"The progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the individual. Even the Chinese philosopher was wise enough to regard the individual as the basis of the empire. Is a democracy, such as we know it, the last improvement possible in government? Is it not possible to take a step further towards recognizing and organizing the rights of man? There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly. I please myself with imagining a State at least which can afford to be just to all men, and to treat the individual with respect as a neighbor; which even would not think it inconsistent with its own repose if a few were to live aloof from it, not meddling with it, nor embraced by it, who fulfilled all the duties of neighbors and fellow-men. A State which bore this kind of fruit, and suffered it to drop off as fast as it ripened, would prepare the way for a still more perfect and glorious State, which also I have imagined, but not yet anywhere seen."
"Thoreau was a great writer, philosopher, poet, and withal a most practical man, that is, he taught nothing he was not prepared to practise in himself. ... He went to gaol for the sake of his principles and suffering humanity. His essay has, therefore, been sanctified by suffering. Moreover, it is written for all time. Its incisive logic is unanswerable." - Mohandas Gandhi
"Civil Disobedience" is like a venerated architectural landmark: It is preserved and admired, and sometimes visited, but for most of us there are not many occasions when it can actually be used. Still, although seldom mentioned without references to Gandhi and King, "Civil Disobedience" has more history than many suspect. In the 1940's it was read by the Danish resistance, in the 1950's it was cherished by those who opposed McCarthyism, in the 1960's it was influential in the struggle against South African apartheid, and in the 1970's it was discovered by a new generation of anti-war activists. The lesson learned from all this experience is that Thoreau's ideas really do work, just as he imagined they would.
www.thoreau.eserver.org/civil.html
Viser innlegg med etiketten Poeter 18oo-tallet. Vis alle innlegg
Viser innlegg med etiketten Poeter 18oo-tallet. Vis alle innlegg
onsdag 5. november 2008
tirsdag 21. oktober 2008
Poems by Khalil Gibran (1883-1931)
Beauty XXV
And a poet said, "Speak to us of Beauty."
Where shall you seek beauty, and how shall you find her unless she herself be your way and your guide?
And how shall you speak of her except she be the weaver of your speech?
The aggrieved and the injured say, "Beauty is kind and gentle.
Like a young mother half-shy of her own glory she walks among us."
And the passionate say, "Nay, beauty is a thing of might and dread.
Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us and the sky above us."
The tired and the weary say, "beauty is of soft whisperings. She speaks in our spirit.
Her voice yields to our silences like a faint light that quivers in fear of the shadow."
But the restless say, "We have heard her shouting among the mountains,
And with her cries came the sound of hoofs, and the beating of wings and the roaring of lions."
At night the watchmen of the city say, "Beauty shall rise with the dawn from the east."
And at noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say, "we have seen her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset."
In winter say the snow-bound, "She shall come with the spring leaping upon the hills."
And in the summer heat the reapers say, "We have seen her dancing with the autumn leaves, and we saw a drift of snow in her hair."
All these things have you said of beauty.
Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied,
And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand stretched forth,
But rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted.
It is not the image you would see nor the song you would hear,
But rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a song you hear though you shut your ears.
It is not the sap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing attached to a claw,
But rather a garden forever in bloom and a flock of angels for ever in flight.
People of Orphalese, beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.
Khalil Gibran
Freedom XIV
And an orator said, "Speak to us of Freedom."
And he answered:
At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,
Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.
Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.
And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.
You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief,
But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.
And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour?
In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes.
And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free?
If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.
You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.
And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.
For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?
And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.
And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.
Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.
These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.
And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.
And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.
Khalil Gibran
Friendship IXX
And a youth said, "Speak to us of Friendship."
Your friend is your needs answered.
He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving.
And he is your board and your fireside.
For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.
When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the "nay" in your own mind, nor do you withhold the "ay."
And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart;
For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.
When you part from your friend, you grieve not;
For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.
And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.
For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.
And let your best be for your friend.
If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also.
For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill?
Seek him always with hours to live.
For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness.
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.
Khalil Gibran
Joy and Sorrow chapter VIII
Then a woman said, "Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow."
And he answered:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.
Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?
And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.
Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.
Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.
When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.
Khalil Gibran
Peace XVIII
The tempest calmed after bending the branches of the trees and leaning heavily upon the grain in the field. The stars appeared as broken remnants of lightning, but now silence prevailed over all, as if Nature's war had never been fought.
At that hour a young woman entered her chamber and knelt by her bed sobbing bitterly. Her heart flamed with agony but she could finally open her lips and say, "Oh Lord, bring him home safely to me. I have exhausted my tears and can offer no more, oh Lord, full of love and mercy. My patience is drained and calamity is seeking possession of my heart. Save him, oh Lord, from the iron paws of War; deliver him from such unmerciful Death, for he is weak, governed by the strong. Oh Lord, save my beloved, who is Thine own son, from the foe, who is Thy foe. Keep him from the forced pathway to Death's door; let him see me, or come and take me to him."
Quietly a young man entered. His head was wrapped in bandage soaked with escaping life.
He approached he with a greeting of tears and laughter, then took her hand and placed against it his flaming lips. And with a voice with bespoke past sorrow, and joy of union, and uncertainty of her reaction, he said, "Fear me not, for I am the object of your plea. Be glad, for Peace has carried me back safely to you, and humanity has restored what greed essayed to take from us. Be not sad, but smile, my beloved. Do not express bewilderment, for Love has power that dispels Death; charm that conquers the enemy. I am your one. Think me not a specter emerging from the House of Death to visit your Home of Beauty.
"Do not be frightened, for I am now Truth, spared from swords and fire to reveal to the people the triumph of Love over War. I am Word uttering introduction to the play of happiness and peace."
Then the young man became speechless and his tears spoke the language of the heart; and the angels of Joy hovered about that dwelling, and the two hearts restored the singleness which had been taken from them.
At dawn the two stood in the middle of the field contemplating the beauty of Nature injured by the tempest. After a deep and comforting silence, the soldier said to his sweetheart, "Look at the Darkness, giving birth to the Sun."
Khalil Gibran
Pleasure XXIV
Then a hermit, who visited the city once a year, came forth and said, "Speak to us of Pleasure."
And he answered, saying:
Pleasure is a freedom song,
But it is not freedom.
It is the blossoming of your desires,
But it is not their fruit.
It is a depth calling unto a height,
But it is not the deep nor the high.
It is the caged taking wing,
But it is not space encompassed.
Ay, in very truth, pleasure is a freedom-song.
And I fain would have you sing it with fullness of heart; yet I would not have you lose your hearts in the singing.
Some of your youth seek pleasure as if it were all, and they are judged and rebuked.
I would not judge nor rebuke them. I would have them seek.
For they shall find pleasure, but not her alone:
Seven are her sisters, and the least of them is more beautiful than pleasure.
Have you not heard of the man who was digging in the earth for roots and found a treasure?
And some of your elders remember pleasures with regret like wrongs committed in drunkenness.
But regret is the beclouding of the mind and not its chastisement.
They should remember their pleasures with gratitude, as they would the harvest of a summer.
Yet if it comforts them to regret, let them be comforted.
And there are among you those who are neither young to seek nor old to remember;
And in their fear of seeking and remembering they shun all pleasures, lest they neglect the spirit or offend against it.
But even in their foregoing is their pleasure.
And thus they too find a treasure though they dig for roots with quivering hands.
But tell me, who is he that can offend the spirit?
Shall the nightingale offend the stillness of the night, or the firefly the stars?
And shall your flame or your smoke burden the wind?
Think you the spirit is a still pool which you can trouble with a staff?
Oftentimes in denying yourself pleasure you do but store the desire in the recesses of your being.
Who knows but that which seems omitted today, waits for tomorrow?
Even your body knows its heritage and its rightful need and will not be deceived.
And your body is the harp of your soul,
And it is yours to bring forth sweet music from it or confused sounds.
And now you ask in your heart, "How shall we distinguish that which is good in pleasure from that which is not good?"
Go to your fields and your gardens, and you shall learn that it is the pleasure of the bee to gather honey of the flower,
But it is also the pleasure of the flower to yield its honey to the bee.
For to the bee a flower is a fountain of life,
And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love,
And to both, bee and flower, the giving and the receiving of pleasure is a need and an ecstasy.
People of Orphalese, be in your pleasures like the flowers and the bees.
Khalil Gibran
And a poet said, "Speak to us of Beauty."
Where shall you seek beauty, and how shall you find her unless she herself be your way and your guide?
And how shall you speak of her except she be the weaver of your speech?
The aggrieved and the injured say, "Beauty is kind and gentle.
Like a young mother half-shy of her own glory she walks among us."
And the passionate say, "Nay, beauty is a thing of might and dread.
Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us and the sky above us."
The tired and the weary say, "beauty is of soft whisperings. She speaks in our spirit.
Her voice yields to our silences like a faint light that quivers in fear of the shadow."
But the restless say, "We have heard her shouting among the mountains,
And with her cries came the sound of hoofs, and the beating of wings and the roaring of lions."
At night the watchmen of the city say, "Beauty shall rise with the dawn from the east."
And at noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say, "we have seen her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset."
In winter say the snow-bound, "She shall come with the spring leaping upon the hills."
And in the summer heat the reapers say, "We have seen her dancing with the autumn leaves, and we saw a drift of snow in her hair."
All these things have you said of beauty.
Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied,
And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand stretched forth,
But rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted.
It is not the image you would see nor the song you would hear,
But rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a song you hear though you shut your ears.
It is not the sap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing attached to a claw,
But rather a garden forever in bloom and a flock of angels for ever in flight.
People of Orphalese, beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.
Khalil Gibran
Freedom XIV
And an orator said, "Speak to us of Freedom."
And he answered:
At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,
Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.
Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.
And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.
You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief,
But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.
And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour?
In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes.
And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free?
If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.
You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.
And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.
For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?
And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.
And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.
Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.
These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.
And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.
And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.
Khalil Gibran
Friendship IXX
And a youth said, "Speak to us of Friendship."
Your friend is your needs answered.
He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving.
And he is your board and your fireside.
For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.
When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the "nay" in your own mind, nor do you withhold the "ay."
And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart;
For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.
When you part from your friend, you grieve not;
For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.
And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.
For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.
And let your best be for your friend.
If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also.
For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill?
Seek him always with hours to live.
For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness.
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.
Khalil Gibran
Joy and Sorrow chapter VIII
Then a woman said, "Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow."
And he answered:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.
Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?
And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.
Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.
Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.
When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.
Khalil Gibran
Peace XVIII
The tempest calmed after bending the branches of the trees and leaning heavily upon the grain in the field. The stars appeared as broken remnants of lightning, but now silence prevailed over all, as if Nature's war had never been fought.
At that hour a young woman entered her chamber and knelt by her bed sobbing bitterly. Her heart flamed with agony but she could finally open her lips and say, "Oh Lord, bring him home safely to me. I have exhausted my tears and can offer no more, oh Lord, full of love and mercy. My patience is drained and calamity is seeking possession of my heart. Save him, oh Lord, from the iron paws of War; deliver him from such unmerciful Death, for he is weak, governed by the strong. Oh Lord, save my beloved, who is Thine own son, from the foe, who is Thy foe. Keep him from the forced pathway to Death's door; let him see me, or come and take me to him."
Quietly a young man entered. His head was wrapped in bandage soaked with escaping life.
He approached he with a greeting of tears and laughter, then took her hand and placed against it his flaming lips. And with a voice with bespoke past sorrow, and joy of union, and uncertainty of her reaction, he said, "Fear me not, for I am the object of your plea. Be glad, for Peace has carried me back safely to you, and humanity has restored what greed essayed to take from us. Be not sad, but smile, my beloved. Do not express bewilderment, for Love has power that dispels Death; charm that conquers the enemy. I am your one. Think me not a specter emerging from the House of Death to visit your Home of Beauty.
"Do not be frightened, for I am now Truth, spared from swords and fire to reveal to the people the triumph of Love over War. I am Word uttering introduction to the play of happiness and peace."
Then the young man became speechless and his tears spoke the language of the heart; and the angels of Joy hovered about that dwelling, and the two hearts restored the singleness which had been taken from them.
At dawn the two stood in the middle of the field contemplating the beauty of Nature injured by the tempest. After a deep and comforting silence, the soldier said to his sweetheart, "Look at the Darkness, giving birth to the Sun."
Khalil Gibran
Pleasure XXIV
Then a hermit, who visited the city once a year, came forth and said, "Speak to us of Pleasure."
And he answered, saying:
Pleasure is a freedom song,
But it is not freedom.
It is the blossoming of your desires,
But it is not their fruit.
It is a depth calling unto a height,
But it is not the deep nor the high.
It is the caged taking wing,
But it is not space encompassed.
Ay, in very truth, pleasure is a freedom-song.
And I fain would have you sing it with fullness of heart; yet I would not have you lose your hearts in the singing.
Some of your youth seek pleasure as if it were all, and they are judged and rebuked.
I would not judge nor rebuke them. I would have them seek.
For they shall find pleasure, but not her alone:
Seven are her sisters, and the least of them is more beautiful than pleasure.
Have you not heard of the man who was digging in the earth for roots and found a treasure?
And some of your elders remember pleasures with regret like wrongs committed in drunkenness.
But regret is the beclouding of the mind and not its chastisement.
They should remember their pleasures with gratitude, as they would the harvest of a summer.
Yet if it comforts them to regret, let them be comforted.
And there are among you those who are neither young to seek nor old to remember;
And in their fear of seeking and remembering they shun all pleasures, lest they neglect the spirit or offend against it.
But even in their foregoing is their pleasure.
And thus they too find a treasure though they dig for roots with quivering hands.
But tell me, who is he that can offend the spirit?
Shall the nightingale offend the stillness of the night, or the firefly the stars?
And shall your flame or your smoke burden the wind?
Think you the spirit is a still pool which you can trouble with a staff?
Oftentimes in denying yourself pleasure you do but store the desire in the recesses of your being.
Who knows but that which seems omitted today, waits for tomorrow?
Even your body knows its heritage and its rightful need and will not be deceived.
And your body is the harp of your soul,
And it is yours to bring forth sweet music from it or confused sounds.
And now you ask in your heart, "How shall we distinguish that which is good in pleasure from that which is not good?"
Go to your fields and your gardens, and you shall learn that it is the pleasure of the bee to gather honey of the flower,
But it is also the pleasure of the flower to yield its honey to the bee.
For to the bee a flower is a fountain of life,
And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love,
And to both, bee and flower, the giving and the receiving of pleasure is a need and an ecstasy.
People of Orphalese, be in your pleasures like the flowers and the bees.
Khalil Gibran
Khalil Gibran (1883 - 1931) a beloved poet from Lebanon
Biography of Khalil Gibran
Gibran Khalil Gibran was born on January 6, 1883, to the Maronite family of Gibran in Bsharri, a mountainous area in Northern Lebanon.
Lebanon was a Turkish province part of Greater Syria (Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine) and subjugated to Ottoman dominion, which granted the Mount Lebanon area autonomous rule. The people of Mount Lebanon had struggled for several years to gain independence from the Ottoman rule, a cause Gibran was later to adopt and become an active member in. The Mount Lebanon area was a troubled region, due to the various outside and foreign interferences that fostered religious hatred between the Christian, especially the Maronite sect, and Moslem populations. Later in his life, Gibran was to seek and unite the various religious sects, in a bid to abolish the religious snobbery, persecution and atrocities witnessed at his time. The Maronite sect, formed during the schism in the Byzantine church in the 5th century A.D., was made up of a group of Syrian Christians, who joined the monk St. Marun to lead their own sectarian thought.
His mother Kamila Rahmeh was thirty when she begot Gibran from her third husband Khalil Gibran, who proved to be an irresponsible husband leading the family to poverty. Gibran had a half-brother six years older than him called Peter and two younger sisters, Mariana and Sultana, whom he was deeply attached to throughout his life, along with his mother. Kamila’s family came from a prestigious religious background, which imbued the uneducated mother with a strong will and later on helped her raise up the family on her own in the U.S.
Growing up in the lush region of Bsharri, Gibran proved to be a solitary and pensive child who relished the natural surroundings of the cascading falls, the rugged cliffs and the neighboring green cedars, the beauty of which emerged as a dramatic and symbolic influence to his drawings and writings. Being laden with poverty, he did not receive any formal education or learning, which was limited to regular visits to a village priest who doctrined him with the essentials of religion and the Bible, alongside Syriac and Arabic languages. Recognizing Gibran’s inquisitive and alert nature, the priest began teaching him the rudiments of alphabet and language, opening up to Gibran the world of history, science, and language. At the age of ten, Gibran fell off a cliff, wounding his left shoulder, which remained weak for the rest of his life ever since this incident. To relocate the shoulder, his family strapped it to a cross and wrapped it up for forty days, a symbolic incident reminiscent of Christ’s wanderings in the wilderness and which remained etched in Gibran’s memory.
At the age of eight, Khalil Gibran, Gibran's father, was accused of tax evasion and was sent to prison as the Ottomon authorities confiscated the Gibrans’ property and left them homeless. The family went to live with relatives for a while; however, the strong-willed mother decided that the family should immigrate to the U.S., seeking a better life and following in suit to Gibran’s uncle who immigrated earlier. The father was released in 1894, but being an irresponsible head of the family he was undecided about immigration and remained behind in Lebanon.
On June 25, 1895, the Gibrans embarked on a voyage to the American shores of New York.
