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<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship blog</a> Companion blog to this one. Poetry & prose related to the Stuart era<br />
<br /><a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> new blog launched 3rd February 2023 Charles Dickens/ 'dark' 19th century history <br />
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<b>Books </b><br />
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A biography titled 'The Unassuming Sky, The Life and Poetry of Timothy Corsellis' by Helen Goethals was published in 2012.<br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-59150318673413641342018-11-11T13:59:00.001-08:002023-03-12T14:11:32.260-07:00John Pudney 'For Johnny' and other 'Songs' <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> John Sleigh Pudney 1909- 1977</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Beaufighter" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); font-family: sans-serif; text-decoration-line: none;" title="en:Bristol Beaufighter">Bristol Beaufighter Mark IF</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa;"> of </span><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No._252_Squadron_RAF" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); font-family: sans-serif; text-decoration-line: none;" title="en:No. 252 Squadron RAF">No. 252 Squadron RAF</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa;"> at </span><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Chivenor" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); font-family: sans-serif; text-decoration-line: none;" title="en:RAF Chivenor">Chivenor</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa;">, Devon.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> CH17305 , Imperial War Museum, photo taken by Mr. B J H Daventry</span><br />
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John Pudney's poem 'For Johnny' was one of the most famous 'War in the Air' World War 2 poems. The writer was a former journalist, who served as a squadron leader in RAF intelligence during the War. The poem was written in 1941 on the back of an envelope during an air raid alert in London, then later submitted to<i> News Chronicle</i> , who published the poem. 'For Johnny' also appeared in Pudney's collection of war poems titled 'Dispersal Point' ( from 1942, reprinted the same year, and again in 1943).<br />
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John Pudney had already published poetry as from 1933. He also edited the collection 'Air Force Poetry' (1944) with <a href="https://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.com/2016/09/henry-treece-air-raid.html">Henry Treece</a> and had seven poems included in the anthology 'More Poems From The Forces' edited by Keidrych Rhys , (1944). He also wrote short stories about his life in the RAF under the names of PERSPEX<br />
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Famous for its simplicity, and its message that the best tribute to be paid to a deceased pilot is to take care of his children. And for being read at the end of the film ' <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpLllaDfImU"> The Way to the Stars' </a> by Michael Redgrave .<br />
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<u> For Johnny</u><br />
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Do not despair<br />
For Johnny-head-in-air,<br />
He sleeps as sound<br />
As Johnny under ground.<br />
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Fetch out no shroud<br />
For Johnny-in-the-cloud,<br />
And keep your tears<br />
for him in after years.<br />
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Better by far<br />
For Johnny-in-the cloud;<br />
To keep you head,<br />
And see his children fed.<br />
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In 1976, a collection of 23 World War 2 written by John Pudney was published , all taken from his 1957 'Collected Works', and not surprisingly, was titled 'For Johnny'. In the introduction, Pudney explained that there was no particular 'Johnny' in mind, which added to the poem's appeal as readers could pick an RAF casualty they knew, and personalise the poem.<br />
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John Pudney's work has been included in subsequent anthologies such as 'The Terrible Rain' and 'I Burn for England' . Not meeting with universal approval . Fellow poet Vernon Scannell ( who served in the army during the War ) was quite catty about Pudney "John Pudney's facile verses were popular during the war but their shallow sentimentality would be unlikely to find admirers now " ( 'Not Without Glory -poets of the second world war'-1976).<br />
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It is easy to agree with Scannell if we are looking for literary merit. Pudney's work is comforting in the way a well chosen 'with sympathy ' card can be. Or occasionally his poetry veers to being too clever such as the line "Timelessly in time with time"- from the poem 'Air Gunner' below, which could be a Yes song lyric from the early 1970's. But John Pudney did make a significant contribution to World War 2 poetry, and deserves a mention, and can't just be dismissed in one line.<br />
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And there's a massive discussion to be had. World War 2 poetry can be appraised as literature, but also a source of writing that feeds a cultural need. 'For Johnny' might be sentimental but it has worked as war poetry if so many people can find it relevant to the whole trauma of loss during war. I had also wondered if Vernon Scannell, who had traumatic experiences due to fighting in the North African and Normandy campaigns, and been jailed as a deserter, resented John Pudney possible lack of direct combat experience ? Scannell's 'Not Without Glory' does not draw on the writer's own war experience or his own poetry.<br />
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Two further poems from the collection 'For Johnny' . As far as I can tell they were both from around 1941 or 1942 . 'Missing' doesn't need much further comment, but draws on a similar theme to 'For Johnny' - the poem. 'Air Gunner' was more literary, about a youth finding his way into this role.<br />
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<br />
<u> Missing</u><br />
<br />
Less said the better.<br />
The bill unpaid, the dead letter,<br />
No roses at the end,<br />
Of Smith my friend<br />
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<br />
<br />
Last words don't matter<br />
And there are none to flatter<br />
Words will not fill the post<br />
Of Smith, the ghost.<br />
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For Smith, our brother,<br />
Only son of loving mother,<br />
The ocean lifted, stirred<br />
Leaving no word.<br />
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<u> Air Gunner</u><br />
<br />
The eye behind this gun made peace<br />
With a boy's eye with doubted, trembled.<br />
Guileless in the mocking light<br />
Of frontiers where death assembled.<br />
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Peace was as single as the dawn,<br />
Flew straightly as the birds migrating,<br />
Timelessly in time with time,<br />
Purposeful, uncalculating<br />
<br />
So boyish doubt was put away:<br />
The man's eye and boy's were one.<br />
Mockery and death retreat<br />
Before the eye behind the gun.<br />
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In the publisher's blurb for 'Dispersal Point' third edition 1942, John Pudney was quoted as saying ;<br />
"I hope these songs will be taken as a simple commentary on the Service and on war occasions generally. They are only songs -not written in tranquillity, but in odd places and corners never far from the sound of aircraft. "<br />
This is perhaps the final word to be said on his war poetry.<br />
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<b>Links</b><br />
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John Pudney entry from <a href="http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/pudney_john">Science Fiction Encyclopedia</a><br />
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Don't forget the companion blog to this one <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a> 17th century related war poetry and prose.<br />
<br />UPDATE February 3rd 2023 New blog launched <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">BleakChesneyWold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' 19th century history <br />
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<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-70952127011459646012018-09-09T09:54:00.003-07:002023-03-12T14:09:18.283-07:00Anna Akhmatova's Poetry / Al Stewart track 'Roads To Moscow' <br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><span style="font-size: large;"> Anna Akhmatova ( Anna Akhmatova Gorenko) </span></span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span><br /><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222;"> 1922 portrait of </span><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Akhmatova" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #663366; font-family: sans-serif; text-decoration-line: none;" title="en:Anna Akhmatova">Anna Akhmatova</a><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222;"> by </span><a class="extiw" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuzma_Petrov-Vodkin" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #663366; font-family: sans-serif; text-decoration-line: none;" title="en:Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin">Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin</a> ( courtesy of Wikipedia) </span></span>
