Oscar Wilde Blog

by Jörg W. Rademacher

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Remembering and documenting the genesis of the edition-cum-translation of The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) in 2000

Dear readers of my blog,

while May and June are the main marking season of an active teacher at a German Gymnasium, events in the outside world, even in literature, do not slow down as the year progresses to the phase when it seems difficult to stick to a rhythm established in January. Then all you had to do was try and work according to another plan fed by a bunch of good intentions...

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Die Entstehung der editierten Übersetzung vom Jahr 2000 von The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) im Kontext von Erinnerung und Dokumentation

Liebe Leser meines Blogs,

während Mai und Juni die Hauptkorrekturzeit eines aktiven deutschen Gymnasiallehrers bilden, wird das Tempo der Ereignisse in außerschulischen Welt, auch in der Literatur, nicht geringer, je mehr das Jahr in die Phase hin fortschreitet, da es schwierig scheint, einen Rhythmus durchzuhalten, der im Januar etabliert wurde. Damals galt es nur, mal wieder einem neuen Plan gemäß zu arbeiten, befeuert von einem ganzen Bündel guter Absichten...

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Tanya Josefowitz

Dear readers of my blog,

this is an unusual time for a blog post, but let me explain briefly why I insert this post in the middle of the month. It is due to Tanya Kagan-Josefowitz’s 93rd birthday on 17 May 2022 that I decided to post some more information on her and her family to promote the recent appearance in a bilingual edition of her memoir Capinero. A Bird in Germany. In fact, accessing this website was first facilitated by having coupled my passion for Oscar Wilde with publishing information on Tanya Kagan-Josefowitz’s first memoir I Remember in early 2019. At the time, it was a former student of mine who alerted me to the fact. Now whoever studies her memoirs or listens to the audio-books cannot but think of both former and current conflicts, since Tanya Kagan-Josefowitz through her father is of Russian-Jewish descent, while by having married David Josefowitz she also became part of a Ukrainian-Jewish family. Reading this post, you may find only muted references to Oscar Wilde – who, of course, had a lot to say about both dress and politics – but I assure you the next monthly post is going to refer more fully to other current matters with a Wildean echo – the imprisonment of Boris Becker in Wandsworth being only one of them,

all best wishes,

Jörg W. Rademacher

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Wildes Hauptwerk

Alles über
"Das Bildnis des Dorian Gray"

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Über mich

Jörg W. Rademacher (*1962), born and bred in Westphalia. Attended university at Münster, Dundee and Lille. State exam in 1988. Ph.D. In 1993. Scholar, language teacher as well as writer and translator at Münster until 2002. Since 2002 secondary school teacher, writer and translator in East Frisia. Working on Wilde since 1988. Publishing on Wilde since 2000 as biographer and editor and translator, on a regular basis with Elsinor Verlag since 2012, since 2015 also editor and translator of Oscar Wilde calendars.

Der neue Kalender

Interesse an einem Kalender?
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A calendar in progress 2023

Composing these reflections when offering, selling, and sending out the current calendar is still only a matter of weeks away, I do feel that this project has made another step: at long last, a balance has been found between word and image, with Günter Plessow the author of the verse translations into German, while I translated two of Egon Günther’s poems into English besides choosing, arranging, and, sparsely this time, commenting the poems. If you like, you can see the history of the Oscar Wilde calendars represented by their respective covers on my website: oscar-wilde-blog.de
In fact, it is only owing to Günter Plessow’s industry in translating what he calls “Lyrical Notes” into German in the year 2021 that a substantial selection of Wilde poems ranging from the 1870s through the 1890s, including “The Sphinx” and “The Ballad of Reading Gaol”, are now available for re-publication as part of this calendar project. This is also why, compared to previous calendars, this Oscar Wilde Calendar concentrates on poetry on the one hand and focuses on verse in English and German on the other hand. Taking the poems chosen this time in turn, I also include miniatures of the collage work, so that it is possible to survey the complete calendar here.

January

Willie Wilde
Salome

The sight of me was as a devouring flame
Burning their hearts with fire, so wantonly
That night I danced for all his men to see !
Fearless and reckless; for all maiden shame
Strange passion-poisons throbbing overcame
As every eye was riveted on me,
And every soul was mine, mine utterly, –
And thrice each throat cried out aloud my name !

“Ask what thou wilt,” black-bearded Herod said,
God wot a weird thing do I crave for prize :
“Give me, I pray thee, presently the head
Of John the Baptist.” ’Twixt my hand it lies.
“Ah mother ! see ! the lips, the half-closed eyes –
Dost think he hates us still now he is dead ?”

Once more, William Wilde’s sonnet “Salome” is there to start the New Year. The image of the head is shocking, it is true, but then facing the reality of a New Year may be shocking again and again.

February

Egon Günther
white morning

(erich mühsam in memoriam)

early on madness wakes from his dream
and shaking stretches long
his limbs when outside wildly rages the stream
drowning out the birds’ songs

close-by stands the fiend
high rises the flood
the guard presses on
roughly into the latrines
far from any friend
depressed is his mood
prepared for war
are only the machines

the white murder undermines
the crumbling dam
that hardly holds in check the hateful pack
many a one in his heart
now feels cold & clammy
deeming himself already the scum’s rich picking
just under the veneer of civilization
wrongfulness – vulgar & naked beast that be –
brashly baring his teeth & also showing his face
the drummer of the nation
conjuring baneful times to be
the press spitting slander across time & space

the murdered’s regards from the grave
are not for you – the murderers
you who with barbarous affectation gave
more support to the law of might
that you ruled to be right:

the tradition of master & slaves
withal the arbitrariness of ancient privilege
you are no adversaries earning his respect
all but despicable torturer knaves
even though arrogantly to subject
you strove the world to your tyranny

in his grave he can but scoff at you
and should you win the world even
with fraud & might & steel
your dream of the master race ne’er comes true
as will prove future’s reel

 

The poem “white morning” by the German poet, painter, writer, and translator Egon Günther had to be omitted from last year’s edition for lack of space. Like Oscar Wilde, the German Jewish socialist Erich Mühsam (1878-1934) endured much before he was even killed in prison for his convictions.

March

Oscar Wilde
By the Arno

The oleander on the wall
Grows crimson in the dawning light,
Though the grey shadows of the night
Lie yet on Florence like a pall.

The dew is bright upon the hill,
And bright the blossoms overhead,
But oh ! the grasshoppers have fled,
The little Attic song is still.

Only the leaves are gently stirred.
By the soft breathing of the gale
And in the almond-scented vale
The lonely nightingale is heard.

The day will make thee silent soon,
O nightingale sing on for love !
While yet upon the shadowy grove
Splinter the arrows of the moon.

Before across the silent lawn
In sea-green vest the morning steals,
And to love’s frightened eyes reveals
The long white fingers of the dawn

Fast climbing up the eastern sky
To grasp and slay the shuddering night,
All careless of my heart’s delight,
Or if the nightingale should die.

 

Poems by Wilde such as “By the Arno.” (March), “From Spring Days to Winter (for Music.)” (April), “San Miniato.” (May), “At Verona.” (June), and “Italia.” (July) record each specific moments in more or less clearly defined places. “By the Arno” has an explicitly Florence setting, breathing a romantic atmosphere redolent not only of Tuscany but of an Oxford college lawn at the dawn of day, also alluding to John Keats.