The Gibrans settled in Boston’s South End, which at the time hosted the second largest Syrian community in the U.S. following New York. The culturally diverse area felt familiar to Kamila, who was comforted by the familiar spoken Arabic, and the widespread Arab customs. Kamila, now the bread-earner of the family, began to work as a peddler on the impoverished streets of South End Boston. At the time, peddling was the major source of income for most Syrian immigrants, who were negatively portrayed due to their unconventional Arab ways and their supposed idleness.
Growing up into another impoverished period, Gibran was to recall the pain of the first few years, which left an indelible mark on his life and prompted him to reinvent his childhood memories, dispelling the filth, the poverty and the slurs. However, the work of charity institutions in the poor immigrant areas allowed the children of immigrants to attend public schools and keep them off the street, and Gibran was the only member of his family to pursue scholastic education. His sisters were not allowed to enter school, thwarted by Middle Eastern traditions as well as financial difficulties. Later on in his life, Gibran was to champion the cause of women’s emancipation and education and surround himself with strong-willed, intellectual and independent women.
In the school, a registration mistake altered his name forever by shortening it to Kahlil Gibran, which remained unchanged till the rest of his life despite repeated attempts at restoring his full name. Gibran entered school on September 30, 1895, merely two months after his arrival in the U.S. Having no formal education, he was placed in an ungraded class reserved for immigrant children, who had to learn English from scratch. Gibran caught the eye of his teachers with his sketches and drawings, a hobby he had started during his childhood in Lebanon.
With Kamila’s hard work, the family’s financial standing improved as her savings allowed Peter to set up a goods store, in which both of Gibran's sisters worked. The financial strains of the family and the distance from home brought the family together, with Kamila providing both financial and emotional support to her children, especially to her introverted son Gibran. During this difficult period, Gibran's remoteness from social life and his pensive nature were deepened, and Kamila was there to help him overcome his reservedness. The mother’s independence allowed him to mingle with Boston’s social life and explore its thriving world of art and literature.
Gibran's curiosity led him to the cultural side of Boston, which exposed him to the rich world of the theatre, Opera and artistic Galleries. Prodded by the cultural scenes around him and through his artistic drawings, Gibran caught the attention of his teachers at the public school, who saw an artistic future for the Syrian boy. They contacted Fred Holland Day, an artist and a supporter of artists who opened up Gibran’s cultural world and set him on the road to artistic fame.
Gibran met Fred Holland Day in 1896, and from then his road to recognition was reached through Day’s artistic unconventionality and his contacts in Boston’s artistic circles. Day introduced Gibran to Greek mythology, world literature, contemporary writings and photography, ever prodding the inquisitive Syrian to seek self-expression. Day’s liberal education and unconventional artistic exploration influenced Gibran, who was to follow Day’s unfettered adoption of the unusual for the sake of originality and self-actualization. Other than working on Gibran’s education, Day was instrumental in lifting his self-esteem, which had suffered under the immigrant treatment and poverty of the times. Not surprisingly, Gibran emerged as a fast learner, devouring everything handed over by Day, despite weak Arabic and English. Under Day’s tutelage, Gibran uttered his first religious beliefs, when he declared "I am no longer a Catholic: I am a pagan," after reading one book given by Day.
During one of Fred Holland Day’s art exhibitions, Gibran drew a sketch of a certain Miss Josephine Peabody, an unknown poet and writer who was to later become one of his failed love experiences; later on, Gibran was to propose marriage and be met with refusal, the first blow in a series of heartaches dealt to Gibran by the women he loved.
Continually encouraging Gibran to improve his drawings and sketches, Day was instrumental in getting Gibran’s images printed as cover designs for books in 1898. At the time, Gibran began to develop his own technique and style, encouraged by Day’s enthusiasm and support. Gradually, Gibran entered the Bostonian circles and his artistic talents brought him fame at an early age. However, his family decided that early success could cause him future problems, and with Gibran’s approval, the young artist went back to Lebanon to finish his education and learn Arabic.
In 1898, Gibran arrived in Beirut speaking poor English and even little Arabic; he could speak Arabic fluently, but not read nor write it. To improve his Arabic, Gibran chose to enroll in the school Madrasat-al-Hikmah, a Maronite-founded school which offered a nationalistic curriculum partial to church writings, history and liturgy. Gibran’s strong-willed nature refused to abide by the parochial curriculum, demanding an individual curriculum catering to his educational needs and aimed at a college level, a gesture indicative of Gibran’s rebellious and individualistic nature; his arrogance bordered on heresy. Nonetheless, the school acquiesced to his request, editing course material to Gibran's liking. He chose to immerse himself in the Arabic-language bible, intrigued by its style and writing, features of which echo in his various works. As a student, Gibran left a great impression on his teachers and fellow students, who were impressed with his outlandish and individualistic behavior, self-confidence, and his unconventional long hair. His Arabic teacher saw in him "a loving but controlled heart, an impetuous soul, a rebellious mind, an eye mocking everything it sees". However, the school’s strict and disciplined atmosphere was not to Gibran’s liking, who flagrantly flouted religious duties, skipped classes and drew sketches on books. At the school, Gibran met Joseph Hawaiik, with whom he started a magazine called al-Manarah (the Beacon), both editing while Gibran illustrated.
Meanwhile, Josephine Peabody, the twenty-four year old Bostonian beauty who caught Gibran’s attention during one of Day’s exhibitions, was intrigued by the young Syrian artist who dedicated a sketch to her, and began corresponding with Gibran throughout his stay in Lebanon. Soon, he became romantically involved with Josephine, and they kept exchanging letters until the relationship fell apart, following the rebuffal of Gibran’s marriage proposal and Josephine’s eventual marriage in 1906.
Gibran finished college in 1902, learning Arabic and French and excelling in his studies, especially poetry. Meanwhile, his relationship with his father became strained over Gibran’s advanced erudition, driving him to move in with his cousin and to live an impoverished life he detested and was ashamed of until the rest of his life. The poverty in Lebanon was compounded with news of illness striking his family, with his half-brother's consumption, his sister Sultana’s intestinal trouble and his mother’s developing cancer. Upon receiving news of Sultana’s dire illness, Gibran left Lebanon in March of 1902.
To his misfortune, Gibran arrived too late; Sultana died at the age of fourteen on April 4th 1902, the first in a series of three family deaths which will fall upon him in the coming months. Gibran was very fond of his sisters and of his family as a whole. At the time of mourning, both Day and Josephine provided distractions for him, in form of artistic shows and meetings at Boston’s artistic circles. Gibran’s artistic talents and unique behavior had captured earlier the interest of the Bostonian society, which welcomed this foreign talent into their artistic circles.
Josephine, who slowly captured Gibran’s heart, became an inflectional person in his life, the Bostonian poet constantly referring to Gibran as ‘her young prophet’. Greatly intrigued by his oriental background, Josephine was charmed by Gibran’s vividly illustrated correspondences and conversations. Josephine’s care and attention were the inspiration behind his book The Prophet, the title of which is based on an eleven-stanza poem Joesphine wrote in December of 1902 describing Gibran’s life in Bsharri as she envisaged it. Later on, when Gibran was to publish The Prophet, he dedicated it to Josephine, whose care and tenderness helped him advance his career.
Illness struck again when his mother underwent an operation in February to remove a cancerous tumor. To compound his misery, Gibran was forced to take on the family business and run the goods store, which was abandoned by his half-brother Peter to pursue his fortune in Cuba. This new burden weighed on Gibran’s spirit, depriving him from dedicating his time to artistic pursuits. During this time, Gibran tried to shy away from the house, to escape the atmosphere of death, poverty and illness. In the following month, Peter returned to Boston from Cuba fatally sick only to die days later on March 12 of consumption. His mother’s cancer continued to spread and she died later that year on June 28, a scene which left Gibran fainting and foaming blood from the mouth.
Following the three family deaths, Gibran sold out the family business and began immersing himself in improving both his Arabic and English writings, a twin task which he was to pursue for the rest of his life. Meanwhile, Day and Josephine were helping him launch his debut art exhibition, which was to feature his allegorical and symbolic charcoal drawings that so fascinated Boston’s society. The exhibition opened on May 3, 1904, and proved a success with the critics. However, the exhibition’s significance lay elsewhere. Josephine, through her future husband, invited a schoolmistress called Mary Haskell to examine Gibran’s drawings. This introduction to the schoolmistress was to mark the beginning of a lifetime relationship, which would greatly influence Gibran’s writing career. Gibran had sought Josephine’s opinion about his Arabic writings, translating them into English. With the language barrier, Josephine could only provide criticism over ideas and thoughts, leaving Gibran alone to tackle his linguistic problems. Josephine’s role was to be taken over by Mary Haskell.
Mary Haskell, who was thirty at the time and ten years older than Gibran, will go on to finance Gibran’s artistic development and encourage him to become the artist that he aspired to be. As a school head mistress, Haskell was an educated, strong-willed and independent woman and an active champion of women’s liberation, who was set apart to Josephine Peabody’s romantic nature. Mary was the reason behind Gibran’s decision to explore writing in English, as she persuaded Gibran to refrain from translating his Arabic works to English and concentrate instead on writing in English directly. Mary’s collaboration and editing of his various English works polished Gibran’s work, most of which first underwent Mary’s editing before going to the publishers. She would spend hours with Gibran, going over his wording, correcting his mistakes and suggesting new ideas to his writings. She even attempted learning Arabic to gain a better grasp of Gibran’s language and his thoughts.
The significance of Mary’s relationship with Gibran is revealed through her diaries, in which she recorded Gibran’s artistic development, their personal and intellectual conversations and his innermost thoughts for nearly seventeen years and a half. These recordings have provided critics with valuable insight into Gibran’s personal thoughts and ideas, which he kept away from the public eye.
In 1904, Gibran started to contribute articles to the Arabic-speaking émigré newspaper called Al-Mouhajer (The Emigrant), marking his first published written work. His first publication was called ‘Vision’, a romantic essay that portrayed a caged bird amid an abundance of symbolism. Despite spending four years in Lebanon learning Arabic, Gibran’s written Arabic left something to be desired. To master Arabic, Gibran relied on his ear for capturing traditional vocabulary, depending heavily on the Arabic stories narrated in his hometown of Bsharri. Hence his Arabic writing had a colloquial feel to it, which was comfortable to his audiences. According to Gibran, rules of language were meant to be broken and he went on to advocate Arab émigré writers to break out of tradition and seek an individual style. Throughout his life, Gibran’s Arabic writings did not receive the critical acclaim his English books had, leading him later on to concentrate on his English writings and abandon the cause of improving his Arabic style.
Gibran’s first Arabic written work came out in 1905 with the publication of Nubthah fi Fan Al-Musiqa (Music), a book inspired by his brother’s 'oud playing and Day’s several invitations to the Opera. During that year, Gibran started a column in Al-Mohajer called ‘Tears and Laughter’’, which was to form the basis of his book A Tear and a Smile. While writing in Al-Mohajer, a certain Arabic émigré writer called Ameen Rihani, wrote to the magazine lauding Gibran’s article which attacked contemporary Arab writers for imitating traditional writers and using poetry for financial gain. Rihani was to become an important Arabic writer and a friend of Gibran’s, whom he later left for the life-long friendship of Mikhail Naimy. At the time, Gibran published several Arabic poems and wrote in newspapers, about various subjects relating to love, truth, beauty, death, good and evil. Most of his writings had a romantic edge to them, with bitter and ironic tones.
In 1906, Gibran published his second Arabic book called Arayis Al- Muruj (The Nymphs of the Valley), a collection of three allegories which take place in Northern Lebanon. The allegories- ‘Martha’, ‘Yuhanna the Mad’, and ‘Dust of Ages and the Eternal Fire’- dealt with issues relating to prostitution, religious persecution, reincarnation and pre-ordained love. The allegories were heavily influenced by the stories he heard back in Bsharri and his own fascination with the Bible, the mystical, and the nature of love. Gibran was to return to the subject of madness in his English book ‘The Madman,’ whose beginnings can be traced to Gibran’s early Arabic writings. What characterized Gibran’s early Arabic publications was the use of the ironic, the realism of the stories, the portrayal of second-class citizens and the anti-religious tone, all of which contrasted with the formalistic and traditional Arabic writings.
Gibran published his third Arabic book Al-Arwah Al-Mutamarridah (Spirits Rebellious) in March of 1908, a collection of four narrative writings based on his writing in Al-Mouhajer. The book dealt with social issues in Lebanon, portraying a married woman’s emancipation from her husband, a heretic’s call for freedom, a bride’s escape from an unwanted marriage through death and the brutal injustices of 19th century Lebanese feudal lords. These writings received strong criticism from the clergy for their bold ideas, their negative portrayal of clergymen and their encouragement of women’s liberation. Gibran was to later recall to Mary the dark period in which Spirits Rebellious was written, during a time when he was haunted by death, illness and loss of love. The anti-clerical content of the book threatened Gibran with excommunication from the church, with the book being censored by the Syrian government.
During one of Gibran's art exhibitions in 1914, an American architect, Albert Pinkam Ryder, paid an unexpected visit to the exhibition, leaving an impression on Gibran who decided to write an English poem in his honor. The poem, which was first edited by Mary, became Gibran’s first English publication, when it went out into print in January 1915.
Meanwhile, Gibran became more actively involved in the politics of the day, especially with the onset of World War I. To Gibran, the war suggested hope of liberating Ottoman-ruled Syria, through a united Arab military front, aided by a general Allied attack. He called on both Muslim and Christian sides to unite their forces against the oppressive Ottoman hegemony. In fact, Gibran fantasized about becoming a fighter and a romantic political hero, who is able to lead his country to liberation. When he actually suggested to Mary going over to Lebanon to fill a post of fighter, she adamantly refused.
In 1915, the pain he had suffered in his shoulder when he was young began to come back, and he underwent electrical treatment on his left shoulder, which had remained weak and in quasi-paralyzed state following the childhood accident. During the war years, Gibran went into a depression that distracted his thoughts and debilitated his health. Despite his active and widespread writings about the Arab uprising against the Ottomans, Giban felt helpless, contributing whatever money he spared to his starving Syria. To distract himself from war thoughts, Gibran tried to seek further recognition in New York, boosting his social life and joining in 1916 the literary magazine The Seven Arts. Gibran prided himself in being the first immigrant to join the board of this magazine, which reflected Gibran’s literary style. At the time, Gibran’s presence began to be demanded in literary circles, who craved to hear recitations from his books and writings.
By 1918, Gibran began to tell Mary of an Arabic work he had been working on which he called ‘my island man,’ the seeds of his most famous book The Prophet. Based on a Promethean man’s exile to an island, The Prophet evoked the journey of the banished man called Al Mustafa, or the Chosen One. In her diary, Mary recounted Gibran’s musings about the book, which he later called ‘the first book in my career –my first real book, my ripened fruit." Soon Gibran added to the work the title of the Commonwealth, a separate work he had attached to the story of Al Mustafa. Gibran was to later link the seeds of The Prophet to an Arabic work he did when he was sixteen years old, where a man at an inn discusses with the rest of the attendants various subjects. However, Gibran still worried about his English writing and he sought Mary’s advice constantly. Gibran had always been fascinated by the language of the Syriac Bible, which reflected Gibran’s views on the creation of ‘an absolute language’, a task he tried to achieve through his various English writings, through the creation of a unified universal style.
Mary was crucial to the development of The Prophet, for she advised Gibran to adopt the English language for this book. Gibran was further encouraged to pursue writing in English following the attention given to his soon-to-be-published book The Madman. The conversation Gibran had with Mary over the issues of marriage, life, death, love…infiltrated his chapters in The Prophet and various other works. However, Mary was against the title of The Prophet, which Gibran came up with in 1919, preferring the title ‘The Counsels,’ the name which she continued to use after the publication of the book. By the fall of 1918, Gibran was preparing to publish his first English book, and another Arabic poem called ‘Al-Mawakib’ (The Processions), his first serious attempt at writing a traditional Arabic poem with rhyme and meter.
Gibran's first English book The Madman came out in 1918 and received good reviews from the local press, who compared him to the Indian writer Tagore, famous for bridging the gap between East and West, and the English poet William Blake. The Madman, a collection of parables which was illustrated by Gibran, revealed the influence of Nietzsche, Jung and Tagore. Following the success of The Madman, Gibran’s popularity began to soar and gradually Gibran started losing touch with his old acquaintances, Day, Josephine, and now he dissolved his relationship with Rihani. Gibran relished the aura of mystery which he evoked among people, given his undisclosed accounts of his oriental background and his personal reserve.
In 1919, Gibran published his Arabic poem ‘Al-Mawakib’, which received little success from the Arab press. During the same year, Gibran joined the board of yet another local magazine Fatat Boston, to which he contributed several Arabic articles. Throughout his life, Gibran joined societies and magazines such as Al-Mouhajer, Al-Funnon, The Golden Links Society and Fatat-Boston, in order to create a mouthpiece for avant-garde Arabic writing and unite Arabic literature abroad. However, Gibran’s success as an Arabic writer remained limited. Ironically, his Arabic language was still not up to standards and received little success in the Arabic press.
In Fatat-Boston, Gibran developed a close relationship with an Arab immigrant writer Mikhail Naimy, whom he had met earlier in 1914. Naimy, a critical thinker at the time, was among the first Arab writers to acknowledge Gibran’s efforts at advancing the Arab language, and correctly making use of Arab customs and background. He treated Gibran’s The Broken Wings as an example of the universal language of literature, pointing out that Selma Karameh could have easily come from a Russian, English or Italian background. However, following Gibran’s death, Naimy immortalized Gibran, replacing the man with a godly image.