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<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; font-size: 14.6667px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; font-size: 14.6667px;"> </span><span style="background-color: #fafafe;">"At the burial of an epoch</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> no psalm is heard at the tomb</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> soon nettles and thistles </span></span><span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> will decorate the spot </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> The only busy hands are those </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> of the grave-diggers .Faster! Faster!</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> and it's quiet, Lord, so quiet</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;"> you can hear time passing."</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> Anna Akhtmatova poem, 'In 1940' </span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="color: #141414;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;">Many basic details of concerning the life of Anna Akhmatova are not agreed upon. Some sources state that Anna Akhmatova was born in St. Petersburg in 1888, others offer Boshoy Fontain, near Odessa, Ukraine in 1889. Associated with the Acemist poetry movement centred round St .Petersburg, Anna Akmatova married fellow poet Nikolay Gumilyov in 1910- though divorced in 1918. Their son, Lev Gumilyov was born in 1912, and collections of Anna's work appeared in 1912 and 1914. </span></span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Though met with official disapproval during the Bolshevik regime, further collections of Anna Akhmatova's work appeared in 1917, and two in 1921. </span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="color: #141414;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;">However, Nikolay Gumilyov was executed in 1921 for alleged taking part in an anti-Bolshevik conspiracy. Anna Akhmatov found that her poetry was no longer permitted to be published, and she survived as a translator and literary critic ,becoming a specialist on the work of Pushkin. </span></span><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Lev Gumilyov served three sentences under Stalin's regime. </span></span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Anna Akhmatov's close friend, the fellow poet Osip Mandelshtam, was hauled away by police in front of her , and imprisoned. </span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"> Two future husbands would also be jailed- in fact her third husband, the art historian Nikolai Punin died in a camp in 1934,</span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="color: #141414;"><span style="background-color: #fafafe;">When World War 2 began, Russia had already signed the Nazi-Soviet pact with Germany. Anna Akhmatov's poetry was allowed to be published again in 1940, but a full collection would not appear until 1961- one source I consulted, stated 1965. One of her 1940 poems - ' To The Londoners,' was a written dedication to those who were facing the London Blitz. </span></span><br />
<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><br /></span></span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Following the launching of Operation Barbarossa ,Stalin permitted Anna Akhmatov to broadcast live to the women of Leningrad as the blockade of the city began in September 1941, but she departed the city in the Spring of 1942 for Tashkent, Uzbekistan. One account has Anna flying out of the city , clutching the manuscript for Shostakovich's 7th Symphony - The Leningrad Symphony'. Whilst absent from Leningrad, Anna Akhmatov read poetry to the wounded troops. In June 1944 Anna Akhmatov returned to the city. During this time her poetry began to be published again, and in 1945 she performed her work to an audience of some 3,000 people at an event in Moscow, and received a standing ovation. </span></span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">However in 1946, the Soviet authorities clamped down on her work. An extensive collection of Anna Akhmatov's poetry being prepared for publication was banned. A high standing member of the Politburo, Anrei Zhadanov, notoriously denounced her work for being "utterly individualistic" and referred to Anna Akhmatov as " a nun and a whore, who combines harlotry with prayer."</span></span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Following her son </span></span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Lev Gumilyov</span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"> 's third arrest and imprisonment in 1949, Anna destroyed a substantial amount of her own work including a play that she had written during her stay at Tashent. </span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">However, following 'The Thaw' after Stalin's death, Anna Akhmatov was allowed to have her work published again with 22 of her poems appearing in an official anthology of Soviet poems in 1958. In 1959 her membership to the Soviet Union of Writers was restored, and Anna was permitted to embark on a foreign travel . Following more of her work being published, </span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Anna Akhmatova was permitted to travel abroad again in 1965.</span><br />
<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">On 5th March 1966 Anna Akhmatov died after a short illness. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif">Anna Akhmatova seemed to have lost so many people close to her during the Revolution, the Purges, World War 2 that she reached a state evoked in her poem 'The Return' from 1944 </span></span><br />
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"The souls of my dears have all flown to the stars<br />
Thank God there's no one left for me to lose"<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><br /></span>
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">A cycle of 16 short poems 'The Winds of War appeared in 'Second World War Poems-chosen by Hugh Haughton ' ( Faber & Faber, 2004). </span><span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">Here is number three in the series.</span></span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">FIRST LONG-RANGE FIRING ON LENINGRAD</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And people's colourful daily round</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Suddenly changed drastically</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">But this was not a city sound,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Not one heard in the villages.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">It resembled a distant peal of thunder</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">As closely as one brother resembles another,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">But in thunder there's the moisture,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Of cool cloud towers</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And the yearning of the meadows-</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">For the news of joyous showers,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">But this was like scorching heat, dry,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And we didn't want to believe</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The rumour we heard-because of</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">How it grew and multiplied,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Because of how indifferently</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">It brought death to my child</span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;">. </span><br />
<i style="background-color: #fafafe; color: #141414;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><br />September 1941</span></i><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif">Yet there were notes of victory within the poetry cycle. </span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"> 15 JANUARY 27, 1944</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And on starless January night,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Amazed at its fantastic fate,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Returned from the bottomless depths of death,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Leningrad salutes itself</span><br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif">16 LIBERATION </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">A clean wind rocks the firs'</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Clean snow covers the ground.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">No longer hearing the tread of the enemy,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">It rests, my land</span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"> </span><br />
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<i><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif">February 1945 </span></i><br />
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Links<br />
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<a class="externalLink" href="https://bookriot.com/2018/04/04/anna-akhmatova-poems/" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: #fafafe; border-radius: 5px; color: #0f19e2; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14.6667px; margin: 0px -3px; padding: 0px 3px;" target="_blank">10 Anna Akhmatova Poems to Read when Life, Love, and Politics Are Hard</a><br />
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Youtube<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zoITZrz_Lk&t=391s">The Muse of Keening</a> Short film about the life of work including as interview with step-daughter.<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vchOX6LGekI">Poem-'Requiem' </a> Anna Akhmatova's most famous poem read out with some minimal electronic backing. Superb.<br />
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Contemporary <a href="http://www.saint-petersburg.com/famous-people/anna-akhmatova/">St Petersburg website about Anna Akhmatova</a> (English language)<br />
