Posted on by Richard Dove

Czechs bouncing

The Vlatava at Prague
RICHARD DOVE loves a sonic celebration of ‘Czechness’

Snesi bych ti modre z nebe – I will bring you the blue from the sky.  This Czech saying was writ large for the two nights the Czech Philharmonic, led by conductor Jakub Hrůša, took over the Proms.  This was music and performance from the depths of the soul – the effort clearly in evidence as the conductor wiped sweat from his brow and dried his glasses.  The performances were visceral, pure, undiluted Czech identity.

Bust of Antonín Dvořák by Josef Mařatka

Dvorak’s Cello Concerto opened these strident proceedings, with soloist Anastasia Kobekina delivering both passion and power.  It is difficult to comprehend why, initially, Dvorak considered the cello insufficient for a solo concerto, having considered the upper registers of the instrument too nasal and the lower register as a mumble. This work confounds both views, having been described by some as the greatest cello concerto. Kobekina’s playing exuded the gentleness of a breath and the crack of a crescendo. 

Josef Suk

The Symphony in C Minor (‘Asrael’) by Dvorak’s protégé and son-in-law, Josef Suk, saw the Czech Philharmonic at its passionate best with this highly emotional work.  It was composed after his mentor’s death and the death at 27 of Suk’s wife, who was Dvorak’s daughter – a veritable dance with death.  Like the poems of ecstasy by Zemlinsky and Scriabin, this intense, thickly-textured work is not played nearly enough. This music is almost a distillation of Czech identity, where life is arduous but the spirit can still soar. The reception was thunderous and enduring. We had all danced with death and triumphed. 

Vítězslava Kaprálová

The second night was devoted to Jancek and Dvorak and a premier performance of Vítězslava Kaprálová’s Military Sinfonietta. Kaprálová’s story is another tragedy – a brilliant student who died in 1940, aged just 25. This is a work that seems to define the triumph and desolation of war. It is no hymn to glorious victory but combines cries of despair and the rhythmic roar of a battalion advancing.

The fiendishly difficult Dvorak Piano Concerto in G minor provided the opportunity to view the intense technical and subtle skills of rising Japanese star Mao Fujita. When not playing, Fujita turned towards the orchestra embracing this complete work. He nodded, smiled and then focused, head down at the keyboard – a soloist not apart but integral to the work, the sound and the orchestra. There were quite a few Japanese people in the audience to appreciate their new star, as we did. His fluid playing defied belief on occasions. Was that really one piano and two hands? The cheers and applause was sustained and heartfelt.  We had witnessed something very special and unique. Conductor Hrůša seemed to merge with the orchestra with his intense gestures and visual cues. This was not conducting, but living and breathing the music.

Leoš Janáček

The evening closed with the gigantic Glagolitic Mass by Leoš Janáček. The orchestra was joined by the Prague Philharmonic Choir and soloists soprano Corinne Winters and mezzo soprano Bella Adamova, along with tenor David Butt Philip and bass Brindley Sherratt. As the orchestra and choir took up their places we steeled ourselves for a beautiful onslaught. The Archbishop of Olomouc had suggested to Janáček a Mass in Old Church Slavonic (which uses the Glagolitic alphabet). The final version of the work was completed in 1928, with the addition of a gargantuan organ solo. The idea appealed to the composer’s pan-Slavism; he saw the ancient language as the ancient wellspring of Czech culture. The orchestra played as if they embodied that culture and those traditions. The silvery strings and ‘Central European’ brass achieved an authentic Middle European sound in this extraordinary, atavistic work.  Again, the thought occurs that the Czech Philharmonic was, before us, curating their heritage in this modern sound with ancient roots.  We roared at the end and almost refused to let the performers leave the stage.  In the slightly revised words of Czech playwright Tom Stoppard: “Notes are sacred.  They deserve respect.  If you get the right ones in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.”  As we headed home, our worlds had all been nudged, not a little but a lot.

Posted on by A Z Foreman

Sleeping Baal

A. Z. FOREMAN is a literary translator, poet and language teacher currently working on a doctorate in Near Eastern Languages at the Ohio State University. He received his B.A. in Linguistics from the University of Chicago, and his M.A. in Arabic Language from the University of Maryland. His translations from Arabic, Chinese, Old Irish, Italian, Russian, Old English, Ukrainian, Yiddish and Welsh have appeared in sundry anthologies, journals and a BBC radio broadcast. These poems were written during an archaeological survey for Old Arabic inscriptions in the Jordanian Harrah

The rain-torrents have turned old ruins up

like writings re-incised by their old pens…

…I stopped to question them. But how to question

immutably mute stones that speak no sense?