With Naimy, Gibran formed in April of 1911 a ten-member Arab émigré organization called Arrabitah Al-Qalamyiah, which promoted the publication of Arab writings and the transmission of world literature. Throughout its life, Arrabitah was led by Gibran’s call for greater artistic freedom, ever encouraging writers to break the rules and seek individual styles. During the time, Gibran’s involvement in his Arabic writings distracted him from completing The Prophet for a while. Moreover, Gibran vacillated between resuming work on The Prophet or embarking on a lecture tour, as his spreading popularity demanded more artistic presence from him. However, he continued to view himself as a spokesman of both the Arab and English worlds, a role whose difficulty he admitted.
Meanwhile, Gibran's political ideas were incensing local politicians in Syria, who reacted against his article which stated ‘You have your Lebanon and I have my Lebanon.’ Gibran disapproved of the way the Syrian territories were being managed, and he wrote extensively on the identity of the emerging Arab countries, as the Greater Syria region began to be divided into Lebanon, Palestine and Syria. On the makeup of emerging countries, Gibran called on politicians to adopt the positive aspects of the Western culture and refrain from importing the surface values of guns and clothes. His political thought sooner gave way to a general view on the cultural makeup of countries and the way citizens ought to lead their lives.
By 1920, nearly three-quarters of The Prophet was done while Gibran’s Arab writings continued to occupy his time. In a poignant letter written to Mary, Gibran confessed that he has resolved the identity problem and has balanced the East and West influences, admitting that "I know now that I am a part of the whole -- a fragment of a jar.… Now I've found out where I fit, and in a way I am the jar -- and the jar is I."
In 1922, Gibran started to complain about heart trouble, which was later attributed to his nervous psychological state, and he personally admitted: "But my greatest pain is not physical. There’s something big in me…. I've always known it and I can’t get it out. It’s a silent greater self, sitting watching a smaller somebody in me do all sorts of things.’’ With the near compellation of work on The Prophet, Mary and Gibran acknowledged Nietzsche’s great influence on the book, which is reminiscent of Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Mary had advised Gibran about the style of The Prophet, covering issues such as the use of capitalization, the use of punctuation marks and the form of paragraphs. Gibran had insisted that he wanted his paragraphs to remain short, almost becoming one lines. Mary had always pointed out that Gibran was a man of few words, who limited his letters to a minimum of words.
A few months before the publication of The Prophet, Gibran summarizeed the book to Mary: "The whole Prophet is saying one thing: ‘you are far far greater than you know -- and all is well.'
By 1923, Gibran had a well-established reputation in the Arab world through his Arabic articles, which he contributed to the various local and émigré Arabic newspapers. During this time, Gibran was gradually depending less on Mary as a financier and editor. He had agreed earlier with Mary to pay off his loans by sending her several of his paintings, an agreement which settled down their quarrels over money. And as Gibran's confidence in his English writings grew, his reliance on Mary's opinion dwindled. However, Mary’s face remained an inspiration in his illustrations, for soon Gibran will decide to restrict his paintings to book illustrations. The Prophet finally came into print in October of 1923, with a modest success in the U.S.
By 1923, Gibran had developed a close correspondence with an Arab writer, May Ziadeh. Their acceptance began in 1912, when she wrote to Gibran recalling to him how moved she was with the story of Selma Karameh in The Broken Wings.
May, an intellectual writer and an active proponent of women’s emancipation, was born in Palestine where she received classical education in a convent school. In 1908she had moved to Cairo where her father started a newspaper. Similar to Gibran, May was fluent in English, Arabic and French, and in 1911 she published her poems under the pseudonym Isis Copia. May found The Broken Wings too liberal for her own tastes, but the subject of women’s rights occupied her until the rest of her life and was a common passion between her and Gibran. Later on, May became a champion of Gibran’s writings and came to replace Mary’s role as an editor and conversant over the coming years. By 1921, Gibran had received her picture and they were to continue corresponding until the end of his life.
During the twenties, Gibran continued to be active in the political arena, writing extensively on the issue of culture and society and the need of the emerging Arab countries to transport the positive sides of Western culture. Gibran’s writings had remained controversial in his home country, especially with his liberal views on the Church and clergy. As a writer, Gibran relished controversy, and his writings reflected this spirit. His limited success in the Arab world drove Gibran to abandon the cause of gaining acceptance as an Arabic writer and he concentrated his efforts instead on writing in English. Slowly, Gibran was getting to grips with his writing, creating a style of language, as he revealed to Mary that he wished to write small unified books, which could be read in one sitting and carried in one’s pocket.
Mary's role in Gibran's writing career was gradually dwindling, but she came to his rescue when he made some bad investments. Mary had always handled Gibran’s financial affairs, ever present to extricate him from his bad financial keeping. However, Mary was about to make her life decision in 1923 by deciding to move into the house of a Southern landowner, to become his future wife in May of 1926. Gibran helped her reach this decision, which slightly clouded their relationship. However, Gibran continued to confide in Mary, and he told her about the second and third parts of The Prophet which he intended to write. The second part was to be called The Garden of the Prophet and it would recount the time the prophet spent in the garden on the island talking to his followers. The third part would be called The Death of the Prophet and it would describe the prophet’s return from the island and how he is imprisoned and freed only to be stoned to death in the market place. Gibran’s project was never to be completed, due to the deterioration of his health and his preoccupation with writing his longest English book, Jesus, The Son of Man.
As Mary slipped slowly out of his life, Gibran hired a new assistant Henrietta Breckenridge, who later played an important role following his death. She organized his works, helped him edit his writings and managed his studio for him. By 1926, Gibran had become a well-known international figure, a stance which was to his liking. Seeking a greater cosmopolitan exposure, Gibran began in 1926 to contribute articles to the quarterly journal The New Orient, which had an international approach encouraging the East and West to meet. At the time, he had started working on a new English work, Lazarus and His Beloved, which was based on an earlier Arabic work. This book was a dramatic collection of four poems recounting the Bible story of Lazarus, his quest for his soul and his eventual meeting of his soul mate.
In May of 1926, Mary married the Southern Landowner Florance Minis. At the time, Mary’s journals reveal Gibran’s perception with the writing of Jesus, The Son of Man. Writing the story of Jesus had been a lifetime ambition, especially the attempt at portraying Jesus as no one else has done before. Gibran had traced Jesus’ life from Syria to Palestine, never sparing a book that recounted his life journey. To Gibran, Jesus appeared as human acting in natural surroundings and he often had dreams about meeting his ideal character in the natural scenery of Bsharri. Gibran’s imagination was further fueled by the native stories he had heard in Lebanon about Jesus’ life and acts. Soon, by January of 1927 Mary was editing the book, for Gibran still relied on Mary’s editing before sending his works to print.
By 1928, Gibran’s health began to deteriorate, and the pain in his body due to his nervous state was on the increase, driving Gibran to seek relief in alcohol. Soon Gibran’s excess drinking turned him into an alcoholic at the height of the prohibition period in the U.S. That same year, Gibran was already thinking of the post-life and he began inquiring about purchasing a monastery in Bsharri, which was owned by Christian Carmelites. In November of 1928, Jesus, Son of Man was published and received good reviews from the local press, who delighted in Gibran’s treatment of Jesus, the Son of Man. By that time, the artistic circles thought it was high time Gibran was honored; by 1929 every possible society sought to give him a tribute. In honor of his literary success, a special anthology of Gibran’s early works was issued by Arrabitah under the title As-Sanabil.
Gibran’s mental health, however, and his alcohol addiction drove him in one evening to burst out crying, lamenting the weakness of his mature works. ‘I have lost my original creative power,’ he lamented to an audience during a reading of one of his mature works. By 1929, doctors were able to trace Gibran’s physical ailment to the enlargement of his livers. To avoid the issue of illness, Gibran ignored all medical care, relying instead on heavy drinking. To distract himself, Gibran turned to an old work about three Earth gods written in 1911. This new book recounts the story of three earth gods who watch the drama of a couple falling in love. Mary edited the book which went into print in mid-March of 1930.
By 1930, Gibran’s excessive drinking to escape the pain in his liver aggravated his disease, and hopes of finishing the second part of The Prophet, The Garden of the Prophet, dwindled. Gibran revealed to Mary his plans of building a library in Bsharri and soon he drew the last copy of his will. To his pen-pal May Ziadeh, Gibran revealed the fear of death as he admitted, ‘I am, May, a small volcano whose opening has been closed.'
On April 10th 1931, Gibran died at the age of forty-eight in a New York hospital, as the spreading cancer in his liver left him unconscious. The New York streets staged a two-day vigil for Gibran’s honor, whose death was mourned in the U.S. and Lebanon. His will left large amounts of money to his country, since he wanted his Syrian citizens to remain in their country and develop it rather than immigrate. Mary, Mariana and Henrietta all attended to Gibran’s studio, organizing his works, sorting out books, illustrations and drawings. To fulfill Gibran’s dream, Marianna and Mary travelled in July of 1931 to Lebanon to bury Gibran in his hometown of Bsharri. The citizens of Lebanon received his coffin with celebration rather than mourning, rejoicing his homecoming, for in death Gibran’s popularity increased. Upon Gibran’s return, The Lebanese Minister of Arts opened the coffins and honored his body with a decoration of Fine Arts. Meanwhile, Marianna and Mary started negotiating the purchase of the Carmelite monastery Gibran wished to obtain. By January of 1932, the Mar Sarkis monastery was bought and Gibran moved to his final resting-place. Upon Mary’s suggestion, his belongings, the books he read, and some of his works and illustrations were later shipped to provide a local collection in the monastery, which turned into a Gibran museum. ..
Kilde (which I hearty recommend ): www.PoemHunter.com
Gibran Khalil Gibran was born on January 6, 1883, to the Maronite family of Gibran in Bsharri, a mountainous area in Northern Lebanon.
Lebanon was a Turkish province part of Greater Syria (Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine) and subjugated to Ottoman dominion, which granted the Mount Lebanon area autonomous rule. The people of Mount Lebanon had struggled for several years to gain independence from the Ottoman rule, a cause Gibran was later to adopt and become an active member in. The Mount Lebanon area was a troubled region, due to the various outside and foreign interferences that fostered religious hatred between the Christian, especially the Maronite sect, and Moslem populations. Later in his life, Gibran was to seek and unite the various religious sects, in a bid to abolish the religious snobbery, persecution and atrocities witnessed at his time. The Maronite sect, formed during the schism in the Byzantine church in the 5th century A.D., was made up of a group of Syrian Christians, who joined the monk St. Marun to lead their own sectarian thought.
His mother Kamila Rahmeh was thirty when she begot Gibran from her third husband Khalil Gibran, who proved to be an irresponsible husband leading the family to poverty. Gibran had a half-brother six years older than him called Peter and two younger sisters, Mariana and Sultana, whom he was deeply attached to throughout his life, along with his mother. Kamila’s family came from a prestigious religious background, which imbued the uneducated mother with a strong will and later on helped her raise up the family on her own in the U.S.
Growing up in the lush region of Bsharri, Gibran proved to be a solitary and pensive child who relished the natural surroundings of the cascading falls, the rugged cliffs and the neighboring green cedars, the beauty of which emerged as a dramatic and symbolic influence to his drawings and writings. Being laden with poverty, he did not receive any formal education or learning, which was limited to regular visits to a village priest who doctrined him with the essentials of religion and the Bible, alongside Syriac and Arabic languages. Recognizing Gibran’s inquisitive and alert nature, the priest began teaching him the rudiments of alphabet and language, opening up to Gibran the world of history, science, and language. At the age of ten, Gibran fell off a cliff, wounding his left shoulder, which remained weak for the rest of his life ever since this incident. To relocate the shoulder, his family strapped it to a cross and wrapped it up for forty days, a symbolic incident reminiscent of Christ’s wanderings in the wilderness and which remained etched in Gibran’s memory.
At the age of eight, Khalil Gibran, Gibran's father, was accused of tax evasion and was sent to prison as the Ottomon authorities confiscated the Gibrans’ property and left them homeless. The family went to live with relatives for a while; however, the strong-willed mother decided that the family should immigrate to the U.S., seeking a better life and following in suit to Gibran’s uncle who immigrated earlier. The father was released in 1894, but being an irresponsible head of the family he was undecided about immigration and remained behind in Lebanon.
On June 25, 1895, the Gibrans embarked on a voyage to the American shores of New York.
The Gibrans settled in Boston’s South End, which at the time hosted the second largest Syrian community in the U.S. following New York. The culturally diverse area felt familiar to Kamila, who was comforted by the familiar spoken Arabic, and the widespread Arab customs. Kamila, now the bread-earner of the family, began to work as a peddler on the impoverished streets of South End Boston. At the time, peddling was the major source of income for most Syrian immigrants, who were negatively portrayed due to their unconventional Arab ways and their supposed idleness.
Growing up into another impoverished period, Gibran was to recall the pain of the first few years, which left an indelible mark on his life and prompted him to reinvent his childhood memories, dispelling the filth, the poverty and the slurs. However, the work of charity institutions in the poor immigrant areas allowed the children of immigrants to attend public schools and keep them off the street, and Gibran was the only member of his family to pursue scholastic education. His sisters were not allowed to enter school, thwarted by Middle Eastern traditions as well as financial difficulties. Later on in his life, Gibran was to champion the cause of women’s emancipation and education and surround himself with strong-willed, intellectual and independent women.
In the school, a registration mistake altered his name forever by shortening it to Kahlil Gibran, which remained unchanged till the rest of his life despite repeated attempts at restoring his full name. Gibran entered school on September 30, 1895, merely two months after his arrival in the U.S. Having no formal education, he was placed in an ungraded class reserved for immigrant children, who had to learn English from scratch. Gibran caught the eye of his teachers with his sketches and drawings, a hobby he had started during his childhood in Lebanon.
With Kamila’s hard work, the family’s financial standing improved as her savings allowed Peter to set up a goods store, in which both of Gibran's sisters worked. The financial strains of the family and the distance from home brought the family together, with Kamila providing both financial and emotional support to her children, especially to her introverted son Gibran. During this difficult period, Gibran's remoteness from social life and his pensive nature were deepened, and Kamila was there to help him overcome his reservedness. The mother’s independence allowed him to mingle with Boston’s social life and explore its thriving world of art and literature.
Gibran's curiosity led him to the cultural side of Boston, which exposed him to the rich world of the theatre, Opera and artistic Galleries. Prodded by the cultural scenes around him and through his artistic drawings, Gibran caught the attention of his teachers at the public school, who saw an artistic future for the Syrian boy. They contacted Fred Holland Day, an artist and a supporter of artists who opened up Gibran’s cultural world and set him on the road to artistic fame.
Gibran met Fred Holland Day in 1896, and from then his road to recognition was reached through Day’s artistic unconventionality and his contacts in Boston’s artistic circles. Day introduced Gibran to Greek mythology, world literature, contemporary writings and photography, ever prodding the inquisitive Syrian to seek self-expression. Day’s liberal education and unconventional artistic exploration influenced Gibran, who was to follow Day’s unfettered adoption of the unusual for the sake of originality and self-actualization. Other than working on Gibran’s education, Day was instrumental in lifting his self-esteem, which had suffered under the immigrant treatment and poverty of the times. Not surprisingly, Gibran emerged as a fast learner, devouring everything handed over by Day, despite weak Arabic and English. Under Day’s tutelage, Gibran uttered his first religious beliefs, when he declared "I am no longer a Catholic: I am a pagan," after reading one book given by Day.
During one of Fred Holland Day’s art exhibitions, Gibran drew a sketch of a certain Miss Josephine Peabody, an unknown poet and writer who was to later become one of his failed love experiences; later on, Gibran was to propose marriage and be met with refusal, the first blow in a series of heartaches dealt to Gibran by the women he loved.
Continually encouraging Gibran to improve his drawings and sketches, Day was instrumental in getting Gibran’s images printed as cover designs for books in 1898. At the time, Gibran began to develop his own technique and style, encouraged by Day’s enthusiasm and support. Gradually, Gibran entered the Bostonian circles and his artistic talents brought him fame at an early age. However, his family decided that early success could cause him future problems, and with Gibran’s approval, the young artist went back to Lebanon to finish his education and learn Arabic.
In 1898, Gibran arrived in Beirut speaking poor English and even little Arabic; he could speak Arabic fluently, but not read nor write it. To improve his Arabic, Gibran chose to enroll in the school Madrasat-al-Hikmah, a Maronite-founded school which offered a nationalistic curriculum partial to church writings, history and liturgy. Gibran’s strong-willed nature refused to abide by the parochial curriculum, demanding an individual curriculum catering to his educational needs and aimed at a college level, a gesture indicative of Gibran’s rebellious and individualistic nature; his arrogance bordered on heresy. Nonetheless, the school acquiesced to his request, editing course material to Gibran's liking. He chose to immerse himself in the Arabic-language bible, intrigued by its style and writing, features of which echo in his various works. As a student, Gibran left a great impression on his teachers and fellow students, who were impressed with his outlandish and individualistic behavior, self-confidence, and his unconventional long hair. His Arabic teacher saw in him "a loving but controlled heart, an impetuous soul, a rebellious mind, an eye mocking everything it sees". However, the school’s strict and disciplined atmosphere was not to Gibran’s liking, who flagrantly flouted religious duties, skipped classes and drew sketches on books. At the school, Gibran met Joseph Hawaiik, with whom he started a magazine called al-Manarah (the Beacon), both editing while Gibran illustrated.
Meanwhile, Josephine Peabody, the twenty-four year old Bostonian beauty who caught Gibran’s attention during one of Day’s exhibitions, was intrigued by the young Syrian artist who dedicated a sketch to her, and began corresponding with Gibran throughout his stay in Lebanon. Soon, he became romantically involved with Josephine, and they kept exchanging letters until the relationship fell apart, following the rebuffal of Gibran’s marriage proposal and Josephine’s eventual marriage in 1906.