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<a href="http://www.saint-petersburg.com/museums/anna-akhmatova-museum-at-the-fountain-house/">St. Petersburg.com</a> entry for Anna Akhmatova Museum<br />
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Recommended Books<br />
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'Anna Akhmatova Poems' Selected and Translated by Lyn Coffin -Introduction by Joseph Brodsky'<br />
published by 'Norton & Company' London/New York 1983<br />
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'Anna Akhmatova Selected Poems-Selected, Translated and Introduced by Stanley Kuntiz with Max Hayward'<br />
published by Collins Harvill, London 1989<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Al Stewart song 'Roads To Moscow' </span><br />
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Folk rock singer-songwriter Al Stewart has excelled in writing countless songs with a historical theme. My favourite is 'Road To Moscow' from the 1973 album 'Past, Present and Future'. Unfortunately not in a position to reproduce the lyrics so can only quote from them<br />
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'Roads to Moscow' tells the story of a Red Army soldier serving at the time of Operation Barbarossa. The first verses describe the Soviets retreating deep into Russia, then in turn drive the Germans back. The soldier begins to dream of his return home-but becomes a prisoner of war, but escapes after a day. He successfully rejoins the Red Army. But only to be moved from the ranks and ordered to a Soviet labour camp for allowing himself to be taken prisoner. The song ends with him gazing through the wire, realising that Winter was approaching.<br />
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"It's cold and damp in the transit camp<br />
The air is still and solemn<br />
The pale sun of October whispers<br />
The snow will soon be coming<br />
And I wonder when I will be home again<br />
And the morning answers never. "<br />
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The debate whether song lyrics about war can be counted as 'war poetry' seems hard to resolve. But if it is accepted that lyrics can be considered as war poetry, then 'Roads to Moscow' is a strong contender.<br />
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Links<br />
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<a href="http://www.alstewart.com/publicfiles/HISTORY_roadstom.htm">Al Stewart explanation </a> of 'Roads to Moscow'<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKE4Y1Us46o">'Roads to Moscow' (song) </a> from 'Youtube'<br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: red;">Finally</span> Please remember that there is a companion blog to this one called <a href="http://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a> about Stuart era War Poetry and literature. Also features contemporary fiction about the 17th century . </span><div><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;">UPDATE New blog launched by Michael Bully in February 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> relating to Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana </span></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-63516038855471004392018-07-18T13:23:00.001-07:002023-03-12T14:13:10.946-07:00Nelly Sachs ( 1891- 1970) 'Chorus of the Rescued '<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;"> 'The Worms of Fear Still Feed Upon Us'</span><br />
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<i>I wish to thank the 'Swedish History in English' Facebook group for their help with this feature</i><br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Nelly_Sachs_1966.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="396" data-original-width="280" height="320" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Nelly_Sachs_1966.jpg" width="226" /></a></div>
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Nelly Sachs in 1966 at the time of being joint winner of the Nobel prize for Literature<br />
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German Jewish poet Nelly Sachs (1891- 1970) managed to escape from Berlin to Sweden in 1940. A fellow poet, Gudrun Harlan, managed to contact the Swedish novelist Selma Lagerholf to assist : Nelly Sachs had been a long standing reader of Selam Lagherholf's work and they had corresponded for some years, and Nelly Sachs later maintained that her own love for Sweden developed from Selma Lagerholf's writing- particularly the novel 'Gosta Berling' (1891) . Prince Eugene of Sweden also helped in acquiring the necessary documentation.<br />
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Nelly Sachs had already been interrogated a number of times by the Gestapo, and one source suggests that she had actually received notification to report for deportation. However on 16th May 1940, Nelly Sachs and her mother took one of the last flights from Germany to Sweden, where they remained for the rest of their lives.<br />
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It was only after World War 2 that Nelly's poetry received international acclaim : She wrote a great deal about the Holocaust. Her most famous poems include Chimneys, Numbers. Some are just too stark and painful to read . They evoke the systematic brutality of the Holocaust as much it could be possible in the written word.<br />
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There is an element of trauma for having escaped, the 'guilt of the rescued' . Many of Nelly Sachs' relatives did not survive the camp. A number of friends such as fellow poet Getrud Kolmar were also murdered in the holocaust. Nelly befriended the Romanian poet Paul Celan, who survived a Nazi Labour camp, and later settled in Paris.<br />
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There is a brittle and fragile element to her poetry- 'the rescued' can not separate themselves from the horror of those who perished:<br />
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<b>Chorus of the Rescued</b><br />
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We, the rescued,<br />
From whose hollow bones death had began to whittle his flutes,<br />
And on whose sinews he had already stroked his bow-<br />
Our bodies continues to lament<br />
With their mutilated music.<br />
We, the rescued,<br />
The worms of fear still feed on us.<br />
Our constellation is buried in dust.<br />
We, the rescued,<br />
Beg you;<br />
Show us your sun,but gradually.<br />
Lead us from star to star, step by step.<br />
Be gentle when you teach us to live again.<br />
Lest the song of a bird,<br />
Or a pail being filled at the well,<br />
Let our badly sealed burst forth again<br />
and carry us away-<br />
We beg you;<br />
Do not show us an angry dog, not yet-<br />
It could be, it could be<br />
That we will dissolve into dust-<br />
Dissolve into dust, before your eyes ,<br />
For what binds our fabric together?<br />
We whose breath vacated us,<br />
Whose soul fled to Him out of that midnight<br />
Long before our bodies were rescued<br />
Into the ark of the moment.<br />
We, the rescued,<br />
We, press your hand<br />
We look into your eye-<br />
But all that binds us together now is leave-taking,<br />
the leave-taking in the dust<br />
Binds together with you.<br />
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<i>- Nelly Sachs, translated by Michael Hamburger </i><br />
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Taken from the anthology 'Poetry of the Second World War- An International Anthology ' .edited by Desmond Graham 1995.<br />
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Several collections of her work were printed during Nelly Sachs' lifetime. Her New York Times obituary suggested that her collection ' Flight and Metamorphosis' (1959) received particular acclaim.<br />
A play 'Eli' from 1950- set in Nazi Occupied Poland- was read out on West German radio, and performed on stage in 1962. In 1965 Nelly Sachs won the Peace Prize of German Publishers ( <i>Friedenspreis des Deutcshen Buchandels </i>) And in 1966 she became the joint winner of the Nobel Prize of Literature along with Israeli writer Schmuel Yosef Agnon.<br />
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Paul Celan took his own life in 1970, three weeks before Nelly Sachs died in a Stockholm hospital on 12th May 1970. She was 78.<br />
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<b><u>Links of interest </u></b><br />
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Nelly Sachs' <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1966/sachs-speech.html">Nobel Prize Speech 1966</a><br />
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<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/13/archives/nelly-sachs-poet-dead-at-78-won-nobel-prize-for-literature.html">New York Times obituary </a> to Nelly Sachs<br />
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<a href="https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/sachs-nelly-leonie">Jewish Women's Archive </a> Article on Nelly Sachs<br />
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<a href="https://archive.org/details/nellysachs">Nelly Sachs Collection on line </a><br />
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Home page has English language biography feature. The digitalised documents are largely in German and Swedish.<br />
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UPDATE New blog by Michael Bully launched in 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana <br />
<br />Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-65207404814954677182018-05-28T12:19:00.002-07:002023-03-12T14:17:19.857-07:00Sidney Keyes 'A Poet of Great Promise' part one<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Sidney Keyes ( 27th May 1922- 29th April 1943)</span><br />