وجلا السيول عن الطلول كانها    زبر تجد متونها اقلامها

فوقفت اسألها وكيف سؤالنا     صما خوالد ما يبين كلامها

               — from a Jāhilī  poem attributed to Labīd bin Rabī’ah

            1. Arriving in Amman

With speakers’ call to prayer, a minaret

hails me synthetic welcome. Radios.

Shawarma. Shisha. Soon the body glows

with a heat dryer than the brow is wet.

Twelve greetings later, on a car-loud street

pink with the ancient sun about to set,

the mind is red for something waiting yet

out there, where time still goes on deathless feet

in sand, on black torched rocks no hand has scratched

since Rome made war, where other Arabs spread

tears for a drought, a beast, a man outmatched,

or scraped song shards:

                                    Mot feasts. Brute death eats yet.       

The interchange of night and day is set.                               

Baal sleeps. He only sleeps. He is not dead[1].                        

            2. Into the Harrah

We wake into black morning, race the dawn

down Baghdad highway with the Bedouin,

riding no camels now but a Nissan,

to meet the leavings of their ancient kin

wheeling through stonelands down a knotting route

whose winds like secrets only one man tells

blow ears hot, till dark rocks force us on foot

to enter the most beautiful of hells

where, hard up a stone-scaled, day-blasted hill

I climb and clasp my way in sweat until

we reach the written vestige of a man

that has outfaced the centuries’ churning reigns

before my feet:           “by Māsek ben Sahrān,         

The year he rose and shattered Caesar’s chains”     

            3. Desert Remembrance at Noon

Stop and let us weep in memory

— from a Jāhilī poem attributed to Imru’-l-Qays

This is where brutal things are beautiful.

Almighty silence, stone and sun command

everything. Nothing living here can stand

alone. Alone is slow death as a fool.

You must foot up these rocks where visions bend

in air throbbed like a feverish head, and jewel

yourself with grit-toned sweat to comprehend

water’s real taste.

                                    This earth was great and cruel

to men who wrought and died and somehow thrived

at dice with Shahs and Caesars. The austere

received them like a palace. Their inscribed

names still immune to deadly heavens out here

on letter-chumbled stone call back in me:

Stop here and weep with us in memory…

            4. The Last Ride of Ghayyār-el

By Ghayyār-el ben Ghawth of the line of Hathāy when he rode from his folk

      He camps for war

            So be his final campment here today

      Fame for him is first

            So be his final campment here today

      He suffers who returns

            So be his final campment here today

He has gone to the outlands to stay in the heath and watch for his uncle Sakrān..

               — inscription from Marabb al-Shurafā’

            Too long he’s waited for Sakrān out here

with the clan’s camp. The raid should have been done

before that barrow’s shadow was even near

darkening up his tent. But now the sun

            unslowable by gods or jinns or men

reddens down till the desert seems to burn

cold at his prayer: Allāt let him return.

So, saddling up, he camels out again

for outlands. The carved words he leaves behind

shrill on a stone that heavied a god’s mind

survive the night and more. He camps for war.

So be his final campment here today.

He suffers who returns.

                                                An arrow tore

the kid’s skull. Old Sakrān was on his way.

            5. Sā’ed Avenged

By Sā’ed son of Mar’ son of Nūr. He grieved for his brother Nūr whom the Nabataeans killed when he was pasturing the livestock of the tribes of Awīdh and Thlayp, so O Allāt of Oman and goddess of Dathan and Gadd of Awīdh and Gadd of Thlayp, let him have revenge against him that did this.

               — Inscription C 2445

            The night went long on Sā’ed down the plain,

eyes pricked by ceaseless stars. Cuff eyes that weep

at rock and tentmark. Time had come to keep

the vow. Make Raqmo bleed. Nūr had been slain

               by the town-squatters cowering again

behind their king and walls. So charged the owl

loud on the cairn with carnage in its howl:

Your arrows on Nabato for your pain!

He and the heart were up. Thlayp and Awīdh

were at his back as day began to breathe,

like a hot godhead ready to speak flame

inhaling brief cool. The damned convoy came

from Raqmo’s gate. Bows ended five. Eight others

bleeding alive.

                        And all thirteen had brothers.

            6. Return to Amman, feeling ill from a burger

Considering how natural men survive

with man and nature both as enemies

when honor is the balm to keep alive

with violence pandemic like disease,

where empire is an organ of the fates

that shape your tribe as surely as the sun

kills and revives land,             I, a child of states,

recall, tonight in New Rabbath Ammon[2],

the stones man-worked and heaved for a dead woman

beside a wadi. There no practical

mind-skidding struggle could repress the human

rite of a megalithic funeral

against a godless world their gods redeem.