Gibran finished college in 1902, learning Arabic and French and excelling in his studies, especially poetry. Meanwhile, his relationship with his father became strained over Gibran’s advanced erudition, driving him to move in with his cousin and to live an impoverished life he detested and was ashamed of until the rest of his life. The poverty in Lebanon was compounded with news of illness striking his family, with his half-brother's consumption, his sister Sultana’s intestinal trouble and his mother’s developing cancer. Upon receiving news of Sultana’s dire illness, Gibran left Lebanon in March of 1902.
To his misfortune, Gibran arrived too late; Sultana died at the age of fourteen on April 4th 1902, the first in a series of three family deaths which will fall upon him in the coming months. Gibran was very fond of his sisters and of his family as a whole. At the time of mourning, both Day and Josephine provided distractions for him, in form of artistic shows and meetings at Boston’s artistic circles. Gibran’s artistic talents and unique behavior had captured earlier the interest of the Bostonian society, which welcomed this foreign talent into their artistic circles.
Josephine, who slowly captured Gibran’s heart, became an inflectional person in his life, the Bostonian poet constantly referring to Gibran as ‘her young prophet’. Greatly intrigued by his oriental background, Josephine was charmed by Gibran’s vividly illustrated correspondences and conversations. Josephine’s care and attention were the inspiration behind his book The Prophet, the title of which is based on an eleven-stanza poem Joesphine wrote in December of 1902 describing Gibran’s life in Bsharri as she envisaged it. Later on, when Gibran was to publish The Prophet, he dedicated it to Josephine, whose care and tenderness helped him advance his career.
Illness struck again when his mother underwent an operation in February to remove a cancerous tumor. To compound his misery, Gibran was forced to take on the family business and run the goods store, which was abandoned by his half-brother Peter to pursue his fortune in Cuba. This new burden weighed on Gibran’s spirit, depriving him from dedicating his time to artistic pursuits. During this time, Gibran tried to shy away from the house, to escape the atmosphere of death, poverty and illness. In the following month, Peter returned to Boston from Cuba fatally sick only to die days later on March 12 of consumption. His mother’s cancer continued to spread and she died later that year on June 28, a scene which left Gibran fainting and foaming blood from the mouth.
Following the three family deaths, Gibran sold out the family business and began immersing himself in improving both his Arabic and English writings, a twin task which he was to pursue for the rest of his life. Meanwhile, Day and Josephine were helping him launch his debut art exhibition, which was to feature his allegorical and symbolic charcoal drawings that so fascinated Boston’s society. The exhibition opened on May 3, 1904, and proved a success with the critics. However, the exhibition’s significance lay elsewhere. Josephine, through her future husband, invited a schoolmistress called Mary Haskell to examine Gibran’s drawings. This introduction to the schoolmistress was to mark the beginning of a lifetime relationship, which would greatly influence Gibran’s writing career. Gibran had sought Josephine’s opinion about his Arabic writings, translating them into English. With the language barrier, Josephine could only provide criticism over ideas and thoughts, leaving Gibran alone to tackle his linguistic problems. Josephine’s role was to be taken over by Mary Haskell.
Mary Haskell, who was thirty at the time and ten years older than Gibran, will go on to finance Gibran’s artistic development and encourage him to become the artist that he aspired to be. As a school head mistress, Haskell was an educated, strong-willed and independent woman and an active champion of women’s liberation, who was set apart to Josephine Peabody’s romantic nature. Mary was the reason behind Gibran’s decision to explore writing in English, as she persuaded Gibran to refrain from translating his Arabic works to English and concentrate instead on writing in English directly. Mary’s collaboration and editing of his various English works polished Gibran’s work, most of which first underwent Mary’s editing before going to the publishers. She would spend hours with Gibran, going over his wording, correcting his mistakes and suggesting new ideas to his writings. She even attempted learning Arabic to gain a better grasp of Gibran’s language and his thoughts.
The significance of Mary’s relationship with Gibran is revealed through her diaries, in which she recorded Gibran’s artistic development, their personal and intellectual conversations and his innermost thoughts for nearly seventeen years and a half. These recordings have provided critics with valuable insight into Gibran’s personal thoughts and ideas, which he kept away from the public eye.
In 1904, Gibran started to contribute articles to the Arabic-speaking émigré newspaper called Al-Mouhajer (The Emigrant), marking his first published written work. His first publication was called ‘Vision’, a romantic essay that portrayed a caged bird amid an abundance of symbolism. Despite spending four years in Lebanon learning Arabic, Gibran’s written Arabic left something to be desired. To master Arabic, Gibran relied on his ear for capturing traditional vocabulary, depending heavily on the Arabic stories narrated in his hometown of Bsharri. Hence his Arabic writing had a colloquial feel to it, which was comfortable to his audiences. According to Gibran, rules of language were meant to be broken and he went on to advocate Arab émigré writers to break out of tradition and seek an individual style. Throughout his life, Gibran’s Arabic writings did not receive the critical acclaim his English books had, leading him later on to concentrate on his English writings and abandon the cause of improving his Arabic style.
Gibran’s first Arabic written work came out in 1905 with the publication of Nubthah fi Fan Al-Musiqa (Music), a book inspired by his brother’s 'oud playing and Day’s several invitations to the Opera. During that year, Gibran started a column in Al-Mohajer called ‘Tears and Laughter’’, which was to form the basis of his book A Tear and a Smile. While writing in Al-Mohajer, a certain Arabic émigré writer called Ameen Rihani, wrote to the magazine lauding Gibran’s article which attacked contemporary Arab writers for imitating traditional writers and using poetry for financial gain. Rihani was to become an important Arabic writer and a friend of Gibran’s, whom he later left for the life-long friendship of Mikhail Naimy. At the time, Gibran published several Arabic poems and wrote in newspapers, about various subjects relating to love, truth, beauty, death, good and evil. Most of his writings had a romantic edge to them, with bitter and ironic tones.
In 1906, Gibran published his second Arabic book called Arayis Al- Muruj (The Nymphs of the Valley), a collection of three allegories which take place in Northern Lebanon. The allegories- ‘Martha’, ‘Yuhanna the Mad’, and ‘Dust of Ages and the Eternal Fire’- dealt with issues relating to prostitution, religious persecution, reincarnation and pre-ordained love. The allegories were heavily influenced by the stories he heard back in Bsharri and his own fascination with the Bible, the mystical, and the nature of love. Gibran was to return to the subject of madness in his English book ‘The Madman,’ whose beginnings can be traced to Gibran’s early Arabic writings. What characterized Gibran’s early Arabic publications was the use of the ironic, the realism of the stories, the portrayal of second-class citizens and the anti-religious tone, all of which contrasted with the formalistic and traditional Arabic writings.
Gibran published his third Arabic book Al-Arwah Al-Mutamarridah (Spirits Rebellious) in March of 1908, a collection of four narrative writings based on his writing in Al-Mouhajer. The book dealt with social issues in Lebanon, portraying a married woman’s emancipation from her husband, a heretic’s call for freedom, a bride’s escape from an unwanted marriage through death and the brutal injustices of 19th century Lebanese feudal lords. These writings received strong criticism from the clergy for their bold ideas, their negative portrayal of clergymen and their encouragement of women’s liberation. Gibran was to later recall to Mary the dark period in which Spirits Rebellious was written, during a time when he was haunted by death, illness and loss of love. The anti-clerical content of the book threatened Gibran with excommunication from the church, with the book being censored by the Syrian government.
During one of Gibran's art exhibitions in 1914, an American architect, Albert Pinkam Ryder, paid an unexpected visit to the exhibition, leaving an impression on Gibran who decided to write an English poem in his honor. The poem, which was first edited by Mary, became Gibran’s first English publication, when it went out into print in January 1915.
Meanwhile, Gibran became more actively involved in the politics of the day, especially with the onset of World War I. To Gibran, the war suggested hope of liberating Ottoman-ruled Syria, through a united Arab military front, aided by a general Allied attack. He called on both Muslim and Christian sides to unite their forces against the oppressive Ottoman hegemony. In fact, Gibran fantasized about becoming a fighter and a romantic political hero, who is able to lead his country to liberation. When he actually suggested to Mary going over to Lebanon to fill a post of fighter, she adamantly refused.
In 1915, the pain he had suffered in his shoulder when he was young began to come back, and he underwent electrical treatment on his left shoulder, which had remained weak and in quasi-paralyzed state following the childhood accident. During the war years, Gibran went into a depression that distracted his thoughts and debilitated his health. Despite his active and widespread writings about the Arab uprising against the Ottomans, Giban felt helpless, contributing whatever money he spared to his starving Syria. To distract himself from war thoughts, Gibran tried to seek further recognition in New York, boosting his social life and joining in 1916 the literary magazine The Seven Arts. Gibran prided himself in being the first immigrant to join the board of this magazine, which reflected Gibran’s literary style. At the time, Gibran’s presence began to be demanded in literary circles, who craved to hear recitations from his books and writings.
By 1918, Gibran began to tell Mary of an Arabic work he had been working on which he called ‘my island man,’ the seeds of his most famous book The Prophet. Based on a Promethean man’s exile to an island, The Prophet evoked the journey of the banished man called Al Mustafa, or the Chosen One. In her diary, Mary recounted Gibran’s musings about the book, which he later called ‘the first book in my career –my first real book, my ripened fruit." Soon Gibran added to the work the title of the Commonwealth, a separate work he had attached to the story of Al Mustafa. Gibran was to later link the seeds of The Prophet to an Arabic work he did when he was sixteen years old, where a man at an inn discusses with the rest of the attendants various subjects. However, Gibran still worried about his English writing and he sought Mary’s advice constantly. Gibran had always been fascinated by the language of the Syriac Bible, which reflected Gibran’s views on the creation of ‘an absolute language’, a task he tried to achieve through his various English writings, through the creation of a unified universal style.
Mary was crucial to the development of The Prophet, for she advised Gibran to adopt the English language for this book. Gibran was further encouraged to pursue writing in English following the attention given to his soon-to-be-published book The Madman. The conversation Gibran had with Mary over the issues of marriage, life, death, love…infiltrated his chapters in The Prophet and various other works. However, Mary was against the title of The Prophet, which Gibran came up with in 1919, preferring the title ‘The Counsels,’ the name which she continued to use after the publication of the book. By the fall of 1918, Gibran was preparing to publish his first English book, and another Arabic poem called ‘Al-Mawakib’ (The Processions), his first serious attempt at writing a traditional Arabic poem with rhyme and meter.
Gibran's first English book The Madman came out in 1918 and received good reviews from the local press, who compared him to the Indian writer Tagore, famous for bridging the gap between East and West, and the English poet William Blake. The Madman, a collection of parables which was illustrated by Gibran, revealed the influence of Nietzsche, Jung and Tagore. Following the success of The Madman, Gibran’s popularity began to soar and gradually Gibran started losing touch with his old acquaintances, Day, Josephine, and now he dissolved his relationship with Rihani. Gibran relished the aura of mystery which he evoked among people, given his undisclosed accounts of his oriental background and his personal reserve.
In 1919, Gibran published his Arabic poem ‘Al-Mawakib’, which received little success from the Arab press. During the same year, Gibran joined the board of yet another local magazine Fatat Boston, to which he contributed several Arabic articles. Throughout his life, Gibran joined societies and magazines such as Al-Mouhajer, Al-Funnon, The Golden Links Society and Fatat-Boston, in order to create a mouthpiece for avant-garde Arabic writing and unite Arabic literature abroad. However, Gibran’s success as an Arabic writer remained limited. Ironically, his Arabic language was still not up to standards and received little success in the Arabic press.
In Fatat-Boston, Gibran developed a close relationship with an Arab immigrant writer Mikhail Naimy, whom he had met earlier in 1914. Naimy, a critical thinker at the time, was among the first Arab writers to acknowledge Gibran’s efforts at advancing the Arab language, and correctly making use of Arab customs and background. He treated Gibran’s The Broken Wings as an example of the universal language of literature, pointing out that Selma Karameh could have easily come from a Russian, English or Italian background. However, following Gibran’s death, Naimy immortalized Gibran, replacing the man with a godly image.
With Naimy, Gibran formed in April of 1911 a ten-member Arab émigré organization called Arrabitah Al-Qalamyiah, which promoted the publication of Arab writings and the transmission of world literature. Throughout its life, Arrabitah was led by Gibran’s call for greater artistic freedom, ever encouraging writers to break the rules and seek individual styles. During the time, Gibran’s involvement in his Arabic writings distracted him from completing The Prophet for a while. Moreover, Gibran vacillated between resuming work on The Prophet or embarking on a lecture tour, as his spreading popularity demanded more artistic presence from him. However, he continued to view himself as a spokesman of both the Arab and English worlds, a role whose difficulty he admitted.
Meanwhile, Gibran's political ideas were incensing local politicians in Syria, who reacted against his article which stated ‘You have your Lebanon and I have my Lebanon.’ Gibran disapproved of the way the Syrian territories were being managed, and he wrote extensively on the identity of the emerging Arab countries, as the Greater Syria region began to be divided into Lebanon, Palestine and Syria. On the makeup of emerging countries, Gibran called on politicians to adopt the positive aspects of the Western culture and refrain from importing the surface values of guns and clothes. His political thought sooner gave way to a general view on the cultural makeup of countries and the way citizens ought to lead their lives.
By 1920, nearly three-quarters of The Prophet was done while Gibran’s Arab writings continued to occupy his time. In a poignant letter written to Mary, Gibran confessed that he has resolved the identity problem and has balanced the East and West influences, admitting that "I know now that I am a part of the whole -- a fragment of a jar.… Now I've found out where I fit, and in a way I am the jar -- and the jar is I."
In 1922, Gibran started to complain about heart trouble, which was later attributed to his nervous psychological state, and he personally admitted: "But my greatest pain is not physical. There’s something big in me…. I've always known it and I can’t get it out. It’s a silent greater self, sitting watching a smaller somebody in me do all sorts of things.’’ With the near compellation of work on The Prophet, Mary and Gibran acknowledged Nietzsche’s great influence on the book, which is reminiscent of Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Mary had advised Gibran about the style of The Prophet, covering issues such as the use of capitalization, the use of punctuation marks and the form of paragraphs. Gibran had insisted that he wanted his paragraphs to remain short, almost becoming one lines. Mary had always pointed out that Gibran was a man of few words, who limited his letters to a minimum of words.
A few months before the publication of The Prophet, Gibran summarizeed the book to Mary: "The whole Prophet is saying one thing: ‘you are far far greater than you know -- and all is well.'
By 1923, Gibran had a well-established reputation in the Arab world through his Arabic articles, which he contributed to the various local and émigré Arabic newspapers. During this time, Gibran was gradually depending less on Mary as a financier and editor. He had agreed earlier with Mary to pay off his loans by sending her several of his paintings, an agreement which settled down their quarrels over money. And as Gibran's confidence in his English writings grew, his reliance on Mary's opinion dwindled. However, Mary’s face remained an inspiration in his illustrations, for soon Gibran will decide to restrict his paintings to book illustrations. The Prophet finally came into print in October of 1923, with a modest success in the U.S.
By 1923, Gibran had developed a close correspondence with an Arab writer, May Ziadeh. Their acceptance began in 1912, when she wrote to Gibran recalling to him how moved she was with the story of Selma Karameh in The Broken Wings.
May, an intellectual writer and an active proponent of women’s emancipation, was born in Palestine where she received classical education in a convent school. In 1908she had moved to Cairo where her father started a newspaper. Similar to Gibran, May was fluent in English, Arabic and French, and in 1911 she published her poems under the pseudonym Isis Copia. May found The Broken Wings too liberal for her own tastes, but the subject of women’s rights occupied her until the rest of her life and was a common passion between her and Gibran. Later on, May became a champion of Gibran’s writings and came to replace Mary’s role as an editor and conversant over the coming years. By 1921, Gibran had received her picture and they were to continue corresponding until the end of his life.
During the twenties, Gibran continued to be active in the political arena, writing extensively on the issue of culture and society and the need of the emerging Arab countries to transport the positive sides of Western culture. Gibran’s writings had remained controversial in his home country, especially with his liberal views on the Church and clergy. As a writer, Gibran relished controversy, and his writings reflected this spirit. His limited success in the Arab world drove Gibran to abandon the cause of gaining acceptance as an Arabic writer and he concentrated his efforts instead on writing in English. Slowly, Gibran was getting to grips with his writing, creating a style of language, as he revealed to Mary that he wished to write small unified books, which could be read in one sitting and carried in one’s pocket.
Mary's role in Gibran's writing career was gradually dwindling, but she came to his rescue when he made some bad investments. Mary had always handled Gibran’s financial affairs, ever present to extricate him from his bad financial keeping. However, Mary was about to make her life decision in 1923 by deciding to move into the house of a Southern landowner, to become his future wife in May of 1926. Gibran helped her reach this decision, which slightly clouded their relationship. However, Gibran continued to confide in Mary, and he told her about the second and third parts of The Prophet which he intended to write. The second part was to be called The Garden of the Prophet and it would recount the time the prophet spent in the garden on the island talking to his followers. The third part would be called The Death of the Prophet and it would describe the prophet’s return from the island and how he is imprisoned and freed only to be stoned to death in the market place. Gibran’s project was never to be completed, due to the deterioration of his health and his preoccupation with writing his longest English book, Jesus, The Son of Man.
