Analysis of E. Bagritsky’s poem “Birdcatcher”
In 1928, Eduard Bagritsky published his first book, “Southwest,” which included works written from 1918 to 1924, published in various newspapers and magazines.
Conventionally, the book can be divided into several sections, each of which is a conditional stage in the evolution of the lyrical hero. This is a movement from the traditionally romantic “The Birdcatcher”, through the dramatic “Insomnia”, “The Thought about Opanas”, to the tragic discord with reality “Poems about the Nightingale and the Poet” and, finally, to the emerging entry into social issues “Tigarette Box”.
In its essence, Bagritsky’s work always remains romantic, but the very nature of romantic tendencies and the content of the romantic ideal change. The poet moves from a general humanistic ideal to a revolutionary, class ideal; from an abstractly understood will, from a freely creative personality (Diedel, Till Eulenspiegel) to the poeticization of a person formed by the revolution, a bearer of revolutionary ideals.
The poem "The Birdcatcher" was written in 1918 and embodies a traditional romantic vision. The theme of the poem is freedom. The poem bears the imprint of “bookishness”; its hero, Diedel, is a traditional image borrowed from German romantics, personifying abstractly understood will and freedom.
Endless spaces: long roads, boundless skies, groves and forests are open to the hero:
Thus goes the cheerful Didel
With a stick, a bird and a knapsack
Through the forested Harz,
Along the banks of the Rhine.
According to Thuringia oak,
According to pine Saxony,
Through Westphalia elderberry,
In Bavaria, intoxicating.
There is no “prose of life” here, but only a traditional hymn for romantics to a person dissolved in nature, a “natural person”, free and happy.
At first glance, it may seem that Bagritsky is consciously turning away from social reality: poems about a joyfully singing bird catcher appear in the difficult and heroic year of the eighteenth year. But there were no contradictions here. The delight that was caused by what was happening was realized here in romantic images. It was a hymn to the very spirit of the revolution, which freed people from slavery and social oppression, causing a feeling of personal freedom, a feeling of joyful freedom.
A person is in complete harmony with the world around him. And the world itself, bright and sonorous, appears as an expanded metaphor “the world is a bird.”
This contrast was the embodiment of the contrast between transitory life and triumphant existence. Hence the internal harmony of the world of the poem, where even the antithesis (up - down, cry - laugh) is the embodiment of an organically beautiful world: the world is beautiful - “green below, blue and dark blue above”, an amazing - an enthusiastic state possesses a person in this world: “is it necessary cry if... Didel... laughs casually.” This “by chance” is especially significant: a person is happy, he laughs, he is happy about the fullness of life, he does not need special reasons to feel harmony; joy expressed in laughter is his usual state.
The harmony of the hero's inner life is emphasized by the structure of the poem. It has 14 stanzas, each stanza is a complete sentence. The poem is written in trochaic tetrameter. There are no rhymes - consonances at the end of lines - but at the end of each line the stress falls on the penultimate syllable (female rhyme), which gives a softer sound, and only in the last line of each stanza the stress falls on the last syllable (male rhyme), which gives hardness sound, logically completes the sentence.
The rhythmic pattern is very clear:
In the elderberry, raw and round,
The nightingale struck with his pipe,
The tits are ringing on the pine tree,
A finch beats on a birch tree.
_ _ _/ _ _/ _ _/ _
_ _ _/ _ _/ _ _/ _
_ _ _/ _ _/ _ _/ _
_ _ _/ _ _/ _ _/
The poet uses anacrusis in this stanza. In other stanzas - pyrrhic:
But, staggering along the roads,
Spending the night under fences,
_ _ _/ _ _ _ _/ _
_ _ _/ _ _ _ _/ _
He will blow on the elderberry bell,
And the elderflower beckon rings, -
From the elderberry cover
The nightingale answers.
He will blow into the pine decoy,
And the pine decoy whistles, -
On the pine tree the tits respond
The bells are scattered.
In the same stanzas, sound writing is used: combinations (an, zinn, zni, an, zinn, zinn), conveying the sound of an elderberry call, and combinations (an, sosn, ov, svis, an, sosn, ov), conveying the whistle of a pine call .
Birch call is “the lightest, most sonorous” and probably the most beloved. Didel treats him “tenderly.” The knapsack in which the decoys are stored is called “reserved.” Birds joyfully respond to the sounds of decoys. Nature is consonant and harmonious with the mood and bright feelings of the hero.
In the poem “Birdcatcher” the traditional romantic world of Bagritsky is formed, the theme of freedom, rebellion, and loneliness of the poet is stated.
In subsequent poems, social motives penetrate Bagritsky's lyrics. His first book, “Southwest,” captured both the evolution of the poet himself and, to a certain extent, the path of Soviet romantic poetry in the first post-revolutionary decade; from traditionally romantic poems to rethinking the very concept of “romanticism” and “romance”.
BIRDKEEPER
The bird catcher's job is difficult:
Learn the habits of birds
Remember flight times
Whistle with different whistles.