Baal sleeps. I am awake to hear him dream.

بلينا وما تبلى النجوم الطوالع        وتبقى الجبال بعدنا والمصانع

                                             We perish and rot 　

                                             　　but the rising stars do not.

                                             　When we are gone,

                                             　　　the hills and stoneworks stay.

                                                            —  Labīd bin Rabī’a

[1]                  A paraphrase of North Arabian inscription KRS 2453, a good candidate for the earliest recorded piece of Arabic poetry. Based on decipherment by Al-Jallad.

[2]                  “Rabbath Ammon”, the Biblical name for the Ammonite capital located on the same site as the modern city of Amman

Posted on by Victoria Moul

Verses and translations by Victoria Moul

VICTORIA MOUL is a critic, poet and translator living in Paris. Recent poems have appeared or are forthcoming in PNReview, bad lilies, Black Iris, Modern Poetry in Translation, The Dark Horse and Ancient Exchanges. She reviews regularly for The Friday Poem and the TLS. She writes a weekly substack on poetry and translation, Horace & friends (https://vamoul.substack.com/)

Seta and Sporophyte

If this were Ovid, Seta would have been

A slim bright girl, whose bead of blood

One day ran down her inner thigh, a seed

Threaded across the warp of veins

Vermilion on cream and blue. He took

Such pleasure in the colour that he slew

Her just to satisfy himself and draw the skein

Of red from her rotting body; a damp, fine

And part translucent sort of stem, though not

To bear a flower, but his tensed pouch, the Sporophyte.

(Seta and sporophyte are terms referring to parts of moss. I had in mind particularly a common moss in which the sporophyte – spore-bearing structure – is formed of a stem-like seta, bright red and standing straight up from the main body of the moss, bearing dark red capsules. None of the transformations in Ovid’s Metamorphoses refer to moss, but I was struck by the coincidence of the technical term Seta and the Sita of Indian mythology.)

Three poems from The Sanskrit

The Subhasitaratnakosha is a huge 11th century anthology of Sanskrit verse and verse quotations. It was compiled by a Buddhist monk but most of the contents are not (or not obviously) Buddhist, and date from several centuries earlier. It includes some poetry attributed to women.

Subhasitaratnakosha no. 999

As the grime and caustic iron

Of North Sea water, somehow laid

Precisely in the spotless scoop

Of shell is filtered by a cloud

And turns to pearl as sweet and clear

As April rain: so can you raise

The warm and grubby coins of envy

To the gold of praise.

no. 998

Your glory in this world and the next, it is

The ribcage of that royal bird, the soul:

The waters of the seven seas

Fill, like a skull, his little drinking bowl.

Lokāloka is the name of a mountain which is both in and out of the world (loka and aloka), marking the boundary between death and life. The Raghuvamsha by Kālidāsa is a long Sanskrit poem about the lineage of Raghu, and at this point in the poem it is concerned with a difficulty in conceiving a child. Kālidāsa is often considered to have been the greatest poet and playwright of ancient India.

Lokāloka (Raghuvamsha 1.68)

The clouds in Calvi steam on the mountain top:

From the pool we watch them teeter, stir, disperse.

My father has just died

But unbeknownst to me somewhere inside

Dividing cells will in a few months reassemble

His closed eyes.

Two versions of Horace

After Horace, Odes 1.30 O Venus, regina Cnidi Paphique

Mary, queen of Walsingham, forget

Your darling Norfolk; turn to hear

In Lowestoft and Dartmouth Park, the thrum

            Of womens’ prayer.

Come with a child, the blazing boy, and bring

The Muses, skirts up to dance; allow

Also the elderly to attend your train;

            And Christ your son.

After Horace, Odes 3.22

The only baby in all of Horace (Odes 3.22)

Lady of the hills and woods

Hear me when my time is come

Preserve me from all dangers and

            Heed too your son.

Above my house a pine-tree looms

And every day that passes I

Pray that one day my baby shall

            Stand as high.

Spare me then the staggered blows

Of a slow labour, or

A dead child. Bring us torn but

            Safe to shore.

Two Translations of Casimir Sarbiewski

Casimir Sarbiewski (1595-1640) was a Polish Jesuit poet who wrote in Latin. His poetry was an enormous success across Europe in the seventeenth century, with a particularly enthusiastic readership in England.

After Sarbiewski – ‘De divino amore’

Last week I watched Love mending his nets

 (Very dextrous he is too)

His gear was all gold: hooks and line

            The bait, the flies, even the worm.

