...Wallace Stevens i hans essay "Imagination as Value"

Wallace Stevens var direktør for et forsikringsselskab. Dette prosaiske virke hindrede ham dog ikke i også at være en genial digter i fritiden. - Sandt at sige er han en af den poetiske modernismes helt store figurer og anses af flere fremstående kritikere (Kermode, Hillis-Miller) for USA´s største og egensindigste digter i dette århundrede.

Nedennævnte digt er det selvsamme digt, som de litteraturvidenskabsstuderende på

første del i denne uge pukler med at analysere i tekstanalyse, har jeg ladet mig fortælle. Det kan være, at vi kan aflokke en sådan analyse fra en af de håbefulde aspiranter senere i løbet af næste uge....

Især ville jeg jo personligt gerne vide. Hvem fanden er Ramon Fernandez?

Digtet er først bragt på originalsproget og derefter i Poul Borums oversættelse. Gør dig den ulejlighed at læse begge...!

Wallace Stevens

--------------------------------------

The Idea of Order at Key West

She sang beyond the genius of the sea.

The water never formed to mind or voice,

Like a body wholly body, fluttering

Its empty sleeves; and yet its mimic motion

Made constant cry, caused constantly a cry,

That was not ours although we understood,

Inhuman, of the veritable ocean.

The sea was not a mask. No more was she.

The song and water were not medleyed sound

Even if what she sang was what she heard,

Since what she sang was uttered word by word.

It may be that in all her phrases stirred

The grinding water and the gasping wind;

But it was she and not the sea we heard.

For she was the maker of the song she sang.

The ever-hooded, tragic-gestured sea

Was merely a place by which she walked to sing.

Whose spirit is this? we said, because we knew

It was the spirit that we sought and knew

That we should ask this often as she sang.

If it was only the dark voice of the sea

That rose, or even colored by many waves;

If it was only the outer voice of the sky

And cloud, of the sunken coral water-walled,

However clear, it would have been deep air,

The heaving speech of air, a summer sound

Repeated in a summer without end

And sound alone. But it was more than that,

More even than her voice, and ours, among

The meaningless plungings of water and the wind,

Theatrical distances, bronze shadows heaped

On high horizons, mountainous atmospheres

Of sky and sea.

It was her voice that made

The sky acutest at its vanishing.

She measured to the hour its solitude.

She was the single artificer of the world

In which she sang. And when she sang, the sea,

Whatever self it had, became the self

That was her song, for she was the maker. Then we,

As we beheld her striding there alone,

Knew that there never was a world for her

Except the one she sang and, singing, made.

Ramon Fernandez, tell me, if you know,

Why, when the singing ended and we turned

Toward the town, tell why the glassy lights,

The lights in the fishing boats at anchor there,

As the night descended, tilting in the air,

Mastered the night and portioned out the sea,

Fixing emblazoned zones and firey poles,

Arranging, deepening, enchanting night.

Oh! Blessed rage for order, pale Ramon,

The maker's rage to order words of the sea,

Words of fragrant portals, dimly-starred,

And of ourselves and of our origins,

In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds.

Wallace Stevens, 1935

Og i Poul Borums oversættelse:

Idé om orden ved Key West

Hun sang hinsides dette havs geni.

Aldrig fik vandet form af sind og stemme

som en krop der helt er krop - det flagred med

de tomme ærmer, rørte sig dog mimisk

til stadigt skrig, fremkaldte, stadig skrig,

der ikke var som vores, skønt vi forstod,

umen´skelige, del af havet.

Det hav var ingen maske. Hun ej heller.

Og sang og vand var intet potpourri,

selv om så det hun sang var det hun hørte,

thi det hun sang blev udtalt ord for ord.

Og vandets kværnen, vindens gispen rørte

sig måske nok i alle sætninger;

men det var hende, ikke hav vi hørte

For hun var skaber af den sang hun sang.

Og havet, kappeklædt, med tragisk gestus,

var blot et sted hun gik langs for at synge

Hvis ånd er dette? sagde vi, som vidste

at det var ånd vi søgte, vidste at vi

ville spørge sådan ofte, mens hun sang.

Hvis det der steg blot var havets mørke stemme,

ja, en af mange bølger farvet stemme;

var skyers og himmels stemme, sunkne

korallers stemme bag en mur af vand

- så var den, ligemeget hvor klar, dyb luft,

forpustet luftig tale, sommerlyd

gentaget i den endeløse sommer,

og lyd alene. Den var meget,

ja, mer end hendes stemme, eller vores,

blandt meningsløse styrt af vand og vind,

den teatralske afstand, bronzeskygger

ophobet over høje horisonter,

havs og himmels bjergluft.

Det var hendes

stemme der skærped himlen, før den svandt.

Hun gav den stund af dens mål af ensomhed.

Og hun var ene-frembringer af den verden,

hvori hun sang: hun var dens skaber. Vi

så hende ensomt stride frem og vidste:

for hende var der ingen anden verden

end den hun sang og skabte i sin sang.

Ramon Fernandez, sig mig hvis du kan,

hvorfor, da sangen standsed og vi vendte

hjemad, hvorfor de udtryksløse lygter

på fiskerbådene der lå for anker,

mens nat faldt på, svingende i luften

behersked natten, delte havet op,

fastlagde heraldisk mønster, flammepoler,

ordned, fordybed og fortrylled natten.

Velsignet drift mod orden, blege Ramon,

en skabers trang til at ordne havets ord,

ord om stråleporte, diset stjerneklædte,

og om os selv og vor oprindelse,

med spøgelsesgrænser og skarpere lyde.