Longley’s love of language
Today’s global lit class was Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell. Our tutor for the day was taken with the colourful turns of phrase: grated Parmesan is “sprinkle cheese,” given names are “front names” and sanity is described as a condition in which one’s “parts are gathered.”
Not having the lecturer’s notes, I copied the above from the NYT Review of Books, which bore a suspicious similarity to her lecture. I guess that’s a quick way to give a lecture.
After class I went across the street to the Ulster Museum to see local poet Michael Longley do a selection of readings relating to the Great War. He read some of his own poems about his father, who served in WWI, and some poems by Siegfried Sassoon, Isaac Rosenberg and Keith Douglas, all three veterans of the two great wars, only one of who survived. I’d never heard of Rosenberg and Douglas, however it was moving to see the reverence Longley had for these men, for their language and their sensitivity and their bravery. Who else but a man who has spent his life crafting poetry could have an exquisite appreciation for the work of other poets. Below is The Dug-Out by Sassoon an link to a poem by Rosenberg.
The Dug-Out,
Why do you lie with your legs ungainly huddled,
And one arm bent across your sullen, cold,
Exhausted face? It hurts my heart to watch you,
Deep-shadowed from the candle's guttering gold;
And you wonder why I shake you by the shoulder;
Drowsy, you mumble and sigh and turn your head...
You are too young to fall asleep for ever;
And when you sleep you remind me of the dead.
11-8