As Mary slipped slowly out of his life, Gibran hired a new assistant Henrietta Breckenridge, who later played an important role following his death. She organized his works, helped him edit his writings and managed his studio for him. By 1926, Gibran had become a well-known international figure, a stance which was to his liking. Seeking a greater cosmopolitan exposure, Gibran began in 1926 to contribute articles to the quarterly journal The New Orient, which had an international approach encouraging the East and West to meet. At the time, he had started working on a new English work, Lazarus and His Beloved, which was based on an earlier Arabic work. This book was a dramatic collection of four poems recounting the Bible story of Lazarus, his quest for his soul and his eventual meeting of his soul mate.
In May of 1926, Mary married the Southern Landowner Florance Minis. At the time, Mary’s journals reveal Gibran’s perception with the writing of Jesus, The Son of Man. Writing the story of Jesus had been a lifetime ambition, especially the attempt at portraying Jesus as no one else has done before. Gibran had traced Jesus’ life from Syria to Palestine, never sparing a book that recounted his life journey. To Gibran, Jesus appeared as human acting in natural surroundings and he often had dreams about meeting his ideal character in the natural scenery of Bsharri. Gibran’s imagination was further fueled by the native stories he had heard in Lebanon about Jesus’ life and acts. Soon, by January of 1927 Mary was editing the book, for Gibran still relied on Mary’s editing before sending his works to print.
By 1928, Gibran’s health began to deteriorate, and the pain in his body due to his nervous state was on the increase, driving Gibran to seek relief in alcohol. Soon Gibran’s excess drinking turned him into an alcoholic at the height of the prohibition period in the U.S. That same year, Gibran was already thinking of the post-life and he began inquiring about purchasing a monastery in Bsharri, which was owned by Christian Carmelites. In November of 1928, Jesus, Son of Man was published and received good reviews from the local press, who delighted in Gibran’s treatment of Jesus, the Son of Man. By that time, the artistic circles thought it was high time Gibran was honored; by 1929 every possible society sought to give him a tribute. In honor of his literary success, a special anthology of Gibran’s early works was issued by Arrabitah under the title As-Sanabil.
Gibran’s mental health, however, and his alcohol addiction drove him in one evening to burst out crying, lamenting the weakness of his mature works. ‘I have lost my original creative power,’ he lamented to an audience during a reading of one of his mature works. By 1929, doctors were able to trace Gibran’s physical ailment to the enlargement of his livers. To avoid the issue of illness, Gibran ignored all medical care, relying instead on heavy drinking. To distract himself, Gibran turned to an old work about three Earth gods written in 1911. This new book recounts the story of three earth gods who watch the drama of a couple falling in love. Mary edited the book which went into print in mid-March of 1930.
By 1930, Gibran’s excessive drinking to escape the pain in his liver aggravated his disease, and hopes of finishing the second part of The Prophet, The Garden of the Prophet, dwindled. Gibran revealed to Mary his plans of building a library in Bsharri and soon he drew the last copy of his will. To his pen-pal May Ziadeh, Gibran revealed the fear of death as he admitted, ‘I am, May, a small volcano whose opening has been closed.'
On April 10th 1931, Gibran died at the age of forty-eight in a New York hospital, as the spreading cancer in his liver left him unconscious. The New York streets staged a two-day vigil for Gibran’s honor, whose death was mourned in the U.S. and Lebanon. His will left large amounts of money to his country, since he wanted his Syrian citizens to remain in their country and develop it rather than immigrate. Mary, Mariana and Henrietta all attended to Gibran’s studio, organizing his works, sorting out books, illustrations and drawings. To fulfill Gibran’s dream, Marianna and Mary travelled in July of 1931 to Lebanon to bury Gibran in his hometown of Bsharri. The citizens of Lebanon received his coffin with celebration rather than mourning, rejoicing his homecoming, for in death Gibran’s popularity increased. Upon Gibran’s return, The Lebanese Minister of Arts opened the coffins and honored his body with a decoration of Fine Arts. Meanwhile, Marianna and Mary started negotiating the purchase of the Carmelite monastery Gibran wished to obtain. By January of 1932, the Mar Sarkis monastery was bought and Gibran moved to his final resting-place. Upon Mary’s suggestion, his belongings, the books he read, and some of his works and illustrations were later shipped to provide a local collection in the monastery, which turned into a Gibran museum. ..
Kilde (which I hearty recommend ): www.PoemHunter.com
fredag 26. september 2008
Edgar Allan Poe - analyse av novellen Lingeia (1838) og diktet The Raven (1845)
Because I could not stop for Death
He kindly stopped for me
–Emily Dickinson
Da Edgar Allan Poe var førti, ble han funnet liggende på en planke på toppen av noen tønner utenfor en bar. Han døde noen dager senere. Livet til Poe var, i likhet med mange av hans historier, kort og merkelig makabert. Akkurat som Olaf Bull hadde han en nervesykdom som gav seg utslag i sterk alkoholisme. Allikevel klarte han å legge igjen en litterær produksjon uten sidestykke, spesielt innen novellesjangeren, og er regnet som oppfinneren av detektivhistorien.
I 1812, tre år etter at Poe ble født, døde foreldrene hans, og han flyttet inn med onkelen John. Fosterfaren og Poe hadde aldri noe godt forhold, og Poes drikke- og pengespillproblemer gjorde det bare enda verre. Etter at Poe ble stilt for krigsretten i militæret på grunn av disse problemene, flyttet han ut til tanta sin. Her møtte han den ti år yngre kusina Virginia Clemm, som senere skulle bli hans kone. I denne perioden begynte den litterære karriæren hans for fullt.
Poe ble i disse årene avhengig av opium, og helsen begynte å bli verre samtidig som han ble mer og mer respektert som forfatter og poet. Virginias helse gikk også opp og ned, og Poe drakk ofte hardest i de periodene hun hadde det verst. Han begynte også å treffe andre kvinner; èn ny forlovelse ble brutt fordi han var utro med en tredje kvinne, og den neste, av hans død, den 7. oktober 1849.
Bibliografi:
Tamerlane: And Other Poems, By a Bostonian (lyrikk) 1827
Poems (lyrikk) 1831
Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (novellesamling) 1840
Murders in the Rue Morgue: And Other Stories (novellesamling) 1841
The Prose Romances of Edgar A. Poe, No. 1 (novellesamling) 1843
The Raven and Other Poems (lyrikk) 1845
Tales of Edgar A Poe (novellesamling) 1845
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket 1850 †
Diverse samlinger og brev
“Ligeia”
Opplevelsen av atskilthet skaper angst, ja den er kilden til all angst.
–Erich Fromm
Ligeia, gitt ut i 1838, er en novelle som har blitt utsatt for utallige fortolkninger, av mer eller mindre troverdig karakter. At den handler om ønsket til å unnslippe døden er ganske sikkert, men budskapet i fortellingen er verre å sette fast.
Novellen begynner med et sitat fra Joseph Glanvill (filosof og metafysiker, kjent for bøker om hekser), som forteller at viljen er mystisk, at Gud er en stor Vilje som gjennomsyrer alt i universet, og at mennesket dør bare som resultat av en svak vilje.
Historien, fortalt i førsteperson, beskriver forholdet mellom en jeg-personen og den mystiske damen Ligeia. Hovedpersonen vet ikke nøyaktig hvor han møtte henne, eller hva hennes bakgrunn er. Ligeia er beskrevet som utrolig lærd i alle vitenskapene, også i det metafysiske. Hun kommer og går “som en skygge”, er tynn, men utrolig vakker, og har svært uvanlige, men merkelig tiltrekkende øyne. Hun er intens i levemåte, og fortelleren føler seg som et barn i forhold til henne. Når hun blir syk, og er på vei til å dø, kjemper hun og klamrer fast til livet, og til jeg-personen, med en nesten skremmende mental styrke. Her ber hun ham sitere et dikt hun selv skrev tidligere:
Diktet forteller om en skare med engler som sitter sammen i de ”ensomme, senere år” og ser på et teaterstykke om “håp og frykt”, med fantomer og galskap, synd og grusomhet. Ut av skuespillet kommer en blod-rød ting som eter seg gjennom mimerne på scenen, og serafene gråter når dette røde teppet faller ned. Stykket er tragedien “Menneske” og helten er “Erobreren Orm.”
Ligeia spør hvorfor det må være slik, at mennesket er så forgjengelig, og siterer hviskende Joseph Glanvill med sin siste pust.
Jeg-personen flytter bort fra sitt gamle hjem, til et melankolsk hjem i en rolig del av England. Han er blitt avhengig av opium i sin depresjon, men gifter seg på nytt, med Lady Rowena Trevanion. Det ene rommet i huset hans er pentagonalt og dekorert på en måte som får alle som går inn der til å føle seg redde og uvel, med noen draperier som aldri helt ser like ut uansett hvor mye du ser på dem, og en røkelseslampe med et snirklete, slangeaktig design. Hans nye kone blir òg syk, og hun ligger lenge.
En dag hender det at Rowena får et slags anfall mens hun er sengeliggende, og jeg-personen går forbi lampen og bort til henne for å gi henne noe vin. I sin svake opiumrus gjør han ikke noe når han føler noen bevege seg med ham i rommet, og forteller heller ikke Rowena noe om de par dråpene med rød væske som falt i glasset hennes før hun drakk vinen, men han legger merke til en sterk forverring av hennes sykdom fra nå av. Lady Rowena dør etter få dager. Natten hun dør, sitter jeg-personen hos henne, og hver gang han tenker på Ligeia, hører han svake lyder, hikst og snufs, fra den bandasjerte kroppen som ligger der, og hver gang han reiser seg for å sjekke, ser hun ut som om hun nettopp døde på nytt, for så å alltid virke ”mer død enn før”. Når natten nærmer seg dag, og hovedpersonen er for redd til å røre seg, beveger plutselig liket på seg. Det klatrer ut av senga, og sakte men sikkert ser vi at det ikke er kroppen til Lady Rowena lenger; den som nå kommer ut av bandasjene er Lady Ligeia.
Komposisjonen Poe brukte i “Ligeia” var en form som var veldig populær for gudstjenester på 1800-tallet. Den begynner med et sitat for introduksjon (exordiumet) av tema. Deretter kommer eksposisjonen, hvor vi får kjenne Ligeia gjennom minnene til hovedpersonen. Denne delen slutter med divisjonen, som er diktet “Erobreren Orm” og Ligeias død og forandring. Det innleder diskusjonen, som gir eksempel (praxis) for at viljen seirer over døden. De to siste avsnittene gir konklusjonen, hvor fortelleren gjentar det sentrale temaet, viljens kamp mot døden. Viljestyrken er her demonstrert, og sannheten i Glannvills sitat er bevist.
Ligeia er i gresk mytologi en av sirenene. Sirenene var mytiske fuglekvinner som sang og lurte seilere til å kaste seg i sjøen, hvor de ble gjort om til stein. Homer nevner Ligeia i sitt episke dikt Odyssevs, og Poe hinter til dette når han beskriver håret hennes: ”de ravne-svarte, de skinnende, de luksuriøse og naturlig bølgete lokkene, som setter inn den fulle kraften bak det homerske epitetet ‘hyasintinsk!’” I tillegg er noe av det første vi får høre om henne at hun har et ”forheksende ... lavt musikalsk språk.” Det er definitivt noe mystisk med Ligeia som person helt fra starten av. Hovedpersonen er betatt av henne, men de har et ensidig forhold; hun er den som fortryller ham, mens han prøver å forstå henne. Hvis en tolker henne som en sirene, så virker det som om hun har brukt fortelleren til å gjenoppstå fra de døde. Fortelleren har glemt veldig mange detaljer om Ligeia, for eksempel hennes familiebakgrunn. Kanskje har hun dødd og gjenoppstått flere ganger gjennom historien, ved å forføre andre menn tidligere? I så tilfelle er det hun som er ”Erobreren Orm” i diktet, hun blir selv Døden og helten i tragedien ”Menneske.” Denne teorien virker ganske logisk helt til en leser litt nøyere i avsnittet etter diktet, hvor Ligeia spør ”Å Himmelske Far! ... skal denne Erobreren aldri bli erobret?”
Sirenene er døtre av Persephone, dronning over underverdenen (gift med Pluto). Den mytologiske Ligeia er derfor i nær slekt med Døden. I novellen får Ligeia en slags oppstandelse fra de døde, og viser dermed at hun har en slags makt over dødsriket. Ligeia kan her også lett tolkes som en slags Jesus-figur, men dette brukes heller som en effekt i forvarsling om hva som skal skje, enn om henne som person. I eksposisjonen har hun øyne med en ”skjønnhet enten over eller ikke en gang fra jorda.” De er ”guddommelige kuler.”
Det finnes mange andre bibelske allusjoner, for eksempel har Ligeia ”uendelig overlegenhet,” i all slags vitenskap og studier, og han ”lar henne få lede ham” gjennom verden, og gjennom hans ”metafysiske studier.” Ligeia har mange egenskaper som vanligvis bare tilhører Gud – guddommelig skjønnhet og en uendelig kunnskap. Rowena, derimot, er bare en vanlig dødelig. Èn tolkning sier at historien forteller om kampen for å komme nærmere Gud; når Ligeia dør blir det en avstand til Gud, men når hovedpersonen ved hjelp av viljen får henne til å komme tilbake, er Gud og universet sammen igjen. Denne teorien understøttes både av de bibelske allusjonene og av den homiletiske oppbygningen, men personlig synes jeg den utelater en god del elementer i novellen, som er for viktige til å ignorere.
Den største friksjonen oppstår mellom viljens tilsynelatende seier over døden i den ytre fortellingen, og dødens seier i diktet, ”Erobreren Orm”. I dette diktet skildres menneskenes liv som en evig rundgang i søken etter et fantom som ikke kan fås tak i, hvor dette fantomet er frihet fra døden. Temaet i diktet virker altså motsatt av det som vises av Ligeias gjenoppstandelse, men allikevel har diktet fått en veldig sentral plass i novellen. Diktet legger en slags parallell til den ytre historien.
Hvis en tenker oppstandelsen som et resultat av fortellerens opium-fantasier blir temaet fortsatt konsekvent, og mange andre løse brikker ser ut til å falle på plass. Da Lady Rowena ble syk, og fortelleren gikk for å gi henne noe vin, så han, eller ”kan ha drømt at [han] så” noen røde dråper falle ned i glasset hennes, men unngikk å si noe til henne. Han begrunner dette med at det må ha vært noe han har fantasert. Dette skurrer litt med hvor godt denne fantasifulle fortelleren husker andre detaljer, som hvordan rommet ser ut. Psykologisk passer denne tolkningen også veldig bra; jeg-personen er som besatt med Ligeia, og følger henne ”som et barn.” Når hun dør er det naturlig at hans neste kone ikke når opp til hans høye krav, og han projiserer Ligeias personlighet over på Rowena.
Jeg tror Poe prøvde å la alle disse tre budskapene ha omtrent like sterk begrunnelse i historien, for å gjøre novellen mer intrikat, og for å vise hvor mye Ligeias død påvirket hele verdensoppfatningen til denne hovedpersonen som var så avhengig av henne.
Jeg så at hun måtte dø – og jeg kjempet desperat i ånden med den avskyelige Azrael.
Uansett om Ligeia klarte å seire over døden eller ikke, viser denne historien godt hvor sterkt frykt for døden kan gå inn på sinnet til en person. Dette temaet går igjennom historien som en rød tråd fra begynnelse til slutt.
“The Raven”
Når gjøken galer fra bar kvist, blir ingen trist – men galer den fra løvrik gren, blir det angst og mén.
–Nordisk ordtak
Poes kanskje mest kjente verk, “The Raven,” har blitt gjenstand for utallige hyllester, omskrivinginger og parodier; fra Lou Reed sin kokain-påvirkede versjon til en gjesteopptreden av ravnen i The Simpsons’ allehelgensepisode. Dette stemningsfulle diktet ble utgitt i 1845, og følger en veldig strikt form, med fast rim, mange gjentakelser og en veldig sterk rytme.
Diktet åpner med at jeg-personen, som sitter alene i sitt kammers og studerer gamle, glemte bøker for å distrahere seg fra tanker om sin tapte Lenore, blir avbrutt av en banking på døra. Han åpner, og ser ut, men finner bare mørket, og “intet mer”. Det eneste ordet som høres er hviskingen av ordet “Lenore”, som kommer fra hans egen munn, og han går tilbake til rommet sitt.
Nå kan han høre en banking på vinduet sitt; han åpner det nervøst og en ravn stiger inn i rommet. Ravnen setter seg på toppen av en byste av Pallas, den greske visdomsguden. Jeg-personen spør ravnen hva den heter, og den svarer “aldri mer”. Personen tenker at i morgen vil fuglen være borte, “slik håp har forlatt meg før”. Og fuglen sier “aldri mer”.
Selv om fortelleren vet at fuglen ikke kan si annet, spør han den hva som menes med “aldri mer”. Han setter seg i stolen som “hun” (Lenore) satt i før, og føler savn. Han sier at han ønsker å glemme den tapte Lenore, og ravnen sier “aldri mer”. Han fortsetter å spørre ut fuglen, om det finnes frihet fra melankoli, og ravnen sier “aldri mer”. Til slutt spør han om han vil møte Lenore i paradis, og ravnen forsetter med sitt ene svar, “aldri mer”.
Med sinne sier han at fuglen skal forsvinne fra huset hans, og komme seg tilbake til stormen og natten, hvorpå fuglen svarer “aldri mer”. Til slutt gir mannen opp, og fuglen sitter der ennå mens lampelyset tegner skyggen dens ned på gulvet, og fortelleren sier at sjelen hans vil løftes fra den skyggen “aldri mer”.