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<i>This an extract from a longer piece being prepared on Sidney Keyes. Been offered further material from the <a href="http://sussexhistoryforum.co.uk/index.php">South East History Board</a> forum after declaring my interest in Keyes' work. This piece is more focused on Sidney Keyes connection to War poetry. A follow up article will look at Keyes in relation to the 'New Apocalypse' and other poetry from the 1940's along with the longest of his war poems 'The Foreign Gate' </i><br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/The_British_Army_in_Tunisia_1943_NA880.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="787" data-original-width="800" height="314" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/The_British_Army_in_Tunisia_1943_NA880.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"> Image: British Army in Tunisia NA880 courtesy of IWM & Wiki Commons </span><br />
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Lieutenant Sidney Arthur Kilworth Keyes was killed in action near Sidi Abdulla, Tunisia, on 29th April 1943. He was serving with the 1st Battalion of the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment and was a month away from his 21st birthday : Keyes had seen active service for two weeks. and was posthumously awarded the Hawthornden Prize in 1943 for his second collection of poetry, 'The Cruel Solstice' which is dedicated to fellow Oxford University poet John Heath Stubbs. He was buried at Massicault Cemetery, Tunisia.<br />
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There is fair amount of biography on line , including a recent feature on the War Poets Association website about Sidney Keyes. He came from a middle class background, brought up largely by his grandfather. Educated at Tonbridge School then Queens College, Oxford. I have listed further sources for anyone interested in researching Sidney Keyes' life below,<br />
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I have a second edition copy of 'The Cruel Solstice' from 1944. The huge range of poetic themes is impressive: Titles such as 'William Yates in Limbo, 'St. John the Baptist', 'William Byrd', 'Don Juan', 'Orestes and the Furies', 'The Kestrels', abound- perhaps one in ten poems are related to the War.<br />
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Certainly the poet Vernon Scannell in his much neglected work on World War 2 poetry- 'Not Without Glory ' (1976) stressed that Keyes largely seemed to be avoiding the idea of poetry being some sort of war reportage and was strangely detached from World events. It is possible to go further, Keyes is almost retreating into his inner world of nature and mysticism . The two examples copied below, 'War Poet' and 'Europe's Prisoners' show Keyes breaking out of his own landscape .<br />
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Keyes also wrote a poem titled 'Dunbar, 1650' ( written June 1942) ....referring to Cromwell's victory against a Scottish army of double his size on 3rd September 1650. And 'The Foreign Gate' , an epic poem that covers several printed pages, which also deals with warfare ( written February- March 1942).<br />
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Keyes most famous poem is 'War Poet' from March 1942. One that has been regularly added to World War 2 anthologies.<br />
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War Poet<br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #141823; font-size: 15px;">"</span><span style="color: #141823;"> I am the man who looked for peace and found</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">My own eyes barbed,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">I am the man who groped for words and found</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">An arrow in my hand.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">I am the builder whose firm walls surround</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">A slipping land.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">When I grow sick or mad</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Mock me not nor chain me:</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">When I reach for the wind</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Cast me not down:</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Though my face is a burnt book</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">And a wasted town."</span></span><br />
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It seemed quite non-specific, but then was written months before Keyes saw military action.<br />
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One of my favourite war related poems from 'The Cruel Solstice' is 'Europe's Prisoners' . Just sums up what was happening in 1930's/ 1940's Europe.<br />
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The last two lines seem to suggest that Keyes hopes that those in prison will break out to seek a devastating retribution on the world that has caged them.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"Until at last the courage they have learned</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Shall burst the walls and overturned the world"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "tinos";"> Keyes was writing in 1941, and would have no concept of how horrific the labour and concentration camp conditions would be. The poem is an interesting snapshot of how a British poet imagines the plight of the huge numbers of people in captivity, and yearns for them to stage a romantic rebellion. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "tinos";"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "tinos";"><br /></span></span>
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Europe's Prisoners<br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">" Never a day, never a day passes</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">But I remember then, their stoneblind faces</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Beaten by arclights, their eyes turned inward</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Seeking an answer and their passage homeward:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">For being citizens of time, they never</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Would learn the body's nationality.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Tortured for years now, they refuse to sever</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Spirit from flesh or accept our callow century.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Not without hope, but lacking present solace,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The preacher know the feels of nails and grace,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The singer snores; the orator's facile hands</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">are fixed in a gesture no one understands.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Others escaped, yet paid for their betrayal;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Even the politicians with their stale</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Visions and cheap flirtation with the past</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Will not die any easier at the last.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The ones who took to garrets and consumption</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">In foreign cities, found a deep dungeon</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Than any Dachau. Free but still confined.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The human lack of pity split their mind.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Whatever days, whatever season pass,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The prisoners must start in pain's white face;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Until at last the courage they have learned</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Shall burst the walls and overturn the world."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">21st May 1941 </span></i><br />
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A final word by Private James Lucas :<br />
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"During my Army Service I had a number of Platoon commanders. Keyes was the best of them. He was the quieter, determined, non-blustering type of leadership. His manners impeccable and he did not talk down to us, nor was he condescending to us- so many officers were. He was a gallant, Christian gentleman who sacrificed himself for the men under his command. "<br />
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Memoir included in Sidney Keyes 'Collected Poems' , Carcanet , 2002.<br />
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In fact Sidney Keyes' work is best explored via 'Collected Poems' , Carcanet, 2002. Essentially the last update of the original 1944 collected works edited by Michael Meyer , an Oxford contemporary. Biographical material has been added including two accounts of soldiers who fought with Keyes,<br />
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<a href="http://www.warpoets.org/conflicts/world-war-ii/sidney-keyes-1922-1943/">War Poets Association</a> page on Sidney Keyes<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.tonbridge-school.co.uk/about-the-school/history-of-the-school/notable-old-tonbridgians/sidney-keyes/">Tonbridge School </a> page on Sidney Keyes<br />
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Please check my other blog featuring Stuart era War & Literature <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/"></a>UPDATE Latest blog by Michael Bully launched on February 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana <br />
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<br /></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-69279298874443956422018-04-29T05:59:00.003-07:002022-06-07T12:51:38.860-07:00T R Hodgson <span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> Thomas Rahilley Hodgson 1915 -1941 'This Life This Death' </span><br />
