Ofterdingen and Kropotkin: May 2012

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Hat K. Konkursdelikte begangen?

The peculiar similarity between retweets and spam || R. 'had once told me that he wished to become a spy, but was not sure who to approach' || Paris ganz Wahrheit, Versailles ganz Lüge, und diese Lüge losgelassen durch den Mund Thiers’. [...]: „Sie können sich auf mein Wort verlassen, das ich nie gebrochen habe!“ | Paris all truth, Versailles all lie, and this lie issued via Thiers' mouth [...]: "You may trust my word which I have never broken!" (Karl Marx, Der Bürgerkrieg in Frankreich, MEW 17, p.349, transl. mine) || The Scarlett Empress: http://ow.ly/b5ozz || "Interspersed with shots of a marital partner she now senses to be a dangerously unhinged imbecile [...]" (link) || "R. said that the constant flow of information was best compared to an unending orgasm, necessitating the continual removal of its euphoric product." || Es hielt ängstlich die angebornen Schönheiten seines alten Systems aufrecht und fügte obendrein alle Kniffe des zweiten Kaiserreichs hinzu, seinen wirklichen Despotismus und seine Scheindemokratie, seine politischen Blendwerke und seine finanziellen Schwindeleien, seine hochtrabenden Phrasen und seine gemeinen Taschenspielerkünste. | Anxiously it maintained the hereditary beauty of its old system and furthermore added to it all the ruses of the second empire, its real despotism, its phony democracy, its political deceptions and its financial frauds, its grandiloquent phraseology and its base arts of legerdemain. (Karl Marx, Der Bürgerkrieg in Frankreich, MEW 17, p.5, transl. mine) || "I cannot tell you where Robinson finally found his Utopia."

Monday, May 14, 2012

back to front

The dry cleaner who wears the T-Shirt inside out that says "kcaB ot eht erutuF" || School teachers suffer a good deal from having to listen to this sort of twaddle from proud parents, but they usually get their own back when the time comes to write their end-of-year reports. If I were a teacher, I would cook up some real scorchers for the children of the doting parents. "Your son Maximilian," I would write, "is a total wash-out. I hope you have a family business you can push him into when he leaves school because he sure as heck won't get a job anywhere else." Or, if I were feeling lyrical that day, I might write, "It is a curious truth that grasshoppers have their hearing organs in the sides of their abdomen. Your daughter, Vanessa, judging by what she's learnt this term, has no hearing organs at all." (R. Dahl quoted in M. Talbot "The Candy Man", The New Yorker, July 11, 2005, p.94) || His childhood had been overshadowed by sickness. However, despite the threat of scrofula and recurrent bouts of fever, he had succeeded in clearing the hurdle of adolescence with the aid of good nursing and fresh air; and after this his nerves had rallied, had overcome the languor and lethargy of chlorosis, and had brought his body to its full physical development. (J.-K. Huysmans, Against Nature, Penguin, 1959, p.18) || Auch zu seinen immer wieder gescheiterteten Versuchen, in der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft Fuß zu fassen, hat er weder kritisch, die soziale Reglementierung betreffend, noch selbstkritisch Stellung genommen. Obschon es zeitweilig scheinen mochte, als habe er sich von den Beschränkungen seiner im Verhältnis zu den kulturtragenden Schichten unterprivilegierten Herkunft emanzipiert, gelang es ihm nie, das Gespenst der Verarmung und Deklassierung zu bannen [...] || On his continually failing attempts to enter bourgeois society he never commented, neither critically on the rules of society, nor self-critically. Although it may have appeared intermittently as if he had emancipated himself from the limitations of a descent that was underprivileged in relation to the upper cultural strata, he never managed to banish the spectre of impoverishment and decline of social standing. (WG Sebald, "Bis an den Rand der Natur: Versuch über Stifter" in Die Beschreibung des Unglücks, Fischer, 2003, p.19, transl. mine)

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Die Velozipedistinnen

Audacity but insufficient balance

Wednesday, May 09, 2012

fata morgana

...and evening full of the linnets' wings || In the context of European royalty, a morganatic marriage is a marriage between people of unequal social rank, which prevents the passage of the husband's titles and privileges to the wife and any children born of the marriage. It is also known as a left-handed marriage because in the wedding ceremony the groom holds his bride's right hand with his left hand instead of his right. || Als morganatische Ehe (lat. matrimonium morganaticum, mittellateinische Neubildung zu althochdeutsch morgangeba, „Morgengabe“) oder Ehe zur linken Hand bezeichnet man eine im europäischen Adel nicht selten vorkommende Form der Ehe, bei der einer der beiden Ehepartner (meistens die Frau) von niedrigerem Stand war als der andere. (wiki) || Die Nachmittagssonne war schon ziemlich tief zu Rüste gegangen, und spann schon manchen rothen Faden zwischen den dunklen Tannenzweigen herein, von Ast zu Ast springend, zitternd und spinnend durch die vielzweigigen Augen der Himbeer- und Brombeergesträuche – daneben zog ein Hänfling sein Lied wie ein anderes dünnes Goldfädchen von Zweig zu Zweig, entfernte Berghäupter sonnten sich ruhig, die vielen Morgenstimmen des Waldes waren verstummt, denn die meisten der Vögel arbeiteten, oder suchten schweigend in den Zweigen herum. (A. Stifter, Der Hochwald, link) || Already the afternoon sun had sunk far, and here and there already spun red threads between the dark fir branches, bouncing from bough to bough, trembling and weaving through the thickly wooded eyes of the rasperry and blackberry bushes - beside it a linnet drew its song like another wispy golden strand from branch to branch, distant mountain tops calmly faced the sun, the many morning voices of the forest had fallen quiet, since most of the birds laboured or searched silently among the branches. (Stifter, Der Hochwald, my transl.) || Erlaubte ihm Berlin noch die Illusion, als Kosmopolit unbemerkt passieren zu können, so wird es ihm mit jedem Abstecher in die Provinz klarer, wie ungeheuer und unbewohnbar sein Gastland geworden ist; nicht umsonst hat er dessen Namen zumeist verkürzt auf die fast lautlose Buchstabenfolge Dtschld., die anmutet wie eine Metapher der Lieblosigkeit. (WG Sebald, "Ein Kaddisch für Österreich - Über Joseph Roth") || While Berlin still granted the illusion that as a cosmopolitan he might remain unnoticed, with every side trip to the provinces it becomes clearer to him just how monstrous and uninhabitable his host country has become; it is no accident that he mostly abbreviated its name to the almost soundless sequence of letters Dtschld., which seems to be a metaphor for lovelessness. (WG Sebald, "On Joseph Roth", my transl.) || ...und der Abend voller Hänflingschwingen.

Ofterdingen and Kropotkin