Diktet er på 108 linjer, fordelt på 18 strofer med seks linjer hver. Poe har selv sagt at lengden på diktet var nøye valgt, av hensyn til effekten diktet skulle gi. Han mente at diktet måtte kunne leses i én omgang for at effekten skulle være optimal, men selvsagt være langt nok til å få fram temaet og holde høy kvalitet.
Versemålet er konstant gjennom hele diktet, med åtte trykktunge stavelser i de fem første verselinjene, så en siste verselinje på fire slag. De fem første linjene kan egentlig deles inn i to halvdeler på fire slag hver, slik at hver strofe har elleve av disse halve linjene. Rytmen er trokeisk (tung-lett).
Den sterke og konstante rytmekomposisjonen, sammen med den stigende stemningen i diktet, gir en følelse av noe ustanselig som marsjerer fram mot et høyere og høyere klimaks.
Hver eneste strofe har ett innrim i første linje (i slutten av første og andre halve linje) og ett tilsvarende innrim i tredje linje, som også rimer med det siste ordet i første halvdel av fjerde linje. I tillegg er det enderim på andre, fjerde, femte og sjette linje, hvor ordene alltid rimer på more. Hvis vi bruker parantes () for å samle rim som er på samme linje, får vi da dette rimmønsteret: (aa)b(cc)(cb)bb. Poe skrev i hans The Philosophy of Composition at han skrev dikt like metodisk som en løste et matematisk problem, og det tror jeg godt kan stemme. De eneste gangene Poe avviker fra rim-ordningen sin er ved å legge inn enda et innrim i tillegg. For å vise kompleksiteten med et eksempel har jeg understreket rimlydene her (fra sjette strofe av diktet):
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore
'T is the wind and nothing more!"
Rimordene blir sterkt framhevet av gjentakelsen av lydene, dette har spesielt stor effekt når ordet Nevermore introduseres av ravnen i åttende strofe.
I tillegg til enderim og innrim er det flust med bokstavrim i diktet. I tolvte strofe, femte linje, har vi for eksempel grim – ungainly – ghastly – gaunt, hvor i tillegg g-lyden er på den trykktunge stavelsen for hvert ord. Disse ordene og rytmen blir altså gjensidig forsterket, sammen med at den uhyggelige stemningen kommer enda bedre fram.
Mange av ordene er gammel- eller poetisk engelsk, som passer sammen med at hovedpersonen studerer ”gamle, glemte bøker,” og de bidrar til å gjøre stemningen mer mystisk eller trolsk. En del symboler er hentet fra klassisk kultur, for eksempel ”plutonsk natt”; Pluto var gud over dødsriket. Det er også bibelske allusjoner, som når jeg-personen spør ravnen om det virkelig finnes ”salve i Gilead,” eller når røkelsen i værelset sprer seg som ved en seraf, en type engel.
Det sentrale symbolet i teksten er ravnen. Ravner er i mange myter koblet sammen med død eller overlevering av beskjeder (som f.eks. Hugin og Munin). Når ravnen lander på bysten av visdomsguden Pallas, blir den selv ansett som vis; og den gis en egenskap av ærbødighet på grunn av dens ”majestetiske” oppførsel. Jeg-personen i diktet spør ravnen ut om hans døde kjære Lenore. Ravnen kan ikke gi noe rasjonelt svar, den kan bare repetere ”aldri mer.” Et menneske ville gitt meningsfylte svar, kanskje med en form for trøst, og gjort kommunikasjonen tosidig. Ravnen fungerer som et emosjonelt speil på dikt-jeget. Spørsmålene hans er utformet slik at ”aldri mer” gir det mest trøstesløse svaret; og denne fuglen, med sitt ene konstante svar, får ham til å legge inn sine egne fortolkninger av setningen ”aldri mer,” og på den måten forsterke galskapen hans.
Venner av Poe skal ha beskrevet ham som, blant annet, en ”humørsyk bokorm.” Kona hans, Virginia, var ofte svært syk. Her er det altså en veldig sterk parallell mellom livet til Poe og diktet. Hans egen livsoppfatning kommer også sterkt fram; det er ingen lykkelig løsning på problemene, jeg-personen blir bare kastet ut i en evig, melankolsk galskap.
Lenore er symbolet på tapt kjærlighet, hun har kommet til det optimalt uoppnåelige – og derfor romantiske – stadium: døden. Dødstemaet er ytterligere intensivert av tidspunktet; en midnatt i desember (kanskje nyttårsaften?). Både midnatt og desember kjennetegner forandring eller avslutning. Hovedpersonen sitter ensom i sitt rikt innredete, lille værelse, som er fullt av minner etter Lenore. Rett utenfor vinduet hersker en sterk storm, i kontrast til det rolige værelset. Stormen kan virke som et symbol på den nært forestående galskapen i sinnet til dikt-jeget; melankolien og savnet har drevet forstanden hans til kanten.
Når dikt-jeget i slutten beordrer ravnen: ”ta ditt nebb ut fra mitt hjerte,” får vi det første virkelig meningsfulle, metaforiske utsagnet i diktet. Før det har alt vært rent bokstavelige spørsmål, de er irrasjonelle, men med undertoner av dypere meninger. Når svaret ”aldri mer” kommer fra ravnen siste gang, blir det for første gang åpent erkjent hvor sterkt savnfølelsen verker.
Edgar Allan Poe er en av de lyrikerne som virkelig får til å overføre sine egne følelser til leseren. Uten å måtte forklare hvorfor vi skal føle det sånn, setter han oss inn i en situasjon hvor det blir naturlig for oss å føle det samme som fortelleren. Kan hende er disse følelsesskildringene en måte å mildne egne smerter. Ofte bruker Poe den fysiske bakgrunnen i historien til stemningsskildring, gjerne med mye symbolbruk. Ifølge Poe er den største sorgen, sorgen over døden til en ”vakker kvinne”. Det var det han brukte som basis for å skrive ”The Raven”. I “The Raven” er Lenore beskrevet som en “sjelden og blendende jomfru,” hun huskes av hovedpersonen som noe perfekt, men òg litt mystisk på grunn av hennes død, og hovedpersonens sterke savn. Lenore er gjort synonymt med Poes definisjon av Skjønnhet, hun har ingen egentlig funksjon utenom å være et savnobjekt, og gi bakgrunn for hoved-personens angst. Den jobben gjør hun derimot veldig bra, og ”The Raven” er et glimrende eksempel på hvor sterk savnfølelsen kan bli, hvor mye det sliter i en persons sinn at noen en elsker forsvinner fra livet.
Selvtortursproblemet:
Vil jeg virkelighet eller vil jeg bare forbli i dette mørke av skjønnhet?
Stein Mehren
Jeg-personen i Poes ”The Raven” legger opp spørsmål til ravnen som får den til å si at håpene hans blir oppfylt ”aldri mer.” Han torturerer seg selv med savn og melankoli, og bruker ravnen til å forsterke disse følelsene. I ”Ligeia” får hovedpersonen, om en tolker det slik, hallusinasjoner av at Ligeia oppstår fra de døde. Begge personene påfører seg selv denne emosjonelle torturen, mer eller mindre ubevisst.
Kilder:
Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe 1984
Russell Noyes: English Romantic Poetry and Prose 1956
Fredrik Wandrup: En uro som aldri dør - Olaf Bull og hans samtid 1995
Websider:
http://www.sparknotes.com/
http://www.comnet.ca/~forrest/
http://www.pambytes.com/poe/poe.html
http://www.poedecoder.com/
http://www.dagbladet.no/bull/
http://home.bip.net/torstein21/digte_bu.html
http://www.britannica.com/search?ct=eb&query=Bull+Olaf
http://www.bokkilden.no/
http://fuv.hivolda.no/prosjekt/bergobe/ http://biphome.spray.se/torstein21/angstkultur.html
http://www.geocities.com/steastu/Syngja.html
http://www.apollon.uio.no/apollon02-97/hageberg.html
http://www.oslo.net/historie/MB/utg/9548/kritikk/3.html
http://www.samlaget.no/gjennomspraket/obull.html
http://www.kalliope.org/biografi.cgi?fhandle=bull
http://www.john-keats.com/biografie/chapter_vii.htm#lamia
http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/keats.html
http://libarts.wsu.edu/english/Journals/PoeStudies/
http://www.daria.no
Som en kurositet har jeg tatt med to analyser - et dikt og en novelle - skrevet av Edgar Allan Poe. Du må selv skaffe til veie tekstene det er snakk om. Ikke glem å lytte til versjonene av "The Raven" du finner blant litteraturvideoene. Så er det bare "å kose" seg gjennom analysen av teksten. Når arbeidet er utført, vil du føle deg som et nytt og opplyst menneske. Lykke til!
He kindly stopped for me
–Emily Dickinson
Da Edgar Allan Poe var førti, ble han funnet liggende på en planke på toppen av noen tønner utenfor en bar. Han døde noen dager senere. Livet til Poe var, i likhet med mange av hans historier, kort og merkelig makabert. Akkurat som Olaf Bull hadde han en nervesykdom som gav seg utslag i sterk alkoholisme. Allikevel klarte han å legge igjen en litterær produksjon uten sidestykke, spesielt innen novellesjangeren, og er regnet som oppfinneren av detektivhistorien.
I 1812, tre år etter at Poe ble født, døde foreldrene hans, og han flyttet inn med onkelen John. Fosterfaren og Poe hadde aldri noe godt forhold, og Poes drikke- og pengespillproblemer gjorde det bare enda verre. Etter at Poe ble stilt for krigsretten i militæret på grunn av disse problemene, flyttet han ut til tanta sin. Her møtte han den ti år yngre kusina Virginia Clemm, som senere skulle bli hans kone. I denne perioden begynte den litterære karriæren hans for fullt.
Poe ble i disse årene avhengig av opium, og helsen begynte å bli verre samtidig som han ble mer og mer respektert som forfatter og poet. Virginias helse gikk også opp og ned, og Poe drakk ofte hardest i de periodene hun hadde det verst. Han begynte også å treffe andre kvinner; èn ny forlovelse ble brutt fordi han var utro med en tredje kvinne, og den neste, av hans død, den 7. oktober 1849.
Bibliografi:
Tamerlane: And Other Poems, By a Bostonian (lyrikk) 1827
Poems (lyrikk) 1831
Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (novellesamling) 1840
Murders in the Rue Morgue: And Other Stories (novellesamling) 1841
The Prose Romances of Edgar A. Poe, No. 1 (novellesamling) 1843
The Raven and Other Poems (lyrikk) 1845
Tales of Edgar A Poe (novellesamling) 1845
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket 1850 †
Diverse samlinger og brev
“Ligeia”
Opplevelsen av atskilthet skaper angst, ja den er kilden til all angst.
–Erich Fromm
Ligeia, gitt ut i 1838, er en novelle som har blitt utsatt for utallige fortolkninger, av mer eller mindre troverdig karakter. At den handler om ønsket til å unnslippe døden er ganske sikkert, men budskapet i fortellingen er verre å sette fast.
Novellen begynner med et sitat fra Joseph Glanvill (filosof og metafysiker, kjent for bøker om hekser), som forteller at viljen er mystisk, at Gud er en stor Vilje som gjennomsyrer alt i universet, og at mennesket dør bare som resultat av en svak vilje.
Historien, fortalt i førsteperson, beskriver forholdet mellom en jeg-personen og den mystiske damen Ligeia. Hovedpersonen vet ikke nøyaktig hvor han møtte henne, eller hva hennes bakgrunn er. Ligeia er beskrevet som utrolig lærd i alle vitenskapene, også i det metafysiske. Hun kommer og går “som en skygge”, er tynn, men utrolig vakker, og har svært uvanlige, men merkelig tiltrekkende øyne. Hun er intens i levemåte, og fortelleren føler seg som et barn i forhold til henne. Når hun blir syk, og er på vei til å dø, kjemper hun og klamrer fast til livet, og til jeg-personen, med en nesten skremmende mental styrke. Her ber hun ham sitere et dikt hun selv skrev tidligere:
Diktet forteller om en skare med engler som sitter sammen i de ”ensomme, senere år” og ser på et teaterstykke om “håp og frykt”, med fantomer og galskap, synd og grusomhet. Ut av skuespillet kommer en blod-rød ting som eter seg gjennom mimerne på scenen, og serafene gråter når dette røde teppet faller ned. Stykket er tragedien “Menneske” og helten er “Erobreren Orm.”
Ligeia spør hvorfor det må være slik, at mennesket er så forgjengelig, og siterer hviskende Joseph Glanvill med sin siste pust.
Jeg-personen flytter bort fra sitt gamle hjem, til et melankolsk hjem i en rolig del av England. Han er blitt avhengig av opium i sin depresjon, men gifter seg på nytt, med Lady Rowena Trevanion. Det ene rommet i huset hans er pentagonalt og dekorert på en måte som får alle som går inn der til å føle seg redde og uvel, med noen draperier som aldri helt ser like ut uansett hvor mye du ser på dem, og en røkelseslampe med et snirklete, slangeaktig design. Hans nye kone blir òg syk, og hun ligger lenge.
En dag hender det at Rowena får et slags anfall mens hun er sengeliggende, og jeg-personen går forbi lampen og bort til henne for å gi henne noe vin. I sin svake opiumrus gjør han ikke noe når han føler noen bevege seg med ham i rommet, og forteller heller ikke Rowena noe om de par dråpene med rød væske som falt i glasset hennes før hun drakk vinen, men han legger merke til en sterk forverring av hennes sykdom fra nå av. Lady Rowena dør etter få dager. Natten hun dør, sitter jeg-personen hos henne, og hver gang han tenker på Ligeia, hører han svake lyder, hikst og snufs, fra den bandasjerte kroppen som ligger der, og hver gang han reiser seg for å sjekke, ser hun ut som om hun nettopp døde på nytt, for så å alltid virke ”mer død enn før”. Når natten nærmer seg dag, og hovedpersonen er for redd til å røre seg, beveger plutselig liket på seg. Det klatrer ut av senga, og sakte men sikkert ser vi at det ikke er kroppen til Lady Rowena lenger; den som nå kommer ut av bandasjene er Lady Ligeia.
Komposisjonen Poe brukte i “Ligeia” var en form som var veldig populær for gudstjenester på 1800-tallet. Den begynner med et sitat for introduksjon (exordiumet) av tema. Deretter kommer eksposisjonen, hvor vi får kjenne Ligeia gjennom minnene til hovedpersonen. Denne delen slutter med divisjonen, som er diktet “Erobreren Orm” og Ligeias død og forandring. Det innleder diskusjonen, som gir eksempel (praxis) for at viljen seirer over døden. De to siste avsnittene gir konklusjonen, hvor fortelleren gjentar det sentrale temaet, viljens kamp mot døden. Viljestyrken er her demonstrert, og sannheten i Glannvills sitat er bevist.
Ligeia er i gresk mytologi en av sirenene. Sirenene var mytiske fuglekvinner som sang og lurte seilere til å kaste seg i sjøen, hvor de ble gjort om til stein. Homer nevner Ligeia i sitt episke dikt Odyssevs, og Poe hinter til dette når han beskriver håret hennes: ”de ravne-svarte, de skinnende, de luksuriøse og naturlig bølgete lokkene, som setter inn den fulle kraften bak det homerske epitetet ‘hyasintinsk!’” I tillegg er noe av det første vi får høre om henne at hun har et ”forheksende ... lavt musikalsk språk.” Det er definitivt noe mystisk med Ligeia som person helt fra starten av. Hovedpersonen er betatt av henne, men de har et ensidig forhold; hun er den som fortryller ham, mens han prøver å forstå henne. Hvis en tolker henne som en sirene, så virker det som om hun har brukt fortelleren til å gjenoppstå fra de døde. Fortelleren har glemt veldig mange detaljer om Ligeia, for eksempel hennes familiebakgrunn. Kanskje har hun dødd og gjenoppstått flere ganger gjennom historien, ved å forføre andre menn tidligere? I så tilfelle er det hun som er ”Erobreren Orm” i diktet, hun blir selv Døden og helten i tragedien ”Menneske.” Denne teorien virker ganske logisk helt til en leser litt nøyere i avsnittet etter diktet, hvor Ligeia spør ”Å Himmelske Far! ... skal denne Erobreren aldri bli erobret?”
Sirenene er døtre av Persephone, dronning over underverdenen (gift med Pluto). Den mytologiske Ligeia er derfor i nær slekt med Døden. I novellen får Ligeia en slags oppstandelse fra de døde, og viser dermed at hun har en slags makt over dødsriket. Ligeia kan her også lett tolkes som en slags Jesus-figur, men dette brukes heller som en effekt i forvarsling om hva som skal skje, enn om henne som person. I eksposisjonen har hun øyne med en ”skjønnhet enten over eller ikke en gang fra jorda.” De er ”guddommelige kuler.”
Det finnes mange andre bibelske allusjoner, for eksempel har Ligeia ”uendelig overlegenhet,” i all slags vitenskap og studier, og han ”lar henne få lede ham” gjennom verden, og gjennom hans ”metafysiske studier.” Ligeia har mange egenskaper som vanligvis bare tilhører Gud – guddommelig skjønnhet og en uendelig kunnskap. Rowena, derimot, er bare en vanlig dødelig. Èn tolkning sier at historien forteller om kampen for å komme nærmere Gud; når Ligeia dør blir det en avstand til Gud, men når hovedpersonen ved hjelp av viljen får henne til å komme tilbake, er Gud og universet sammen igjen. Denne teorien understøttes både av de bibelske allusjonene og av den homiletiske oppbygningen, men personlig synes jeg den utelater en god del elementer i novellen, som er for viktige til å ignorere.
