Subject
Nabokov sightings in Brazil a9cont.)
From
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello" <jansy@aetern.us>
> Sorry----by mistake I´ve interrupted the former message without
> transcribing the "sightings" ( I shall be translating them from the
> Portuguese and running the risk of not completely succeeding in this
chore )
>
> The Crossing by L.F. Veríssimo ( 2003), last paragraph of an essay that
> discusses Theodor Adorno centennial celebrations and his escape to
America,
> mentioning his Frankfurt companion Walter Benjamin and his suicide in
Spain
> while wating to cross the Pyrenees:
>
> If it had not been for slavery and the forced diaspora from Africa we
> wouldn´t have had samba,jazz and all Caribbean rythms, not mentioning all
> the other contributions by African negroes. The same kind of praise
through
> crooked lines can be made to communism, fascism and other persecuting
> "isms" whose issue was to send so many artists and scientists over to
> America. People like Billy Wilder, Saul Steinberg and Vladimir Nabokov
> would have been as talented if they had not had to evade Hitler, Mussolini
> or the bolchies, but their art would not have been the same without the
> stamp of their exile - and without the opportunities they´ve found in the
> place of their banishment ( "desterro" ) . Perhaps more was provoked by
the
> opportunities offered by an entreprising and rich America, the "chance"
and
> means, than by the freedom they found and which had lured scientist from
> Europe to creating their art in exile. The most notorious example of this
> kind of applied art is the atomic bomb. In a universe that comes with not
> moral relativization a movie by Wilder, a drawing by Steinberg, a book by
> Nabokov, and the bomb - plus a Charlie Parker´s solo - could all be
> presented in the same room, illustrating the same theme: the fruits of a
> crossing ( "travessia" ) .
>
> Chapter on Shakespeare and Stoppard´s movie Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
are
> dead: "Setting" ( Armação)
> " Stoppard is a Czech by birth and this may explain his pleasure in
playing
> with English, with the same distant fascination with the idiom that has
been
> also adopted by Conrad and Nabokov".
>
> Chapter on Steinberg, Saul:
> " The US has had the same effect on Steinberg that it exerted on other
> emigrés from the European culture, such as Nabokov. Equal doses of
revulsion
> and fascination. The emptiness of urban landscape, the vulgarity of its
> oxygenated matrons, the pseudo-rococco of California ( everything in
> California is pseudo ), the violence (...) Steinberg, ( I´m still quoting
> Time Magazine) declares: " One should see that a freat deal of my work is
a
> kind of parody of talent". One of the most gifted graphical artists in
the
> world says: " I want to create a fiction of hability". Many of his woks
are
> indeed evocative of other styles and techniques. he enjoys the over-worked
> caligraphy in which excess becomes its own parody. Parody is also, at
last,
> the art of the expatriates, the literary equivalent of exile. Steinberg -
> who falsified his passport to enter the US with a stamp that he himself
> created - still delights in the imitation of official stamps..."
>
From: "Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello" <jansy@aetern.us>
> Sorry----by mistake I´ve interrupted the former message without
> transcribing the "sightings" ( I shall be translating them from the
> Portuguese and running the risk of not completely succeeding in this
chore )
>
> The Crossing by L.F. Veríssimo ( 2003), last paragraph of an essay that
> discusses Theodor Adorno centennial celebrations and his escape to
America,
> mentioning his Frankfurt companion Walter Benjamin and his suicide in
Spain
> while wating to cross the Pyrenees:
>
> If it had not been for slavery and the forced diaspora from Africa we
> wouldn´t have had samba,jazz and all Caribbean rythms, not mentioning all
> the other contributions by African negroes. The same kind of praise
through
> crooked lines can be made to communism, fascism and other persecuting
> "isms" whose issue was to send so many artists and scientists over to
> America. People like Billy Wilder, Saul Steinberg and Vladimir Nabokov
> would have been as talented if they had not had to evade Hitler, Mussolini
> or the bolchies, but their art would not have been the same without the
> stamp of their exile - and without the opportunities they´ve found in the
> place of their banishment ( "desterro" ) . Perhaps more was provoked by
the
> opportunities offered by an entreprising and rich America, the "chance"
and
> means, than by the freedom they found and which had lured scientist from
> Europe to creating their art in exile. The most notorious example of this
> kind of applied art is the atomic bomb. In a universe that comes with not
> moral relativization a movie by Wilder, a drawing by Steinberg, a book by
> Nabokov, and the bomb - plus a Charlie Parker´s solo - could all be
> presented in the same room, illustrating the same theme: the fruits of a
> crossing ( "travessia" ) .
>
> Chapter on Shakespeare and Stoppard´s movie Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
are
> dead: "Setting" ( Armação)
> " Stoppard is a Czech by birth and this may explain his pleasure in
playing
> with English, with the same distant fascination with the idiom that has
been
> also adopted by Conrad and Nabokov".
>
> Chapter on Steinberg, Saul:
> " The US has had the same effect on Steinberg that it exerted on other
> emigrés from the European culture, such as Nabokov. Equal doses of
revulsion
> and fascination. The emptiness of urban landscape, the vulgarity of its
> oxygenated matrons, the pseudo-rococco of California ( everything in
> California is pseudo ), the violence (...) Steinberg, ( I´m still quoting
> Time Magazine) declares: " One should see that a freat deal of my work is
a
> kind of parody of talent". One of the most gifted graphical artists in
the
> world says: " I want to create a fiction of hability". Many of his woks
are
> indeed evocative of other styles and techniques. he enjoys the over-worked
> caligraphy in which excess becomes its own parody. Parody is also, at
last,
> the art of the expatriates, the literary equivalent of exile. Steinberg -
> who falsified his passport to enter the US with a stamp that he himself
> created - still delights in the imitation of official stamps..."
>