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<i>A longer version of this article has now appeared on the <a href="http://worldwarpoetry.com/blog/world-war-2/thomas-rahilley-hodgson/">WorldWarPoetry.com </a></i><br />
<i> Michael Bully, 11th November 2018 </i><br />
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'Blue Runway Study' by Alexander Johnson<br />
Used with kind permission of the artist.<br />
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Thomas Rahilley Hodgson, Pilot Officer RAF Volunteer Reserve, was killed in action on 17th May 1941 aged 25. He was survived by his parents and his wife. Hodgson is listed on the Runnymede memorial , which commemorate around 20,000 individuals who served with the RAF during World War 2 and had no known grave.<br />
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In 1943, a collection of his poems titled ' This Life This Death' was published by Routledge, London. Hodgson had been writing poetry since 1932, and only seven out of the fifty-five poems could strictly be called 'war poems'.<br />
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It is not known how many of his poems were published in his life time but Hodgson's poetry has been included in two crucial World War 2 poetry anthologies,'The Terrible Rain ' and 'I Burn For England' .<br />
<br />
Robert Graves has been quoted as stating "No war poetry can be expected from the Royal Air Force"<br />
( source Daniel Swift -'Bomber County') .<br />
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Certainly seems that World War 2 War in the Air poetry is even less known that its land and sea counterparts. One exception is Timothy Corsellis (1921- 1941 ), who served in the RAF for only a<br />
matter of months in 1941, produced a couple of highly reclaimed poems such as 'Dawn After The Raid' and 'News Reel of Embarkation .' His work was anthologised in eleven anthologies of war poetry. In 2014 the 'Timothy Corsellis Prize' was established by the Poetry Society, in conjunction with the War Poets Association and the Imperial War Museum, to encourage young people aged 14- 25 to write poetry about World II.<br />
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Two poems worthy of note are 'Searchlights Over Berlin' , written before the Allies saturation bombing of Germany started. Hodgson indicated being part of the War effort couldn't be explained -"And he is rising mad who searches here for meaning."<br />
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<b>Searchlights Over Berlin</b><br />
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"Their silver scalpels probe the wound of night<br />
seeking out doom, a death<br />
to death. And now<br />
no highflung phrase, no braggart<br />
gesture of the hand or jaw<br />
can still the double fear. Who fly<br />
ten thousand feet about in the shrill dark<br />
are linked with those who cover<br />
under earth to hear, vague as sea<br />
upon an island wind. the murmur<br />
which is, for some<br />
eternity, for some<br />
an ending,<br />
And he is rising mad who searches here<br />
for meaning."<br />
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Whilst 'It is Death Now We Look Upon " , commemorates a similar lack of meaning. Death is the ultimate negation of life, there is no value placed on dying whilst fighting in a war .<br />
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Both poems are bleak, and without a clever subtext, and not a single word is wasted. There's probably little to be gained in trying to analyse them. There is a strange sense of loss of self, when faced by the sheer enormity of the War.<br />
<span style="font-size: medium;"><b><br /></b></span>
<b><span style="font-size: medium;">I</span><span style="font-size: medium;">t is Death Now We Look Upon. </span></b><br />
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"dayfall<br />
swallowsong<br />
murmurous the river-<br />
which is a memory -<br />
<br />
it is death now we look upon.<br />
<br />
Now<br />
hands have no meaning<br />
eyes no longer speak<br />
kisses call<br />
sorrow like a dream<br />
out of the dusk remembering<br />
<br />
it is death now we look upon .<br />
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Wherefore<br />
call home the old,<br />
and let him lie<br />
lapped in their shaken<br />
yet unshaken,faith<br />
<br />
call home tomorrow's quick<br />
the beautiful, the glad,<br />
the unrelenting<br />
Call home the children<br />
we have made<br />
but shall we not know.<br />
<br />
Cancel all tears,<br />
and let all love<br />
grow cold,<br />
that pain we may ease,<br />
remembering<br />
<br />
it is death now we look upon."<br />
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<b>Links </b><br />
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More artwork from <a href="http://www.alexander-johnson.com/">Alexander Johnson</a> : Alexander has been working on a World War 2 related art projects and is also inspired by his father' s service as a pilot during the War.<br />
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<a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship </a> A blog about Stuart era poetry and prose related to warfare . Companion blog to this one.<br />
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<a href="http://warpoets.org.uk/worldwar2/poets-and-poetry/timothy-corsellis/">Timothy Corsellis</a> Page maintained on the 'Discover War Poets' website.<br />
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<b>Books </b><br />
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Copies of 'This Life This Death' can still be found on Amazon UK but the book has been out of print for decades now.<br />
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'The Terrible Rain : War Poets 1939- 1945 , an anthology selected and arranged by Brian Gardner' , Magnum Books, 1977<br />
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'I Burn for England . An Anthology of the poetry of World War II Selected and Introduced by Charles Hamblett, Leslie Frewin, 1966<br />
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'Bomber County The Lost Airman of World War 2 ' , Daniel Swift, Hamish Hamilton , 2010.Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-60092701688920017622018-04-11T12:51:00.001-07:002023-03-12T14:20:33.640-07:00More on Johannes Bobrowski -Gertrud Kolmar <br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><b>Johannes Bobrowski's tribute to Gertud Kolmar ( Gertrud Kathe Chodziesner ) </b><span style="font-size: large;"><b> </b> </span> <br />
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<i> Plaque dedicated to Gertud Kolmar, in Berlin, in 1993 courtesy Wikipedia</i><br />
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I have previously posted about <a href="http://worldwar2poetry.blogspot.co.uk/2017/08/johannes-bobrowski.html">Johannes Bobrowski</a> ( 1917- 1965) - and recently went back to 'Shadowlands', the 1966 translation of his work from German by Ruth and Mathew Meads, which was republished in 1984 . After being accepted in his native DDR as a rehabilitated Soviet Prisoner of War and a respected poet, Bobrowski was gradually getting noticed in the West from around 1960 onward. And the East German regime were prepared to grant him some permission to travel.<br />
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'Shadowlands' included a poem titled 'Gerturd Kolmar' : Certainly strange to have Bobrowski, a former German soldier writing a tribute to a Jewish woman poet who didn't survive the holocaust. The poem was first published in a collected titled 'Shadowland Rivers' from 1962, which also contains two poems ' Else Lasker-Schuler ' ( 1869-1945) and 'To Nelly Sachs' (1891- 1970) , who were both German women of Jewish descent.<br />
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An ode Bobrowski wrote about Thomas Chatterton ( 1752- 1770), the forerunner of the English Romantic poets, is a surprising choice .Though Bobrowski shared a huge reverence for Nature with the Romantics, his poetry was largely quite clipped and sparse in its use of words, perhaps having more in common with early 20th century Imagism.<br />
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'Gerturd Kolmar'<br />
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Beech, bloody in leaf,<br />
in smoking depth bitter<br />
the shadows, the door above<br />
of shouting magpies.<br />
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There a girl walked,<br />
a girl with smooth hair,<br />
the plain under her lids<br />
glanced up, her step<br />
was lost in the marches.<br />
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But the dark time<br />
is not dead, my speech<br />
wanders and is<br />
rusty with blood.<br />
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Were I to remember you;<br />
I stepped in front of the beech,<br />
I have commanded the magpie:<br />
Be silent, they come, who were<br />
here-if I remembered:<br />
We shall not die, we shall<br />
be girded about with towers."<br />
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Johannes Bobrowski ( from 'Shadowlands)<br />
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<b> Gertrud Kathe Chodziesner/Gertrud Kolmar ( 10th December 1894- <i>deported </i>March 1943) </b><br />
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Gertrud Kolmar's legacy of 450 poems, two short stories, and three plays. Personal papers and other works were destroyed at the time of her arrest. Her literary career had a promising start with her first collection published in 1917, and was frequent published throughout the 1920's, and a second collection appeared in 1934. But a third volume of poetry was suppressed by the Nazi regime in 1938, and in 1941 Gertud Kolmar became a forced labourer in the armaments industry. On 27th February 1943, Gertud was arrested by the SS and deported to Auschwitz on 2nd March 1943, her exact date of death is not known. Interest has steadily grown in her work.<br />