Den største friksjonen oppstår mellom viljens tilsynelatende seier over døden i den ytre fortellingen, og dødens seier i diktet, ”Erobreren Orm”. I dette diktet skildres menneskenes liv som en evig rundgang i søken etter et fantom som ikke kan fås tak i, hvor dette fantomet er frihet fra døden. Temaet i diktet virker altså motsatt av det som vises av Ligeias gjenoppstandelse, men allikevel har diktet fått en veldig sentral plass i novellen. Diktet legger en slags parallell til den ytre historien.
Hvis en tenker oppstandelsen som et resultat av fortellerens opium-fantasier blir temaet fortsatt konsekvent, og mange andre løse brikker ser ut til å falle på plass. Da Lady Rowena ble syk, og fortelleren gikk for å gi henne noe vin, så han, eller ”kan ha drømt at [han] så” noen røde dråper falle ned i glasset hennes, men unngikk å si noe til henne. Han begrunner dette med at det må ha vært noe han har fantasert. Dette skurrer litt med hvor godt denne fantasifulle fortelleren husker andre detaljer, som hvordan rommet ser ut. Psykologisk passer denne tolkningen også veldig bra; jeg-personen er som besatt med Ligeia, og følger henne ”som et barn.” Når hun dør er det naturlig at hans neste kone ikke når opp til hans høye krav, og han projiserer Ligeias personlighet over på Rowena.
Jeg tror Poe prøvde å la alle disse tre budskapene ha omtrent like sterk begrunnelse i historien, for å gjøre novellen mer intrikat, og for å vise hvor mye Ligeias død påvirket hele verdensoppfatningen til denne hovedpersonen som var så avhengig av henne.
Jeg så at hun måtte dø – og jeg kjempet desperat i ånden med den avskyelige Azrael.
Uansett om Ligeia klarte å seire over døden eller ikke, viser denne historien godt hvor sterkt frykt for døden kan gå inn på sinnet til en person. Dette temaet går igjennom historien som en rød tråd fra begynnelse til slutt.
“The Raven”
Når gjøken galer fra bar kvist, blir ingen trist – men galer den fra løvrik gren, blir det angst og mén.
–Nordisk ordtak
Poes kanskje mest kjente verk, “The Raven,” har blitt gjenstand for utallige hyllester, omskrivinginger og parodier; fra Lou Reed sin kokain-påvirkede versjon til en gjesteopptreden av ravnen i The Simpsons’ allehelgensepisode. Dette stemningsfulle diktet ble utgitt i 1845, og følger en veldig strikt form, med fast rim, mange gjentakelser og en veldig sterk rytme.
Diktet åpner med at jeg-personen, som sitter alene i sitt kammers og studerer gamle, glemte bøker for å distrahere seg fra tanker om sin tapte Lenore, blir avbrutt av en banking på døra. Han åpner, og ser ut, men finner bare mørket, og “intet mer”. Det eneste ordet som høres er hviskingen av ordet “Lenore”, som kommer fra hans egen munn, og han går tilbake til rommet sitt.
Nå kan han høre en banking på vinduet sitt; han åpner det nervøst og en ravn stiger inn i rommet. Ravnen setter seg på toppen av en byste av Pallas, den greske visdomsguden. Jeg-personen spør ravnen hva den heter, og den svarer “aldri mer”. Personen tenker at i morgen vil fuglen være borte, “slik håp har forlatt meg før”. Og fuglen sier “aldri mer”.
Selv om fortelleren vet at fuglen ikke kan si annet, spør han den hva som menes med “aldri mer”. Han setter seg i stolen som “hun” (Lenore) satt i før, og føler savn. Han sier at han ønsker å glemme den tapte Lenore, og ravnen sier “aldri mer”. Han fortsetter å spørre ut fuglen, om det finnes frihet fra melankoli, og ravnen sier “aldri mer”. Til slutt spør han om han vil møte Lenore i paradis, og ravnen forsetter med sitt ene svar, “aldri mer”.
Med sinne sier han at fuglen skal forsvinne fra huset hans, og komme seg tilbake til stormen og natten, hvorpå fuglen svarer “aldri mer”. Til slutt gir mannen opp, og fuglen sitter der ennå mens lampelyset tegner skyggen dens ned på gulvet, og fortelleren sier at sjelen hans vil løftes fra den skyggen “aldri mer”.
Diktet er på 108 linjer, fordelt på 18 strofer med seks linjer hver. Poe har selv sagt at lengden på diktet var nøye valgt, av hensyn til effekten diktet skulle gi. Han mente at diktet måtte kunne leses i én omgang for at effekten skulle være optimal, men selvsagt være langt nok til å få fram temaet og holde høy kvalitet.
Versemålet er konstant gjennom hele diktet, med åtte trykktunge stavelser i de fem første verselinjene, så en siste verselinje på fire slag. De fem første linjene kan egentlig deles inn i to halvdeler på fire slag hver, slik at hver strofe har elleve av disse halve linjene. Rytmen er trokeisk (tung-lett).
Den sterke og konstante rytmekomposisjonen, sammen med den stigende stemningen i diktet, gir en følelse av noe ustanselig som marsjerer fram mot et høyere og høyere klimaks.
Hver eneste strofe har ett innrim i første linje (i slutten av første og andre halve linje) og ett tilsvarende innrim i tredje linje, som også rimer med det siste ordet i første halvdel av fjerde linje. I tillegg er det enderim på andre, fjerde, femte og sjette linje, hvor ordene alltid rimer på more. Hvis vi bruker parantes () for å samle rim som er på samme linje, får vi da dette rimmønsteret: (aa)b(cc)(cb)bb. Poe skrev i hans The Philosophy of Composition at han skrev dikt like metodisk som en løste et matematisk problem, og det tror jeg godt kan stemme. De eneste gangene Poe avviker fra rim-ordningen sin er ved å legge inn enda et innrim i tillegg. For å vise kompleksiteten med et eksempel har jeg understreket rimlydene her (fra sjette strofe av diktet):
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore
'T is the wind and nothing more!"
Rimordene blir sterkt framhevet av gjentakelsen av lydene, dette har spesielt stor effekt når ordet Nevermore introduseres av ravnen i åttende strofe.
I tillegg til enderim og innrim er det flust med bokstavrim i diktet. I tolvte strofe, femte linje, har vi for eksempel grim – ungainly – ghastly – gaunt, hvor i tillegg g-lyden er på den trykktunge stavelsen for hvert ord. Disse ordene og rytmen blir altså gjensidig forsterket, sammen med at den uhyggelige stemningen kommer enda bedre fram.
Mange av ordene er gammel- eller poetisk engelsk, som passer sammen med at hovedpersonen studerer ”gamle, glemte bøker,” og de bidrar til å gjøre stemningen mer mystisk eller trolsk. En del symboler er hentet fra klassisk kultur, for eksempel ”plutonsk natt”; Pluto var gud over dødsriket. Det er også bibelske allusjoner, som når jeg-personen spør ravnen om det virkelig finnes ”salve i Gilead,” eller når røkelsen i værelset sprer seg som ved en seraf, en type engel.
Det sentrale symbolet i teksten er ravnen. Ravner er i mange myter koblet sammen med død eller overlevering av beskjeder (som f.eks. Hugin og Munin). Når ravnen lander på bysten av visdomsguden Pallas, blir den selv ansett som vis; og den gis en egenskap av ærbødighet på grunn av dens ”majestetiske” oppførsel. Jeg-personen i diktet spør ravnen ut om hans døde kjære Lenore. Ravnen kan ikke gi noe rasjonelt svar, den kan bare repetere ”aldri mer.” Et menneske ville gitt meningsfylte svar, kanskje med en form for trøst, og gjort kommunikasjonen tosidig. Ravnen fungerer som et emosjonelt speil på dikt-jeget. Spørsmålene hans er utformet slik at ”aldri mer” gir det mest trøstesløse svaret; og denne fuglen, med sitt ene konstante svar, får ham til å legge inn sine egne fortolkninger av setningen ”aldri mer,” og på den måten forsterke galskapen hans.
Venner av Poe skal ha beskrevet ham som, blant annet, en ”humørsyk bokorm.” Kona hans, Virginia, var ofte svært syk. Her er det altså en veldig sterk parallell mellom livet til Poe og diktet. Hans egen livsoppfatning kommer også sterkt fram; det er ingen lykkelig løsning på problemene, jeg-personen blir bare kastet ut i en evig, melankolsk galskap.
Lenore er symbolet på tapt kjærlighet, hun har kommet til det optimalt uoppnåelige – og derfor romantiske – stadium: døden. Dødstemaet er ytterligere intensivert av tidspunktet; en midnatt i desember (kanskje nyttårsaften?). Både midnatt og desember kjennetegner forandring eller avslutning. Hovedpersonen sitter ensom i sitt rikt innredete, lille værelse, som er fullt av minner etter Lenore. Rett utenfor vinduet hersker en sterk storm, i kontrast til det rolige værelset. Stormen kan virke som et symbol på den nært forestående galskapen i sinnet til dikt-jeget; melankolien og savnet har drevet forstanden hans til kanten.
Når dikt-jeget i slutten beordrer ravnen: ”ta ditt nebb ut fra mitt hjerte,” får vi det første virkelig meningsfulle, metaforiske utsagnet i diktet. Før det har alt vært rent bokstavelige spørsmål, de er irrasjonelle, men med undertoner av dypere meninger. Når svaret ”aldri mer” kommer fra ravnen siste gang, blir det for første gang åpent erkjent hvor sterkt savnfølelsen verker.
Edgar Allan Poe er en av de lyrikerne som virkelig får til å overføre sine egne følelser til leseren. Uten å måtte forklare hvorfor vi skal føle det sånn, setter han oss inn i en situasjon hvor det blir naturlig for oss å føle det samme som fortelleren. Kan hende er disse følelsesskildringene en måte å mildne egne smerter. Ofte bruker Poe den fysiske bakgrunnen i historien til stemningsskildring, gjerne med mye symbolbruk. Ifølge Poe er den største sorgen, sorgen over døden til en ”vakker kvinne”. Det var det han brukte som basis for å skrive ”The Raven”. I “The Raven” er Lenore beskrevet som en “sjelden og blendende jomfru,” hun huskes av hovedpersonen som noe perfekt, men òg litt mystisk på grunn av hennes død, og hovedpersonens sterke savn. Lenore er gjort synonymt med Poes definisjon av Skjønnhet, hun har ingen egentlig funksjon utenom å være et savnobjekt, og gi bakgrunn for hoved-personens angst. Den jobben gjør hun derimot veldig bra, og ”The Raven” er et glimrende eksempel på hvor sterk savnfølelsen kan bli, hvor mye det sliter i en persons sinn at noen en elsker forsvinner fra livet.
Selvtortursproblemet:
Vil jeg virkelighet eller vil jeg bare forbli i dette mørke av skjønnhet?
Stein Mehren
Jeg-personen i Poes ”The Raven” legger opp spørsmål til ravnen som får den til å si at håpene hans blir oppfylt ”aldri mer.” Han torturerer seg selv med savn og melankoli, og bruker ravnen til å forsterke disse følelsene. I ”Ligeia” får hovedpersonen, om en tolker det slik, hallusinasjoner av at Ligeia oppstår fra de døde. Begge personene påfører seg selv denne emosjonelle torturen, mer eller mindre ubevisst.
Kilder:
Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe 1984
Russell Noyes: English Romantic Poetry and Prose 1956
Fredrik Wandrup: En uro som aldri dør - Olaf Bull og hans samtid 1995
Websider:
http://www.sparknotes.com/
http://www.comnet.ca/~forrest/
http://www.pambytes.com/poe/poe.html
http://www.poedecoder.com/
http://www.dagbladet.no/bull/
http://home.bip.net/torstein21/digte_bu.html
http://www.britannica.com/search?ct=eb&query=Bull+Olaf
http://www.bokkilden.no/
http://fuv.hivolda.no/prosjekt/bergobe/ http://biphome.spray.se/torstein21/angstkultur.html
http://www.geocities.com/steastu/Syngja.html
http://www.apollon.uio.no/apollon02-97/hageberg.html
http://www.oslo.net/historie/MB/utg/9548/kritikk/3.html
http://www.samlaget.no/gjennomspraket/obull.html
http://www.kalliope.org/biografi.cgi?fhandle=bull
http://www.john-keats.com/biografie/chapter_vii.htm#lamia
http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/keats.html
http://libarts.wsu.edu/english/Journals/PoeStudies/
http://www.daria.no
Som en kurositet har jeg tatt med to analyser - et dikt og en novelle - skrevet av Edgar Allan Poe. Du må selv skaffe til veie tekstene det er snakk om. Ikke glem å lytte til versjonene av "The Raven" du finner blant litteraturvideoene. Så er det bare "å kose" seg gjennom analysen av teksten. Når arbeidet er utført, vil du føle deg som et nytt og opplyst menneske. Lykke til!
torsdag 25. september 2008
The Raven av Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849) framført av Vincent Price
Here is a virtual movie Edgar Allan Poe reading his great poem "The Raven"
This recording taken from a public domain audio website is qiute possibly my alltime favourite reading of this most dark lunatic frenzied poem.
Heres an excerpt of what the excellent Wikipedia says about this most famous of poems..
"The Raven" is a narrative poem by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in January 1845. It is noted for its musicality, stylized language, and supernatural atmosphere. It tells of a talking raven's mysterious visit to a distraught lover, tracing the latter's slow descent into madness. The lover, often identified as being a student,[1][2] is lamenting the loss of his love, Lenore. The raven, sitting on a bust of Pallas, seems to further instigate his distress with its constant repetition of the word, "Nevermore." Throughout the poem, Poe makes allusions to folklore and various classical works.
Poe claimed to have written the poem very logically and methodically. His intention was to create a poem that would appeal to both critical and popular tastes, as he explains in the follow-up essay: "The Philosophy of Composition". The poem was inspired in part by a talking raven in the novel Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty by Charles Dickens.[3] Poe borrows the complex rhythm and meter of Elizabeth Barrett's poem "Lady Geraldine's Courtship".
The first publication of "The Raven" on January 29, 1845, in the New York Evening Mirror made Poe widely popular in his lifetime. The poem was soon reprinted, parodied, and illustrated. Though some critics disagree about the value of the poem, it remains one of the most famous poems ever written"
Korpen (dikt)
Från Wikipedia
Korpen (engelska The Raven) är en berättande dikt av den amerikanska författaren och poeten Edgar Allan Poe. Den publicerades först i New York Evening Mirror den 29 januari 1845. "Korpen" utmärkts av sin musikalitet, sitt stiliserade språk och sin övernaturliga atmosfär. Den berättar om ett mystiskt besök av en talande korp hos en sorgtyngd älskande, och följer den älskandes långsamma fall ned i vansinne. När den publicerades gjorde den Poe populär, och den räknas än idag som en av världens mest kända dikter.
En känd översättning till svenska gjordes av Viktor Rydberg.
Dikten följer en ej namngiven berättare som sitter och läser "gammal lärdom" som ett sätt att glömma förlusten av sin älskade Lenore (namnet användes tidigare i Poes dikt med samma namn, Lenore). En knackning på hans kammardörr avslöjar ingenting men får hans själ att "brinna." En liknande knackning, något ljudligare, hörs vid hans fönster. När han går för att undersöka detta kliver en korp in i hans kammare. Korpen ägnar honom ingen uppmärksamhet och sätter sig på en byst av Pallas Athena.
Mannen roas av korpens komiskt allvarliga uppsyn och ber fågeln att säga sitt namn. Korpens enda svar är "förbi" ("Nevermore"). Berättaren blir faktiskt förvånad över att korpen kan tala, men den säger inget mer. Plötsligt blir mannen bestört och anmärker att hans "vän" korpen snart kommer att flyga ut ur hans liv, som andra vänner har flugit förut och som hans tidigare förhoppningar. Som till svar säger korpen åter "förbi". Berättaren är övertygad om att det ordet är allt som fågeln kan säga, möjligen inlärt från en tidigare ägare som var otursförföljd.
Berättaren drar ändå fram sin stol direkt framför korpen, beslutsam att lära sig mer om den. Han tänker djupt på detta utan att säga något, men hans tankar vandrar tillbaka till hans förlorade Lenore. Han tror att luften blir tätare och känner änglars närvaro. Berättaren förvirras av att associera fågeln med änglar, blir arg och kallar korpen "ond" och "profet." När han skriker mot korpen svarar den bara "förbi." Slutligen frågar han korpen om Lenore är i himlen. När korpen svarar med sitt typiska "förbi" skriker han och befaller korpen att återvända till sitt avgrundsrike. Korpen rör sig dock aldrig och, synbarligen vid tiden för berättarens recitation av dikten, sitter kvar på bysten av Pallas och kastar sin skugga över hans själ.
søndag 24. august 2008
Hauge og Machado - sjelefrendar?
Kronikk av Elisabet Vallevik
«For meg er Antonio Machado diktaren», skreiv Olav H. Hauge. Den spanske diktaren Antonio Machado (1875–1939) – kanskje mest kjend i Noreg for tittelen til ei bok av biletkunstnaren Ferdinand Finne: «Veien blir til mens du går», henta frå ei verseline i eit av dikta hans – er ein av dei aller største, mest lesne og folkekjære spanske diktarane.