But, staggering along the roads,
Spending the night under fences,
Didel is cheerful, Didel can
Sing songs and catch birds.
In the elderberry, raw and round,
The nightingale struck with his pipe,
The tits are ringing on the pine tree,
A finch beats on a birch tree.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
Three decoys - for each bird
He dedicates the decoy.
He will blow on the elderberry bell,
And the elderflower beckon rings, -
From the elderberry cover
The nightingale answers.
He will blow into the pine decoy,
And the pine decoy whistles, -
On the pine tree the tits respond
The bells are scattered.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
The lightest, most sonorous
Your own birch decoy.
He will check the frets gently,
The crack will blow a melodious air, -
Under his breath he will sing.
On a roadside birch
The finch will thunder in response.
Behind the country road,
Where the roar of the carts has died down,
Over a pond covered with duckweed,
Didel laid out the nets.
And in front of him, green below,
Eduard Bagritsky knew: “The job of a bird catcher is difficult: Learn the habits of birds, Remember the time of flight, Whistle with different whistles.” We are talking here about a difficult matter - a poet.
The bird catcher deceived the elements - in its naive, frank hour; at the time of her poetic spontaneity. Is it not the desire of man to survive among the elements that is expressed in this deception - in poetry? Isn’t this what Pushkin also wrote about, seemingly on another occasion: “Ah, it’s not difficult to deceive me!.. I’m glad to be deceived myself!”?
The play of the elements and man is endless; nature and poet. Man has comprehended the language of the elements - this is a great achievement of man, pleasing to the elements themselves. The skill of a bird catcher from Bagritsky’s poem is the highest poetic skill: “But, staggering along the roads, Spending the night under fences, Didel is cheerful, Didel can sing songs and catch birds.” Poets, like the bird catcher Didel, are wanderers in the world, in history, in time. Bagritsky testifies to this about the poet: “And Didel pulls out Three decoys from his reserved bag - and he dedicates a decoy to each bird. He blows on the elderberry beckon, And the elderberry beckon rings, - From the cover of the elderberry the nightingale answers. He blows on the pine decoy, And the pine decoy whistles, - On the pine tree, in response, the tits scatter bells. And Didel pulls out from his reserved knapsack the lightest, most sonorous of his birch calls.”
And in this deception of the bird catcher is the essence of poetry. Poems are the same mastery of likening harmony. And harmony, like a bird, responds to poetry. And the more perfect the verses are, the more trusting the harmony is to them, the more responsive it is. Having expressed his essence in the bird catcher, Bagritsky expressed the essence of the poet in a measured element. In order for a person to gain confidence in the element of harmony, consonant words are needed - poetry.
The poet is a real bird catcher. Pushkin, Yesenin, Blok, and Baratynsky were skilled “bird catchers”. Knowing about the mysterious power of harmony, Baratynsky addressed the woman: “You will not deprive me of my mind with the lure of affectionate speeches.” But poets, with their poetic speeches, seem to deprive the elements of reason. And Tyutchev, when he wrote, “Don’t believe, don’t trust the poet, maiden,” turned to the virgin truth, to the elements.
And poetry is the language of the elements, revealed to poets by God. The phenomenon of poetic talent, the “gift of God,” is that the creative absolute revealed the language of nature to poets. And she responds to poetry. The storm and the rustle of grass respond. And the element finds itself captive in poetic meter, like a bird in the cage of a skilled bird catcher. “He will gently check the frets, blow through a melodious crack, and with a loud voice the birch tree will sing under his breath.” Here it is - the fraternal interaction of the element as a poet and the poet as an element. “And, having heard this voice, the voice of the tree and the bird, on the roadside birch the finch will thunder in response. Behind the country road, Where the roar of the carts died down, Over a pond covered with duckweed, Didel laid out his nets.”
The voice of the tree and the bird is the voice of the poet. Do poets deprive the elements of freedom? What can they do with a tamed element? And the riot of nature - isn’t it nature’s desire to break out of the captivity of poetry and poems, meter and metaphors? “And before him, green below, blue and blue above, the world rises like a huge bird, whistling, clicking, ringing.” The poet is a bird-catcher in relation to this bird-world. And the poems don’t just sound, they whistle, click, and ring.
The bird catcher is looking for the living elements. The skill of a bird catcher is a complete assimilation of the elements. Only this is poetry; only this is beauty. Poetry is a bird's response to a birdcatcher - like a response to another bird; A tree's response to a person is like a response to another tree. And the skill of a bird catcher (or a poet) is the perfection of assimilation to nature. But before that you need to hear the bird, hear the tree. “The divine verb touches sensitive ears” - with the song of a bird, the rustling of a tree. Sensitive hearing is the skill of a bird catcher.
The poet’s job is to learn the habits of nature. The poet’s gift is to “caress and carve” the elements. Indeed, there is a “fatal stamp on him.”
If the Creator is in the elements, then poetry is an imitation of his prophetic language. This is the most perfect imitation of the “divine verb”, which “touches sensitive ears.” And “the poet’s soul will perk up,” indeed, like a bird—“like an awakened eagle.”