He was golden himself: but for all his gleam he could find

            No waters to fish in. He asked

“Where then can I cast?”

Pass your nets, boy, to the fisher of men:

In his sea

Packed and wriggling you’ll catch

Men and women like me.

De puero Iesu nato

— Is anything more precious than this child of mine?

Whose mouth with running honey wells and fills again,

As balsam flows unstained in streams that do not fail,

And nectar runs in rivers, free and unconstrained.

In his still curls the stars themselves are bound and borne

And on his nape the locks of heaven turn in light.

Could any mother comb such dazzling weight by hand,

Of he who has been born from shiver of starlight?

— His birth is of the royal line, but royalty is obsolete;

And soonest born he’s lain in filth of foreign town,

His right hand grasps at straw, and clings to scraps of hay,

A baby swaddled only by the chill of snow.

Is anything worth less to us than such a child today?

Posted on by Liam Guilar

Three translations from Culhwch ac Owen

LIAM GUILAR is the poetry editor of The Brazen Head. These are three of his translations from the medieval Welsh prose tale, Culhwch ac Olwen (i.m. Michael Alexander)

Translating Culhwch ac Olwen

In popular films the sexy treasure hunter/archaeologist

(they conflate the two, much to my trowel wielding friends’ dismay)

who’s fluent in every lost forgotten ancient language,

confronting the inscription on the recently uncovered wall,

or gazing at the long lost rediscovered legendary text,

looks, then translates, without a pause, the symbols

into fluent, idiomatic, contemporary American.

The reality goes more like this:

Kilyd son of Kledon Wledic

Wanted a wife as noble as himself.

Here is the woman he wanted.

Goleudyt daughter of Anlawd Wledic.

So far so good.

After they stayed together What? Gwest Ah, see note.

They spent the night together. Is that too direct?

The verb’s related to the one for copulation.

They came together. After they were married

….bland. After they slept together,

no, the story teller could have used kysgu gan.

The cruder options? No. Not here. What follows?

The country went to pray they ?might have? offspring

And they got a child/boy through the prayers of the country.

And from the hour she captured, caught?

The next word’s definitely ‘pregnant’. Another note.

‘Became pregnant’ though literally ‘caught pregnancy’.

As though it were an illness, perhaps better than ‘fell pregnant’

which evokes abrupt decline, or woman, falling?

Then she went wild/feral. Another note.

‘She went mad’. Mad or wild is somewhere you go to

in this case beyond the civilised boundaries.

She’s gone mad and won’t go near a building.

Wouldn’t enter a building?

And from the time that she was pregnant,

She went wild and wouldn’t enter any building.

And when her time came, she came to her good sense.

You go mad but come to your senses. The payoff’s here, 

the sudden twist estranging your own language.

You go out of your mind as though it were a car,

and you could leave in the car park to return to

when finished being mad and needed it again. Anyway,

what’s next? Pigs!? What? We’re up to line 7, only

one thousand two hundred and thirty eight to go.

May I marry your daughter?

(The giant Ysbaddaden Pencawr knows he will die when Olwen, his beautiful daughter, marries. Understandably, he doesn’t welcome her suitors. But Culhwch has been told that if he doesn’t marry Olwen, he will never marry anyone. He and his six companions set out to ask the giant for her hand in marriage. What isn’t stated but becomes obvious is that the giant can’t be killed until his daughter is married.)

They killed the nine gatekeepers,

and not a man cried out.

They killed their nine huge mastiffs;

not one so much as squealed.

And so they came into the hall.

‘Ysbaddaden Pencawr! Greetings

in the name of God and man!’

‘You, where are you going?’

‘We seek your daughter, Olwen,

for Culhwch son of Kilyd.’

‘Where are those rascal servants?

Where are those ruffians of mine?

Raise up the forks under my eyelids

so I can see my future son in law.’

This they did. ‘Come back tomorrow

I’ll have an answer for you then.’

He had three stone spears beside him,

each tipped with poison.

As they turned to go he seized one

and flung it after them.

Bedwyr caught it and hurled it back,

piercing the giant through his knee cap.

‘Cursed savage son in law!

It will be worse for me when I go downhill.

Like the sting of a gadfly,

the poisoned iron has hurt me.

Cursed be the smith who made it

and the anvil on which it was forged.‘              

They stayed that night at Custennin’s house.

And on the second day, they set out to the hall,

in majesty, with fine combs in their hair.

‘Ysbaddaden Pencawr,

give us your daughter.

In return for her dowry and marriage fee

to you and her two kinswomen.

And if we don’t get her from you;

you’ll get your death from us.’

‘Her four great-grandmothers

and her four great-grandfathers

are still alive. I must consult them.’