Han var fødd i Sevilla – «Min barndom er minne om ein patio i Sevilla, ein klar frukthage der sitrontreet mognar» – men budde det meste av sitt vaksne liv på høgsletta i innlandet Castilla, mellom anna fem år som fransklektor i den gamle kastiljanske byen Soria. Litteraturhistorisk tilhøyrer han den såkalla 98-generasjonen, som fekk namnet sitt etter det året då Spania miste dei siste oversjøiske koloniane sine – Cuba og Filippinane. Denne hendinga førde til ei oppvakning og krise i Spania, både politisk, sosialt og kulturelt, etter eit hundreår med vanstyre, stagnasjon og borgarkrigar. Det store spørsmålet vart: Kva er Spania? Kva bind oss saman, kva er verdigrunnlaget vi kviler på som nasjon? Denne sjølvransakinga fall saman med oppkoma av ein ny og uvanleg gåverik diktargenerasjon, med namn som Miguel de Unamuno, Pio
Baroja, Azorin, Valle-Inclan og altså Antonio Machado. Det som batt desse saman og gav dei eit felles generasjonsnamn, var nettopp Spania-spørsmålet. Dei nærma seg spørsmålet med stort alvor, og eitt av svara dei fann, kan, i stikkordsform, kallast Castilla. Castilla med det barske og strenge landskapet av endelause sletter, isnande kulde om vinteren og ei brennande sol om sumaren, eit hardført og nøysamt folkeferd. Det var her, framfor alt, at dei meinte å finna Spanias sjel. Antonio Machado identifiserer seg med, og syng om, dette landskapet. Antonio Machado døydde i eksil i Frankrike.
Til sengs med Machado
Olav H. Hauge (1908–1994) sette Antonio Machado høgt, det kan me lesa or dagbøkene hans. Frå Hauge tok til å interessera seg for spansk dikting i 1960-åra og fram til 1989, nemner han Machado elleve gonger. Den 21. april 1967 les han Machado i svensk omsetjing og seier mellom anna: «Gode, forneme dikt. Sprungne av hjarta, song og visjon. Streng form. Cezanne. Dette har vore ein gild dag. Til sengs, midt i vårvinna, med Machado!» 24. juli 1977 skriv han, m.a. «For meg er Machado diktaren». 17. februar 1979: «ENDELEG EIN SOM ER SAMD MED MEG ‘Good poets are sparing in the use of metaphors; but their metaphors at times are real creations.’ Machado.»
Har dei så noko sams som diktarar,desse to?
Tematisk kan ein finna ei rekkje parallellar – allusjonar til det private, til barndomsminne, til ungdomstid, til kjærleik, draum, sorg og tap. Dei er begge sterkt knytte til landskapet der dei bur, som i dikta ofte blir transformert til indre landskap, til sjelebilete. Machado i «Kastiljanske landskap»:
Der, i det høge landet
der Duero formar sin pilboge
rundt Soria, mellom blyfarga åsar
og flekker av sliten eikeskog,
flakkar mitt hjarta omkring, i draumar...
Hauge i «Du leitar»:
Som elvi i haustneter
leitar i regnmyrke
skogar og mumlar
i skodde og regn
under grønskiml og tros
og solsvidde bar, –
slik famlar ditt minne
i sine skuggeskogar
og leitar som elvi
ei haustnatt, til det finn att
halvgløymde far.
Ingen av dei to er framande for eksistensielle tema, og i desse to dikta er metaforbruken slåande lik. Machado:
Vandrar, dine fotefar
er vegen, og inkje anna
vandrar, det finst ingen veg,
vegen blir til medan du går.
Medan du går blir vegen til,
og når du ser deg attende
Ser du stigen du
aldri meir skal trå.
Vandrar, det finst ingen veg,
berre strime i havet.
Og Hauge («Din veg»):
Ingen har varda den vegen
du skal gå
ut i det ukjende
ut i det blå.
Dette er din veg.
Berre du
skal gå han. Og det er
uråd å snu.
Og ikkje vardar du vegen,
du hell.
Og vinden stryk ut ditt far
i aude fjell.
Felles dåm
Personleg tykkjer eg at dikta til Machado og Hauge har ein sams dåm over seg. Det er noko med den direkte tonen, den knappe uttrykksmåten, økonomiseringa med adjektiv... Bileta er ofte henta frå ein tradisjonelt mannleg sfære, det er med på å gje dikta ein mandig tone – eit preg av
virilitet. I dei to fylgjande dikta seier dei noko om tilhøvet sitt til diktekunsten ved å bruka bilete som sverd og pil og boge:
Machado i «Portrett»:
Er eg klassikar eller romantikar? Eg veit ikkje. Mine vers ville eg etterlata
slik hærføraren forlèt sitt sverd:
navnkunnigt for den mandige hand som svinga det,
ikkje omtykt for smedens dyktige handverk.
Hauge i «Akestes»:
Pili til fyrstemann dirrar i masti,
snori er avskoti, og den bundne duva
som letta på flog, er dotti
for ei visshøv pil.
Likevel spenner du bogen, du gråhærde Akestes, du må,
vågar det skotet, den pili –
Den rådande retninga i spansk lyrikk på tida til 98-generasjonen var modernismen. Den spanske modernismen var sterkt påverka av latinamerikansk modernisme (Ruben Dario) og fransk symbolisme og fekk i ettertid mykje å seia for spansk dikting. Typisk for denne retninga var ei
søkjing etter det aristokratiske, estetiske, eksotiske og subjektive. Ho lét seg påverka av andre kunstformer som musikk og skulptur og hadde som ideal det sanseleg vakre og «kunst for kunsten si skuld». Ho forkasta det kvardagslege og jordnære. Antonio Machado var nok påverka
av modernismen, men han tok òg klar avstand frå det kunstsynet som rådde der. Han var svært oppteken av den spanske røyndomen han hadde rundt seg, av det spanske folket og deira lagnad og av naturen på det kastiljanske slettelandet, på lik line med dei andre i 98-generasjonen. Sjølv
seier han: «Eg tenkte at det poetiske element ikkje låg i den lydlege kvaliteten til ordet og heller ikkje i fargen eller i lina eller i ei samling sanseinntrykk, men i ei djup sjeleleg rørsle.» Diktet skal korkje vera pynt eller logisk tanke, men gripa augneblinken:
Ikkje hard og evig marmor
ikkje musikk eller måleri
men ord i tid.
Vel kjent er Olav H. Hauges ironiske blikk på sitt eige tilhøve til modernismen i «Gamal diktar prøver seg som modernist » – han med ville prøva «desse nye styltrone».
Var Hauge samd med Machado i synet på modernismen?
Hauge var i alle høve ikkje redd for å dikta om det kvardagslege og det han hadde rundt seg. Han seier i «Eg har tri dikt»:
Eit godt dikt
skal lukta av te.
Eller av rå
mold og nykløyvd ved.
Røtene
Den meiningsberande funksjonen til ordet synest vera den viktigaste for han. I diktet «Bøn» heiter det:
Opn mine augo, Herre,
so eg kan betre sjå
underet, ikkje berre avglansen utanpå.
Som versemål kunne både Hauge og Machado nytta tradisjonelle strofeformer med røter langt attende i folkeleg tradisjon, Hauge ned sine folkeviseliknande strofer; Machado bruka romansen (balladen), som på si side har røter i dei gamle spanske heltedikta. Men begge bruka òg gjerne sonetten – denne klassiske diktforma som med dei strenge formkrava sine gjerne blir sedd på som den mest krevjande. At Hauge las Machado, har me eit vakkert uttrykk for i diktet «Snø i Castilla»:
I Castilla helsar dei snøen like velkomen
som me helsar aldeblomen um våren.
Difor syng Machado so vakkert um snø,
snø på Castillas solbrende rustraude berg!
Ein skugge søv under snøen på oljegreinene,
eg kjem i hug hagane heime
som ofte vert skadde av frost.
I diktet «Snø i Castilla» fører Olav H. Hauge saman dei to heimane sine, heimstaden i Ulvik med dikting og aldehagar og den store bokheimen, verdslitteraturen. I dagbøkene seier han det sjølv slik: «Økland segjer eg lever i Ulvik, i dikti mine. Eg lever no berre halvveges der, den andre heimen har vore i litteraturen» (12. april 1989). Kanskje kan diktet «Snø i Castilla» symbolisera
eit heilt levd liv?
Elisabet Vallevik er tidlegare spansklektor
«For meg er Antonio Machado diktaren», skreiv Olav H. Hauge. Den spanske diktaren Antonio Machado (1875–1939) – kanskje mest kjend i Noreg for tittelen til ei bok av biletkunstnaren Ferdinand Finne: «Veien blir til mens du går», henta frå ei verseline i eit av dikta hans – er ein av dei aller største, mest lesne og folkekjære spanske diktarane.
Han var fødd i Sevilla – «Min barndom er minne om ein patio i Sevilla, ein klar frukthage der sitrontreet mognar» – men budde det meste av sitt vaksne liv på høgsletta i innlandet Castilla, mellom anna fem år som fransklektor i den gamle kastiljanske byen Soria. Litteraturhistorisk tilhøyrer han den såkalla 98-generasjonen, som fekk namnet sitt etter det året då Spania miste dei siste oversjøiske koloniane sine – Cuba og Filippinane. Denne hendinga førde til ei oppvakning og krise i Spania, både politisk, sosialt og kulturelt, etter eit hundreår med vanstyre, stagnasjon og borgarkrigar. Det store spørsmålet vart: Kva er Spania? Kva bind oss saman, kva er verdigrunnlaget vi kviler på som nasjon? Denne sjølvransakinga fall saman med oppkoma av ein ny og uvanleg gåverik diktargenerasjon, med namn som Miguel de Unamuno, Pio
Baroja, Azorin, Valle-Inclan og altså Antonio Machado. Det som batt desse saman og gav dei eit felles generasjonsnamn, var nettopp Spania-spørsmålet. Dei nærma seg spørsmålet med stort alvor, og eitt av svara dei fann, kan, i stikkordsform, kallast Castilla. Castilla med det barske og strenge landskapet av endelause sletter, isnande kulde om vinteren og ei brennande sol om sumaren, eit hardført og nøysamt folkeferd. Det var her, framfor alt, at dei meinte å finna Spanias sjel. Antonio Machado identifiserer seg med, og syng om, dette landskapet. Antonio Machado døydde i eksil i Frankrike.
Til sengs med Machado
Olav H. Hauge (1908–1994) sette Antonio Machado høgt, det kan me lesa or dagbøkene hans. Frå Hauge tok til å interessera seg for spansk dikting i 1960-åra og fram til 1989, nemner han Machado elleve gonger. Den 21. april 1967 les han Machado i svensk omsetjing og seier mellom anna: «Gode, forneme dikt. Sprungne av hjarta, song og visjon. Streng form. Cezanne. Dette har vore ein gild dag. Til sengs, midt i vårvinna, med Machado!» 24. juli 1977 skriv han, m.a. «For meg er Machado diktaren». 17. februar 1979: «ENDELEG EIN SOM ER SAMD MED MEG ‘Good poets are sparing in the use of metaphors; but their metaphors at times are real creations.’ Machado.»
Har dei så noko sams som diktarar,desse to?
Tematisk kan ein finna ei rekkje parallellar – allusjonar til det private, til barndomsminne, til ungdomstid, til kjærleik, draum, sorg og tap. Dei er begge sterkt knytte til landskapet der dei bur, som i dikta ofte blir transformert til indre landskap, til sjelebilete. Machado i «Kastiljanske landskap»:
Der, i det høge landet
der Duero formar sin pilboge
rundt Soria, mellom blyfarga åsar
og flekker av sliten eikeskog,
flakkar mitt hjarta omkring, i draumar...
Hauge i «Du leitar»:
Som elvi i haustneter
leitar i regnmyrke
skogar og mumlar
i skodde og regn
under grønskiml og tros
og solsvidde bar, –
slik famlar ditt minne
i sine skuggeskogar
og leitar som elvi
ei haustnatt, til det finn att
halvgløymde far.
Ingen av dei to er framande for eksistensielle tema, og i desse to dikta er metaforbruken slåande lik. Machado:
Vandrar, dine fotefar
er vegen, og inkje anna
vandrar, det finst ingen veg,
vegen blir til medan du går.
Medan du går blir vegen til,
og når du ser deg attende
Ser du stigen du
aldri meir skal trå.
Vandrar, det finst ingen veg,
berre strime i havet.
Og Hauge («Din veg»):
Ingen har varda den vegen
du skal gå
ut i det ukjende
ut i det blå.
Dette er din veg.
Berre du
skal gå han. Og det er
uråd å snu.
Og ikkje vardar du vegen,
du hell.
Og vinden stryk ut ditt far
i aude fjell.
Felles dåm
Personleg tykkjer eg at dikta til Machado og Hauge har ein sams dåm over seg. Det er noko med den direkte tonen, den knappe uttrykksmåten, økonomiseringa med adjektiv... Bileta er ofte henta frå ein tradisjonelt mannleg sfære, det er med på å gje dikta ein mandig tone – eit preg av
virilitet. I dei to fylgjande dikta seier dei noko om tilhøvet sitt til diktekunsten ved å bruka bilete som sverd og pil og boge:
Machado i «Portrett»:
Er eg klassikar eller romantikar? Eg veit ikkje. Mine vers ville eg etterlata
slik hærføraren forlèt sitt sverd:
navnkunnigt for den mandige hand som svinga det,
ikkje omtykt for smedens dyktige handverk.
Hauge i «Akestes»:
Pili til fyrstemann dirrar i masti,
snori er avskoti, og den bundne duva
som letta på flog, er dotti
for ei visshøv pil.
Likevel spenner du bogen, du gråhærde Akestes, du må,
vågar det skotet, den pili –
Den rådande retninga i spansk lyrikk på tida til 98-generasjonen var modernismen. Den spanske modernismen var sterkt påverka av latinamerikansk modernisme (Ruben Dario) og fransk symbolisme og fekk i ettertid mykje å seia for spansk dikting. Typisk for denne retninga var ei
søkjing etter det aristokratiske, estetiske, eksotiske og subjektive. Ho lét seg påverka av andre kunstformer som musikk og skulptur og hadde som ideal det sanseleg vakre og «kunst for kunsten si skuld». Ho forkasta det kvardagslege og jordnære. Antonio Machado var nok påverka
av modernismen, men han tok òg klar avstand frå det kunstsynet som rådde der. Han var svært oppteken av den spanske røyndomen han hadde rundt seg, av det spanske folket og deira lagnad og av naturen på det kastiljanske slettelandet, på lik line med dei andre i 98-generasjonen. Sjølv
seier han: «Eg tenkte at det poetiske element ikkje låg i den lydlege kvaliteten til ordet og heller ikkje i fargen eller i lina eller i ei samling sanseinntrykk, men i ei djup sjeleleg rørsle.» Diktet skal korkje vera pynt eller logisk tanke, men gripa augneblinken:
Ikkje hard og evig marmor
ikkje musikk eller måleri
men ord i tid.
Vel kjent er Olav H. Hauges ironiske blikk på sitt eige tilhøve til modernismen i «Gamal diktar prøver seg som modernist » – han med ville prøva «desse nye styltrone».
Var Hauge samd med Machado i synet på modernismen?
Hauge var i alle høve ikkje redd for å dikta om det kvardagslege og det han hadde rundt seg. Han seier i «Eg har tri dikt»:
Eit godt dikt
skal lukta av te.
Eller av rå
mold og nykløyvd ved.
Røtene
Den meiningsberande funksjonen til ordet synest vera den viktigaste for han. I diktet «Bøn» heiter det:
Opn mine augo, Herre,
so eg kan betre sjå
underet, ikkje berre avglansen utanpå.
Som versemål kunne både Hauge og Machado nytta tradisjonelle strofeformer med røter langt attende i folkeleg tradisjon, Hauge ned sine folkeviseliknande strofer; Machado bruka romansen (balladen), som på si side har røter i dei gamle spanske heltedikta. Men begge bruka òg gjerne sonetten – denne klassiske diktforma som med dei strenge formkrava sine gjerne blir sedd på som den mest krevjande. At Hauge las Machado, har me eit vakkert uttrykk for i diktet «Snø i Castilla»:
I Castilla helsar dei snøen like velkomen
som me helsar aldeblomen um våren.
Difor syng Machado so vakkert um snø,
snø på Castillas solbrende rustraude berg!
Ein skugge søv under snøen på oljegreinene,
eg kjem i hug hagane heime
som ofte vert skadde av frost.
I diktet «Snø i Castilla» fører Olav H. Hauge saman dei to heimane sine, heimstaden i Ulvik med dikting og aldehagar og den store bokheimen, verdslitteraturen. I dagbøkene seier han det sjølv slik: «Økland segjer eg lever i Ulvik, i dikti mine. Eg lever no berre halvveges der, den andre heimen har vore i litteraturen» (12. april 1989). Kanskje kan diktet «Snø i Castilla» symbolisera
eit heilt levd liv?
Elisabet Vallevik er tidlegare spansklektor
lørdag 2. august 2008
Visornas hemside
Tebordet.com presenterar stolt visornas hemsida
Spennende svensk hjemmeside for viseinteresserte! Tebordet.com har lagt ut tusen tekster på nettet - så her kan du bli en stund.... I tekstdatabasen finner du bl.a. tekster av Dan Andersson og Gustaf Fröding. Er du interessert i visetekstforfattere på 1700-tallet/1800-tallet,finner du utfyllende stoff om dette også. God reise!
Spennende svensk hjemmeside for viseinteresserte! Tebordet.com har lagt ut tusen tekster på nettet - så her kan du bli en stund.... I tekstdatabasen finner du bl.a. tekster av Dan Andersson og Gustaf Fröding. Er du interessert i visetekstforfattere på 1700-tallet/1800-tallet,finner du utfyllende stoff om dette også. God reise!
Abonner på:
Kommentarer (Atom)