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I am not sure of the date that 'The Female Poet' was written. I think that appeared from 1936 -1938 .<br />
The incredible sense of being helpless against the course of history -'My heart beats like a frightened little bird's' and ' whispering to the wind' /'This shall not be' is so brilliantly . Or perhaps the poet is simply referring to being overwhelmed by a love affair. And the closing line " You hear me speak/But do you hear me feel ? " is spoken thinly to a party that is just not interested.<br />
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The Female Poet ( 'Die Dichterin ' )<br />
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<span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="color: #141823;">You hold me now completely in your hands.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">My heart beats like a frightened little bird's</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Against your palm. Take heed! You do not think</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">A person lives within the page you thumb.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">To you this book is paper, cloth, and ink,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Some binding thread and glue, and thus is dumb,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">And cannot touch you (though the gaze be great</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">That seeks you from the printed marks inside),</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">And is an object with an object's fate.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">And yet it has been veiled like a bride,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Adorned with gems, made ready to be loved,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Who asks you bashfully to change your mind,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">To wake yourself, and feel, and to be moved.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">But still she trembles, whispering to the wind:</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">"This shall not be." And smiles as if she knew.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Yet she must hope. A woman always tries,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Her very life is but a single "You . . ."</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">With her black flowers and her painted eyes,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">With silver chains and silks of spangled blue.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">She knew more beauty when a child and free,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">But now forgets the better words she knew.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">A man is so much cleverer than we,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Conversing with himself of truth and lie,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Of death and spring and iron-work and time.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">But I say "you" and always "you and I."</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">This book is but a girl's dress in rhyme,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Which can be rich and red, or poor and pale,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Which may be wrinkled, but with gentle hands,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">And only may be torn by loving nails.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">So then, to tell my story, here I stand.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">The dress's tint, though bleached in bitter lye,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">Has not all washed away. It still is real.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">I call then with a thin, ethereal cry.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #141823;" /><span style="color: #141823;">You hear me speak. But do you hear me feel?</span></span><br />
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-Gertrud Kolmar ( translated by <span face=""roboto" , "droid sans" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="color: #141823; font-size: 15px;">Translated by Henry A Smith )</span><br />
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<span face=""roboto" , "droid sans" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="color: #141823;"><span style="font-size: 15px;">Taken from the <a href="https://allpoetry.com/Gertrud-Kolmar">All Poetry</a> entry for Gertrud Kolmar</span></span><br />
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Most Indebted to the <a href="https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/kolmar-gertrud">Jewish Women's Archive</a> feature on Gertrud Kolmar .<br />
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And also to Lucy London 's feature on Gertrud Kolmar <a href="http://femalewarpoets.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/gertrud-kolmar-1894-1943.html">Female Poets of the First World War</a> blog<br />
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Finally, must just mention the Stuart era companion blog to this one <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A burnt ship </a><div><br /></div><div>UPDATE New blog launched by Michael Bully on February 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' Victoriana </div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-1868420406647939802018-03-27T12:18:00.001-07:002022-06-07T12:24:31.765-07:001940 -Poetry of the Darkest Hour <br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> Poetry from the Darkest Hour </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Picture of '1940' carved into the walls of the pillbox courtesy of 'Wikipedia' </span></div>
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Apologies for the lack of new posts, but pleased to see that people are still visiting this blog. A lot of spare time has been spent on my latest blog <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">aBurntShip</a> featuring 17th century related war poetry and prose. I started a blog concerning my views on the 1685 Monmouth Rebellion-which is yet unpublished. On my way back to World War 2 poetry.<br />
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With the rise of the movie 'Darkest Hour' -thought that it was time to select some poetry relating to that crucial phase of the War.<br />
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One of my favourite pieces of poetry about this year is the opening part of Bertolt Brecht 's '1940' .<br />
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1.<br />
"Spring is coming.The gentle winds<br />
Are freeing the cliffs of their winter ice.<br />
Trembling, the peoples of the north await<br />
The battle fleets of the house-painter.<br />
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11.<br />
Out of the libraries<br />
Emerge the butchers.<br />
Pressing their children closer<br />
Mothers stand and humbly search<br />
The skies for the inventions of learned men.<br />
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III<br />
The designers sit<br />
Hunched in the drawing offices:<br />
One wrong figure, and the enemy's cities<br />
Will remain Undestroyed. "<br />
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-Bertolt Brecht<br />
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Brecht was living in exile from Germany since 1933. After several years in Denmark, Brecht moved to Sweden in April 1939, but moved to Finland in May 1940. I rate these three verses highly; opening with the idea that the start of Spring, rather than being a cause for celebration, heralds the beginning of the fighting season. In fact knowledge itself is used against rather than for ,the interests of humanity. Butchers go to libraries, learned men are devising new inventions of war, designers are planning to destroy enemy cities.<br />
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<u>British poetry from 1940 </u><br />
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I have selected three poems, all written by women, not for any deliberate reason. I don't think that any of them are of astonishing literary importance. But they convey an eerie fatalism, not necessarily of a defeatist nature, more of a sense of living in a country which has lost control of its destiny. Also reminds one that the events of 1940 were shared by those out of uniform as well as those who were serving.<br />
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<b>Headland 1940 </b><br />
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"The Atlantic clangs, a hammer against the headland.<br />
Lungs of my generation wait for the stroke,<br />
The wave's long tension tattering into smoke<br />
Breathe turmoil, with this headland that is England<br />
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Surf in the cove has woven a scantier garland,<br />
Scalding the ribs of a trawler mined in May.<br />
Roll on my soul: reveal the spindrift boy.<br />
The men like matchwood, broken against the foreland."<br />
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-Lilian Bowes-Lyon<br />
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( from 'Lilian Bowes Lyon Collected Poems, Introduced by C.Day Lewis' , Jonathan Cape, 1948)<br />
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Lilian Bower-Lyon sees 'England' not as Shakespeare's 'sceptered isle' but as a headland being pounded by the Atlantic. There is an almost Byron type view of Nature being indifferent to man, The sea wears down the wreck of a mined fishing boat, the men 'broken like matchwood....' There is something a little obtuse about the 'spindrift boy'....'spindrift' being the spray of the waves blown by wind. Perhaps a play on the words 'boy and 'buoy' .<br />