‘You do that. We’ll go eat.’

He took the second spear

and hurled it after them.

Menw mab Teirgwaedd

caught it and threw it back.

It pierced the centre of his chest

and sprung out the small of his back.

‘Cursed savage son in law.

The pain of this hard iron

is like the sting of a horse-leech.

Cursed be the forge wherein it was heated.

Now, when I go uphill,

there will be a tightness in my chest,

stomach aches and frequent nausea.’ 

They went to their food.

On the third day they came to the court.

‘Ysbaddaden Pencawr,

stop throwing spears at us.

Do not wish hurt and harm

and death upon yourself.’

‘My eyelids have fallen over my eyeballs –

Where are my servants, raise up the forks

so I may look on my future son in law.’

They arose, and as they rose,

he took the third spear

and hurled it at them. This time,

Culhwch caught it and threw it back,

and as he wished, it pierced the eyeball

went through and out the back of his neck.

‘Cursed savage son in law.

As long as I live the sight in one eye

will be worse than the other.

Whenever I walk in the wind it will water.

I’ll have headaches and giddiness

at the start of each moon.

Cursed be the forge that heated it.

Worse than the bite of a mad dog

is the sting of its poisoned iron.’

Next day they came to the court.

‘Don’t attack us anymore.

You’ll bring hurt and harm

and martyrdom to yourself.

Give us your daughter.’

‘Which one of you was told to seek her?’

‘Me, Culhwch, son of Kilyd.’

‘Come here so I can see you.’

A chair was placed under him,

so they could be face to face.

‘Is it you who seeks my daughter?’

‘I do.’ ‘Give me your word

that you’ll be just?’ ‘I give it.’

‘When you give me what I name,

then you will have my daughter.’

‘Name what you want.’

The Lame Ant

(Ysbaddaden gives Culhwch forty impossible tasks. This poem tells how one of them is achieved. Gwythyr is one of Culhwch’s companions.)

As Gwythyr mab Greidawl

was crossing a mountain,

he heard lamentations:

a most bitter wailing.

Dreadful this noise.

He rushed towards it

drawing his sword,

cutting the anthill

off at the ground

saving the ants from

the blistering flames.

‘God’s blessing and ours upon you,’

they said to him.

‘And that which no man can recover

we will recover for thee.’

These were the ants

who collected the flax,

all the nine hestors

Ysbaddaden demanded.

But one seed was missing.

Until just before sunset.

it was finally brought in

by the last, limping ant.

Posted on by Clarence Caddell

Two poems by Clarence Caddell

CLARENCE CADDELL lives on sheep and cattle country in Victoria’s Western District, where he teaches high school English and humanities. He edits The Borough (theboroughpoetry.com), a journal scheduled for launch in September. The poems published here will be collected into the manuscript to be entitled ‘Broken Words,’ a narrative of marital conflict and eventual divorce.  

Digital Memories

I think we are immovable by now.

   Or what might happen?—What and how

Exactly? Rather, when will it fall, our last

   Embrace before the endless fast?

I wonder too if in succeeding time

   Nostalgia for our distant prime

Will see me find again and contemplate

   Hot selfies you once sent as bait.

Home Is Not Sad

What happened to us was unthinkable 

As matter in itself, of how our house

Kept standing in our absence like a fool,

So lacking in the least panpsychic nous

That when I first came back here without you,

Without our children, here was a cliché

It must have meant for a symbolic coup:

A pile of hearth ash by the door as grey

As were the clouds. If I had an idea

Of what it would be like, it was as far 

From this as noumenon from all these mere

Phenomena. My idiotic car

Behind, beneath that senile portico,

The lock and key spoke: ‘What we know, we know’.

Posted on by Steven Knepper

Two poems by Steven Knepper

STEVEN KNEPPER is Bruce C. Gottwald, Jr. ’81 Chair for Academic Excellence at Virginia Military Institute and editor of New Verse Review. His poems have appeared in Alabama Literary Review, First Things, Autumn Sky Poetry, Pembroke Magazine, The William and Mary Review, Pennsylvania English, Ekstasis, Grim & Gilded, and other journals.

Abandoned Well Filled In With Stones

My daughters find it in the weeds,

each mounded stone a chalky skull

hand plucked from dirt and millipedes

and loaded on a cart to haul

down to the open maw they feed—

a task to fill a fear inside,

children that leaned, and fell, and died.

With the Boys at the Shade Gap Picnic

A Summer in the 90s

All pray in earnest for clear skies, good weather,

no t-storms, Lord, we’re finally together,

the scattered Gap boys, late summer vacation,

to rove and roughhouse in sugared elation.

We toss rings for machetes, switchblade knives.

The winner’s mom will skin that boy alive.

Class jester Jake takes a five-dollar bet

to slurp a goldfish, wriggling and wet,

while we shoot down the slide on burlap sacks,

consume a stomach’s ache of picnic snacks:

grapenut ice cream, pizza by the slice,

pie, funnel cake, french fries, and cans of ice

cold Mountain Don’t. “B-12,” the bingo call

sings out. The barkers in each stacked-deck stall

cajole, sweet talk, and dare—cacophanize.

The tank-topped carney with the mismatched eyes

is telling us an edifying tale,

R-rated, shows us centerfolds for sale.

The ancient Ferris Wheel grinds past the stars

while lighters flare, joints glow among the cars

where grunge high-schoolers loiter. One girl flirts

with lead guitar in flannel Pearl Jam shirt.

She’s heard his demo tape. I see my crush

leave with her dad to beat the closing rush.

Exploding fireworks gleam on her hair.

Ignoring the red rain of sparks, I stare

at the spangled ponytail, a memory

to savor August weeks until I see

her on eighth grade’s first day. The evening’s slipped

away.  It’s picnic’s end. Tomorrow ripped

ride wristbands drift, all-access turned to trash.

Spent firework tubes wind-rock in beds of ash.

Posted on by Louis Hunt

Poems from Bhartrihari’s Shatakatraya (‘The Three Hundreds’)

LOUIS HUNT is a retired professor of political theory from James Madison College, Michigan State University. In addition to his work as a political theorist, he has studied Sanskrit and classical Tibetan. In Fall 2008, he lectured on politics and studied classical Tibetan at the Central Institute for Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath, India. He has published poems and translations from Sanskrit in The Rotary Dial, Autumn Sky, The Road Not Taken, Snakeskin, Lighten Up Online, Metamorphoses and Ezra. He is currently working on a volume of translations from the Sanskrit of Kalidasa, Bhartrihari and Nilakantha Dikshita.

Bhartrihari (circa 4th-5th centuries CE) was an Indian poet writing in Sanskrit about whom nothing certain is known. Some traditional sources suggest he was a Buddhist monk, others that he was a king who abandoned his throne for the life of a renunciant. The editor of the 1948 critical edition of the poems, D. D. Kosambi, called Bhartrihari, on the basis of the poems themselves, “a hungry Brahmin in distress.” He is the author of the Shatakatraya (The Three Hundreds), a collection of three thematically focused “centuries” of epigrammatic verses treating worldly wisdom, erotic love and renunciation respectively. Some of the poems traditionally ascribed to Bhartrihari may be later accretions, but the core of the Shatakatraya reveals a poet with a unique voice that is sometimes at odds with the traditional poetic conventions of classical Sanskrit literature.

Bhartrihari writes in the tradition of what is called muktaka (single-stanza) poetry. Depending on the meter employed, a single-stanza poem can range in size from 32 to 84 syllables. (There are even longer forms but none are represented in the verse chosen for these translations.) The easiest way to analyze the meter of a poem in Sanskrit is to divide it into quarter lines. These lines are generally of equal length and organized in terms of a fixed pattern of short and long syllables. Like Greek and Latin meter, Sanskrit meter depends on the balance between short and long syllables rather than the patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables familiar from English. It is impossible to reproduce these complex metrical forms in English. I have chosen instead to employ a “loose iambic” meter which attempts to reproduce the phrasing of the poems. My line breaks generally coincide with metrical pauses in the original Sanskrit. Classical Sanskrit poetry does not use end rhyme but it makes free use of various sonic patterns within the poems such as consonance and assonance, alliteration, and the repetition of the same or similar sounding words. I have used similar devices in my translations. One particularly difficult feature of translating Sanskrit poetry is the prevalence of sometimes lengthy nominal compounds. The grammar of these compounds must be unraveled and there is often more than one way to resolve them. Since it is possible to form nominal compounds freely, this feature of the Sanskrit language makes it possible to create a wide variety of synonyms for things. Such variation is impossible to reproduce in English.  Despite these linguistic and stylistic obstacles, I have tried in these translations to come up with a poetic diction that reproduces as much as possible Bhartrihari’s own.

The numbers in parentheses refer to the poem numbers in the critical edition of D.D. Kosambi, The Epigrams Attributed to Bhartrihari.

Poems from Bhartrihari’s Shatakatraya (‘The Three Hundreds’)

(64)

The sun lends its luster to the lotus pond,

the white lotus blooms by the moon’s grace,

unasked the heavy cloud bestows its rain,

the good help others of their own accord.