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<b>Spring 1940 </b><br />
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"Last spring carried love's garlands -this season's wreath;<br />
broken branches of blossom to decorate death,<br />
cloaking new graves, hardly-though unsought for,<br />
stainless and free as the causes they fought for.<br />
Yes, beggoten of sunlight and suckled by rain,<br />
flowers declare that as surely shall peace follow pain."<br />
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Prudence Macdonald<br />
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( Published in 'Chaos of the Night -Women's Poetry and Verse of the Second World War' selected by Catherine Reilly, Virago ,1984)<br />
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Whilst Prudence Madonald contrasts Spring of 1939 with that of 1940- where flowers were once associated with romance, are now used for wreaths and to 'decorate graves'. There is quite a bitter-sweet feeling about Spring time and war. But am drawn to the poem's simplicity, and the tiny note of optimism ' as surely shall peace follow pain'.<br />
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(extract)<b> Newgale Sands 1940 </b><br />
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"But in June<br />
When the honey honeysuckle is thickest on the<br />
bush<br />
The wind blows off the sea<br />
And no one comes,<br />
In any year<br />
No season has begun then.<br />
Only this year we know it will never begin,<br />
None will come but those<br />
Like us, to say goodbye, sisters to brothers,<br />
Lovers to lovers.<br />
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This quiet deserted year<br />
We saw Newgale sands as men<br />
Shipwrecked see the waiting island,<br />
Two miles of bay still wet<br />
At midday from the morning tide<br />
Under the thick English summer sky<br />
Which only lets the warmth through not the sun;<br />
There was a noon tide bearing on the land<br />
The unremitting roar<br />
Of endless breakers racing<br />
With furious hair after the fretted surf<br />
Scattered like whitened bones on the flat sand......"<br />
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-Joan Barton<br />
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(Published in 'Shadows of War- British Women's Poetry of the Second World War, edited and introduced by Anne Powell, Sutton Publishing, 1999).<br />
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Joan Barton evokes the deserted holiday resort of Newgale Sands. also looking at the notion of the Sea being hostile , or at the very best, indifferent to the affairs of men. Interesting that there is no sense of the sea being a defence against invasion .....but the poet is describing a West facing port. If this was a South coast port, the beach would be cluttered with defences and travel restriction imposed. 'The unremitting roar/ Of endless breakers' reads like a strange allusion to the waves of bombers who are to come. The image of the 'fretted surf/Scattered like whitened bones '.....is haunting.<br />
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<u><b><i>Notes on the Poets.</i></b></u><br />
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Bertolt Brecht<br />
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I can't find a full online version of the poem '1940' . I have used 'Poetry of the Second World War-An International Anthology' edited by Desmond Graham, 'Chatto & Windus', 1995.<br />
<a href="https://www.poemine.com/Bertolt-Brecht/1940.html">Verse VI of 1940 </a> is much quoted generally, but a bit too clever for my liking.<br />
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<u>Lilian Bowes-Lyon (1895- 1949)</u><br />
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Cousin to Elizabeth the late Queen Mother. served as a VAD nurse in World War 1. Had some five collections of poetry published along with a 'Collected Works' in 1948. Worked with the people of Stepney during World War 2.<br />
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Excellent article <a href="http://spitalfieldslife.com/2016/01/27/the-queen-mothers-rebel-cousin/">The Queen Mother's Rebel Cousin</a> by East End historian Roger Mills<br />
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<u>Prudence Macdonald </u><br />
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Little information found - a collection of her work 'No Wasted Hour & Other Poems' was published in 1945.<br />
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<u>Joan Barton ( 1908- 1986)</u><br />
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Involved with the Women's Land Army during World War 2, Set up a bookshop in 1947 in Marlborough, and continued to write poetry , sometimes read her work on radio. Seems to have had several collections of poetry published, most notably 'A House under Old Sarum- New and Selected Poems', Harry Chambers/Peterloo Poets, 1981.Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-34209292119327689072017-11-11T07:29:00.001-08:002023-02-03T11:47:05.723-08:00Lynette Roberts -'Cross and Uncrossed' <br />
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Thought that it was time to update this blog. Have mainly be focused on a new blog dedicated to seventeenth century war related poetry and literature titled <a href="https://aburntship.blogspot.co.uk/">A Burnt Ship</a><br />
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Have also been reading up on the life of Lynette Roberts (1909- 1995) . A longer version of this post will be available soon. Lynette Roberts played a significant role in the Anglo-Welsh poetry scene of the mid-20th century .<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> 'Cross and Uncrossed '</span><br />
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<a href="http://media.iwm.org.uk/ciim5/140/288/large_000000.jpg?action=d&cat=art" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="598" data-original-width="800" height="239" src="https://media.iwm.org.uk/ciim5/140/288/large_000000.jpg?action=d&cat=art" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Norma Bull ' Effigies of Crusaders in Round Temple Church London ' ( Courtesy of Imperial War Museum, IWM ART LD4889 )</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> Lynette Roberts was born in Argentina in 1909, and relocated to Britain in the 1930's, marrying Welsh magazine editor and poet Keidrych Rhys in 1939.The couple settled in the village of Llanybri . Rhys was conscripted on 12th July 1940, and was later to go AWOL for a short time after several years service. . Lynette Roberts immersed herself in Welsh village life, studying the mythology and language of the country, proud of her own distant Welsh ancestry. And wrote poetry of her own. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">Backed by T.S. Elliott’s influence at ‘Faber’ two collections subsequently appeared ' Poems' in 1944 and 'Gods With Stainless Ears' in 1951,and the latter featured a long poem about her life in Wales in World War II, taking in the 19th -21st February 1941 Air Raid on Swansea. The people of Llanybri could see the flames...230 died, 397 injured , 7,000 homes were destroyed. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">Like a tapemachine the cold figures February</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">19th, 20th, 21st. A memorial of Swansea’s tragic loss….” </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> The marriage between Lynette Roberts and Keidrych Rhys broke down in 1948 : Lynette Roberts took their two young children to England in 1949, and in 1955 she opened an art centre at Chislehurst Caves in Kent. In 1956 part of the cave roofs collapsed seriously injuring a sculptor called Peter Danziger. The centre closed and Lynette Roberts had the first of a series of breakdowns and suffered from recurring mental health conditions from the rest of her life until her death in 1995. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> The already published works of Lynette Roberts were left to lapse-seemingly out of fashion as new trends began to flourish in the late 50's such as 'The Movement' and 'The Angry Young Men'. Her previous friendships with such luminaries as Dylan Thomas, Edith Sitwell, Alun Lewis,and T.S. Elliott earned her the occasional mention and the odd footnote. In fact Lynette Roberts shared her research into Welsh culture and mythology with Robert Graves for his work ‘The Roebuck in the Thicket’ , which later became ‘The White Goddess’.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">Even in the late 1970’s /early 1980’s wave of feminism which explored women’s relationship to war, there was little focus on her work. Lynette Roberts was conspicuously absent from Catherine Reilly’s influential ‘Chaos of the Night -Women’s Poetry and Verse ‘ from 1984. One exception was ‘Poetry Wales ‘ magazine that devoted an issue to Lynette Roberts in 1983. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> Anne Powell’s 1996, ‘Shadows of War-British Women’s Poetry of the Second World War’ featured of three of Lynette Roberts’ poem. And in 21st century a new wave of interest appeared in her work with the appearance of 'Lynette Roberts-collected poems' edited by Patrick McGuiness in 2005 and a companion volume of 'Diaries, Letters, and Recollection ' in 2008, also edited by Patrick McGuiness. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">A particularly intriguing entry reads:</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">“And my stay at the Inner Temple when I turned up while the library buildings were still smouldering and continued to burn for another five days. The Round Church wet and empty like a grotesque seashell. Out of this experience I wrote my poem ‘Crossed and Uncrossed.’ “</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">‘Diaries, Letters and Recollections’ 12th June 1942 - Looking back at 10th May 1941 Raid. Here are some verses from said poem to consider :</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif">As the hard crackle of flames leapt on firemen</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> and paled the red walls……….</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #141414; font-size: 10pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""verdana" , sans-serif"> burn into Tang shapes</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Further Reading </span><br />