(13)

Only a stupid king would let these poets,

famed for the eloquent learning

they impart to the young, languish in poverty.

But, even without wealth, the wise are lords.

Jewels do not lose their luster because a fool

cannot judge their worth.

(105)

A rain cloud nurturing passion’s tree,

a welling stream of sensuous play,

the love-god’s cherished kin,

an ocean brimming with brilliant pearls,

the eyes of slender girls drunk on moonlight,

a treasure house of splendid good fortune –

The happy man will always welcome

the arrival of his tumultuous youth.

(257)

Give to the forest deer this sacred grass,

splendid as bamboo cut by a jeweled knife.

And give to the bride this betel leaf,

pale as the skin on a young girl’s cheek,

torn from its stem by her sharp, red nails.

(7)

A splendid palace, amorous girls,

a king’s brilliant white parasol –

Happiness like this is only found

when good deeds are strung together.

But when the thread snaps, see how everything scatters

like a string of pearls broken in a lovers’ quarrel.

(87)

The massing rain clouds fill the sky,

peacocks dance in the surrounding hills,

brilliant white blossoms litter the ground –

Where should the traveler turn his gaze?

(89)

A passing frown, a bashful glance,

a tremor of fright, a lover’s jest –

These young girls with their lovely faces

and darting eyes are scattered everywhere

like lotus blossoms coming into bloom.

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Mark Elder – statesman of music

RICHARD DOVE watches an eminent conductor bow out

The pause was exquisite. The silence seemed to embrace the sold-out Royal Albert Hall. The conductor was momentarily lost in a sound world of his own. He sighed and slowly exhaled. And then the eruption of applause broke the reverie.

This was Sir Mark Elder’s last performance with the Hallé Orchestra: Mahler’s Fifth Symphony. I watched as he smiled and joyously relaxed, gesturing to the orchestra. In his valedictory speech, he reminded us that he had been leading the Hallé for 25 years from its base in Manchester. “Some of you may not know where Manchester is. Well, you get the train to Crewe and keep going.”

Sir Mark Elder is now 77 and whilst stepping down as Music Director, he will still be conducting around the world.

He introduced me to opera. I read an interview with him and David Poultney on their plans for the ENO in 1979. They wanted to create a stir and bring opera to new audiences. I gave it a go, and have been giving it as go ever since.

The triumph and tragedy, exasperation and exuberance of Mahler’s Fifth seemed an entirely appropriate swan-song; an unconventional composer and an unconventional conductor. Elder liked to do things differently and was not afraid to speak out. He abandoned evening dress for the Hallé and called into question the latent jingoism of the Last Night of the Proms at the time of the Gulf War. He lost the conducting gig as a result. He was a very talented bassoonist and keyboard player who found his métier in leading and conducting. He is a fervent advocate of music in schools and reminded us in his finale speech of the importance of music in the cultural life of this country and, indeed, our own lives. He also urged us to protect and nurture the Proms Festival and not to take its continued existence for granted. It was absolutely appropriate that someone who has never been afraid to speak out and challenge orthodoxy should issue not bland platitudes about his career (“Let’s not get too sentimental”) but warn us to be on our guard and ensure that “this unique festival of music” has a future.

Sir Mark should have the last word:

I’ve tried to make the Hallé so much a part of the fabric of the city that even people who don’t appreciate the music we produce at least recognise that Manchester would be a poorer place if the Hallé did not exist. We need different sorts of music. If you can show a five years-old child a concert orchestra, they may not need that music until they are 45, but they try that and remember these people who came to school. Music is a spiritual food. We need it as much as we need fresh air and companionship, a social life or sports. Music is something to share with others. It has to have an open door.

Happy retirement.

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From the Cape to Cairo by keyboard

Olatunji Akin Euba (1935 – 2020), founder of African pianism

RICHARD DOVE enjoys African-European intercultural excellence

I still remember when I first heard the unusual rhythms and bell-like tones of the Ethiopian pianist and composer Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou.  The smell of burnt toast brought me out of a musical reverie.  I could hear the patterns of African percussion in her playing even though I had no clue as to whom I was listening to.  Emahoy was a reclusive nun who rarely gave performances.  She died last year, prompting a reissuing of her sparse recordings.

She remained my main introduction to piano composition in Africa until the arrival of a new CD – African Pianism by Rebeca Omordia – where the work of seven contemporary African composers are featured, as well Chicago-born Florence Price who was the first black female composer to have a symphony premiered in that city in 1933.

There is much to enjoy, from the Arabic timbres of Algerian composer Salim Dada and Morocco’s Nabil Benabdeljalil to the polyrhythms of Soweto-born Mokale Koapeng, who explains that in his Prelude in D he “infuses the dance elements I grew up listening to and witnessing in various townships.” 

South Africa’s Grant McLachlan composed his Sonatina for Double Bass and Piano in 2016 and the third movement, Senzeni Na? (‘What have we done?’) remains hugely popular across the country. He says, “It is a recreation for piano of an anti-apartheid protest song often sung at funerals and demonstrations…inextricably linked to the struggle for freedom and democracy.”  The piece is slow and gentle, but with a quiet rage; it is easy to imagine it being played at sombre funerals.

In contrast, Fela Sowande’s Two Preludes on Yoruba Sacred Folk Melodies is a joyful, original and, as the excellent accompanying sleeve notes by Robert Matthew-Walker reveal, “a profoundly African print with a descending quasi-scalic theme in which seconds and thirds unfurl as leaves of a flowering plant.”

Akin Euba, who died in 2020 was regarded as the most distinguished Nigerian composer, musicologist and pianist of his generation.  He was the originator of “African Pianism” which he described as a style of composition aiming to join the inherent musical syntax of Nigerian Yoruba music to the European keyboard with connotations of fundamental harmony.   Euba was a siren voice for interculturalism in composition, pointing out the similarities between the piano as a Western instrument and several Nigerian traditional instruments. Wakar Duru is Euba’s arrangement of three of Nigeria’s most popular Yoruba songs. One can imagine the piece being played in a concert hall or in a rural village church with feet tapping or bodies swaying depending on location.

This recording is volume 2 of Rebeca Omordia’s exploration of the rich diversity of African piano compositions on the innovative Somm Recordings label.  It is a constantly surprising feast of sounds, moods and emotions. Born in Romania to a Romanian mother and Nigerian father, she is hailed as an African classical music pioneer and is the artistic director of the world’s first ever African Concert Series at the Wigmore Hall in London. This is a perfect starting point for intercultural musical exploration, east, west and all points north and south. 

African Pianism Vol. 2 by Rebeca Omordia.  Somm Recordings.  SOMMCD 0688

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Bliss in the rain

RICHARD DOVE is warmed on a wet day

A rain-soaked, windy, grey Sunday afternoon on the Deal seafront and around 50 valiant, anorak-wrapped hardy souls are in deckchairs facing the Royal Marines tribute (after the 1989 Deal Bombing, in which 11 Royal Marines died) bandstand listening to the Sandwich Concert Brass Band. Can there be a more enduring English scene? As I stand and observe, I wonder if any other genre of music could attract these people to this place, given the atrocious weather.

Brass bands have warmth, whiffs of nostalgia and an enduring empathy with audiences. We are not in awe of their virtuosity. A brass band is the friendly, helpful neighbour who always has that drill bit or lawn spiker to loan you.

Sir Arthur Bliss came to mind as I sheltered and listened. He adored brass bands and was often astounded by their virtuosity: “Hearing the sound these players can produce, it did not take much to persuade me to write Kenilworth.”

The previous few days I had been listening to a new Chandos CD, Bliss: Works for Brass Band, performed by the Black Dyke Band and conducted by that musical polymath, John Wilson. Kenilworth, F13 was composed in 1936 after a visit to four Lancashire towns and Kenilworth Castle. It has everything – an up-beat march, solemn ceremony, solo fanfares, touches of melancholy and a joyous concluding march. It is music that inspires the spirits and warms the heart whatever the weather.

John Wilson has ranged far and wide across Bliss’s brass band works. A highlight is ‘Things to Come’, a suite for Alexander Korda’s film based on H G Wells’ novel The Shape of Things to Come. Wells invited Bliss to compose the music for the film even before filming began. Bliss joined the production team to modify and embellish the score during shooting. The excellent sleeve notes note that the March melody is sorrowful in character, suggesting a weary humanity locked in never-ending strife, yearning for peace. Plus ça change.

Diaghilev’s Ballets left a lasting impression on Bliss. He recalled that leaving a ballet had led him to board the bus home with a Nijinsky leap. A meeting with Ninette de Valois led to the composition of his ballet Checkmate. The four dances on from the ballet soar and swirl as Love and Death compete for ascendancy. We hear rapid shifts of mood as elation and despair are played out. Hardly suitable for a wet Sunday afternoon in Deal – try evening twilight.

This wonderful CD encapsulates the moods and circumstances of a day, a week, a lifetime. John Wilson cajoles and nurtures the Black Dyke (have we lost all our Mills?) Band across this spectrum of Bliss and his love of brass.

Bliss: Works for Brass Band

Black Dyke Band conducted by John Wilson

Chandos Digital CHSA 5344