<br />
Lynette Roberts- <i>Diaries, Letters and Recollections</i>' , edited by Patrick McGuiness, Carcanet Press<br />
(2008)<br />
Lynette Roberts - <i>Collected Poems </i>edited by Patrick McGuiness, Carcanet Press (2005)<br />
<br />
Keidrych Rhys -<i>The Van Pool: Collected Poems </i> edited by Charles Mundye, Seren ( 2012).<br />
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<br />
Lynette Roberts <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituary-lynette-roberts-1603243.html">Independent Obituary</a><br />
<br />
Lynette Roberts feature <a href="http://www.flashpointmag.com/tucklyn.htm">Flashpoint Magazine</a><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><a href="http://www.flashpointmag.com/tucklyn.htm"></a>New blog launched 2nd February 2023 <a href="https://bleakchesneywold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Bleak Chesney Wold</a> Charles Dickens/ 'dark' 19th century history <br />
<br /></div>Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5336509765386532127.post-53360894941085375072017-09-09T06:36:00.000-07:002017-09-09T10:36:27.617-07:00We are at War - Forty Years Backward March <b><i><br /></i></b>
<i>Pleased to hear that the <a href="http://war-experience.org/">Second World War Experience Centre </a> magazine 'Everyone's War' will include an article I wrote last year about poetry from the North Africa campaign. </i><br />
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Two poems about the outbreak of World War 2 from the point of view of teenagers in Britain, Elizabeth Jennings and Michael A. Mason<br />
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<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/64/Air_Raid_Precautions_in_Central_London%2C_England%2C_UK%2C_1941_D3606.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="550" height="320" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/64/Air_Raid_Precautions_in_Central_London%2C_England%2C_UK%2C_1941_D3606.jpg" width="220" /></a></div>
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<b> </b><span style="font-size: x-small;"> Public Air Raid Shelter in Trafalgar Square from 1941</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> Courtesy Wikimedia Commons</span><br />
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<b>Anniversary Fatigue</b><br />
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Deliberately decided to avoid posting about the anniversary of Britain entering into World War 2. Have to admit that anniversary fatigue is taking its toll .<br />
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But if I have posted on 3rd September 2017 would have included Elizabeth Jennings (1926- 2001), who later went on to become one of the 1950's 'Movement' poets. Her work is rarely included in World War 2 poetry anthologies - the exception being 'Poems From the Second World War'<br />
( Macmillan's Children's books in partnership with the IWM. 2005 ).<br />
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<u>'The Second World War' - Elizabeth Jennings</u><br />
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"The voice said 'We are at War'<br />
And I was afraid<br />
for I did not know what this<br />
meant<br />
My sister and I ran to our friends next door<br />
As if they could help. History was lessons learnt<br />
With ancient dates, but here<br />
<br />
Was something utterly news,<br />
The radio, called the wireless then, had said<br />
That the country would have to be brave. There<br />
was much to do. ....."<br />
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Personally I am drawn to the simplicity of the poem, Elizabeth Jennings would have been 13 when war broke out and this poem captures the adolescent realising that they were experiencing ' something utterly news'. I am not in a position to reproduce the whole poem.<br />
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The same anthology contains Anthony Thwaite's poem 'Bournemouth 3rd September 1939' , about a school boy enjoying the seaside whilst waiting to start the Autumn Term. Born 1930, he was far younger than Elizabeth Jennings. The poem ends with the ominous lines<br />
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"...........Later, tucked in bed<br />
I hear the safe sea roll and wipe away<br />
The castles that had built in sand that day. "<br />
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<b>Forty Years Backward March -Michael Arthur Mason </b><br />
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Canadian writer Paul Nicholas Mason has shared this poem his father Michael Mason wrote about serving in the RAF during World War 2, on <a href="http://www.ww2f.com/">WW2f.com</a>, and has kindly given consent for the poem to be reproduced here.<br />
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This is a memory of an outbreak of war from the point of view of a boy just about to turn fifteen. Again I appreciate the simplicity of the poem, which conveys the aspect of the unreal with what Elizabeth Jennings above called 'something utterly news'. Also like characterisation of Chamberlain as 'disheartened Victorian ' ( who was, after all, born in 1869) and the commander who has been 'demothballed' who wishes the boys a 'good war'.<br />
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Paul has supplied the following biography.<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Michael A. Mason was born September 29, 1924 in Oxfordshire, England, the son of the butler to the Earl of Jersey. He was educated in state schools, and joined the RAF in 1943. He was released early in 1946 to return to university in London. Michael eventually earned his B.A. (Hons), Dip Ed, M.A. and PHD in English Language and Literature, and taught at universities in East Africa, B.C. and Ontario, Canada. He finished his teaching career as Head of English and Philosophy at Royal Military College, Kingston, Ontario.</span><br />
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<u>'40 Years Backward March ' - Michael A Mason. </u><br />
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Tired but precise, a voice. “We are at war<br />
With Germany.” I’d seen him the year before<br />
Bringing home “Peace with Honour.”<br />
Chamberlain. “It is the evil things<br />
That we shall be fighting against.”<br />
Thus spake a disheartened Victorian.<br />
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Warm summer and bright sunshine brought them out.<br />
This was a Junkers, circling the school<br />
Low down. “To shelters?” No.<br />
We had no instructions. Besides,<br />
The All Clear had sounded; and so, officially,<br />
He wasn’t there. It seems he abided by that,<br />
Drifting away from us, taking his time.<br />
Just curious.<br />
<br />
Bomber in a hurry shed its cargo<br />
Over the woods. We were below it,<br />
Hunting for walnuts. You fling up a stick and<br />
Down they come. Old Tom was eighty,<br />
But outran most of us. “What’s the use?”<br />
You ask. Why, none. We might have become<br />
So easily part of the harvest.<br />
<br />
Air Commodore, once retired;<br />
Demothballed. He was old; to us, on parade,<br />
Incredibly. “I wish you<br />
A good war,” he said. “Resent him?”<br />
No, not now. For what he meant was<br />
“I hope you survive it.” In such times<br />
This is not the way you should say it.<br />
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An outsize motorbike belting along behind trees<br />
But raised as if to skim them. Suddenly there’s<br />
Our first Vee-One, yammering over the fields<br />
Towards us – you can imagine them<br />
Looking for you (which is bad for morale) –<br />
Till high in plain view over<br />
The huge dead elm behind the house it<br />
Cut, dipped as it lost momentum, and<br />
Blew up somewhere else.<br />
“Missed by a mile?” Or so;<br />
Unless you were in the houses it demolished.<br />
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Before long they were common as wasps and<br />
Rather a trouble at night: each dragon of darkness<br />
Bringing you to the window<br />
The better to watch that<br />
Flaring rumble charting its<br />
Ruinous way. “I take a dim view of this,”<br />
So the cliché ran; but you’d heard<br />
They sometimes swung round before dropping,<br />
And you always had to be sure<br />
That this next one kept right on going.<br />
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Yes, a long time ago, and just<br />
Marginal. Of the mute and inglorious<br />
Multitude only a memory<br />
By another long-time survivor.<br />
But, when nobody’s left to remember<br />
The strange particular drumbeat<br />
Of a Junkers, or Vee-Ones, or summer<br />
So fine that it brought all the wasps out<br />
And thus gave a tinge rather special<br />
To youthful ambitions in those years,<br />
Let’s hope there won’t be such a mustering<br />
Of heavy battalions of nightmares<br />
Lining up on parade at the recall<br />
To arms for the next Peace with Honour<br />
That, by the time that one’s been swatted,<br />
There’ll be nobody left to remember."<br />
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<b>Links</b>. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2001/oct/31/guardianobituaries.books">Guardian Obituary for Elizabeth Jennings</a><br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcBa0Ym78RE">Paul Mason recites Forty Years Backwards March</a> (Youtube ) </div>
Michael Bullyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117590511154306159noreply@blogger.com0