Or maybe, in poetry, nature itself - like the bird catcher from Bagritsky's poem - plays with humanity, likens it to its language - as a gift from God? Poetry is a verb of the elements. The verb of the elements is only poetry, a powerful consonance of words and meanings. And the poet, writing great poems, talks to the elements and wins them over. It extracts kindness from it, goodwill towards oneself, mercy, the love of the elements for a person. And the poet manages to do this.
Poems are like the chirping and whistling of a bird catcher. Revolutionary poems are like the sounds of a bird catcher, addressed to the bird-revolution, to the bird-storm.
Revolutionary poetry, which Bagritsky represented, made the language of bird catcher-humanity even more perfect - for conversation with the elements; made the language of humanity more decisive. This is what the author of “The Birdcatcher” wrote: “October! The sounds of the night fade away. But Smolny is dressed in flames, From there, into the world of sorrows and boredom, the decree will fly like a cannon. And in the sky above the military crowd, From a high roof, In the rain and darkness, Simple and extraordinary, A red flag flies and flutters.”
Revolutionary poetry, demanded by the elements in the era of its violence, spoke to it in the appropriate language. Revolutionary poetry spoke on behalf of man to the violence of the elements, so that even in this state it would remain kind to man. And at the same time, revolutionary poetry remained with Pushkin: “And I, who have learned how to write poetry and beat with a rifle, the killers of the singer, will not find a reward, will not take revenge for the blood shed? I avenged Pushkin at Perekop, I carried Pushkin through the Urals, I wandered through the trenches with Pushkin, covered in lice, hungry and barefoot. And my heart beat unaccountably, And a free flame began to boil in my heart, And in the whistle of bullets behind the machine-gun song, I read Pushkin with inspiration!”
The poet discovers God - he learns his supreme speech, just as the bird catcher learned the speech of birds. There is a discovery of God by the poet, who comes to an agreement with nature. Poems are the common language of nature and man.
And the poet-bird-catcher goes through the world: “So the cheerful Didel goes with a stick, a bird and a knapsack Through the Harz, overgrown with forest, Along the banks of the Rhine. Through Thuringia with oak, Through Saxony with pine, Through Westphalia with elderberry, Through Bavaria with hops. Martha, Martha, is it necessary to cry, If Didel walks in the field, If Didel whistles for the birds And laughs by chance?
This is the existence of a poet, a universal poet, since in the elements a poet can only be universal. This is the essence of writing poetry; This is the essence of the twinning of nature and man, the elements and the poet. “Laughs by chance” is a phenomenon of poetry, after all, a good deed needed by God, who has many birds. The Creator sacrifices his birds to the bird catcher for the opportunity to hear his whistle, for his skill. The Creator - the almighty master - worships only mastery. Perfection is revealed to God by a birder who can speak the language of trees and birds.
To show the Creator perfection, the phenomenon of mastery - and this is what poetry is called to do. Therefore blessed are the bird-catching poets. A bird caught by a bird catcher is a gift from God for the perfection of skill...
And there is no need to cry to the world. You don’t have to be afraid of anything, “if Didel walks in the field, If Didel whistles for the birds And laughs by chance.” This means that the birdcatcher-poet never ceases to negotiate with the elements in its language about mercy for humanity. Harmony hears a bird catcher who can skillfully speak the language of birds and trees, loves him and laughs kindly back at him...
Reviews
I came across this poem by Bagritsky many, many years ago in the magazine “Pioneer” (by the way, it was a wonderful magazine). True, the whole poem, in which Thuringia and Saxony are mentioned, as well as Martha and the incomprehensible cheerful Didel, could not appear in the Soviet children's press, therefore, from a short published excerpt, I, then ten years old, was struck and forever etched in my memory by the lines “And before him, green below, blue and blue above...".
All this is a preface to the fact that I want to thank you for your sensitive and emotional analysis of Bagritsky’s poetry. It seems to me that today almost no one knows him or takes him seriously. Did “The Death of a Pioneer” spoil things here? :)
As for the fact that Tyutchev turns to the virgin truth... this is unlikely. The collective image of a completely earthly maiden serves as a contrast to the image of a poet overwhelmed by passions. However, the poem turned out to be flawed - that very case when life imitates art. Many years later, Tyutchev could have directly addressed his warning to the long-suffering Elena Denisyeva, his “last love.”
One more note, if I may. You say that the poet deprives the elements of reason. Does the element have reason? This is an oxymoron, but it’s an interesting oxymoron, I don’t argue. It would be interesting to develop it further.
And lastly, the phrase “To God who has many birds” seems unfortunate to me. The idea is clear, but a poultry yard involuntarily comes to mind.
The bird catcher's job is difficult:
Learn the habits of birds
Remember flight times
Whistle with different whistles.
But, staggering along the roads,
Spending the night under fences,
Didel is cheerful, Didel can
Sing songs and catch birds.
In the elderberry, raw and round,
The nightingale struck with his pipe,
The tits are ringing on the pine tree,
A finch beats on a birch tree.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
Three decoys for each bird
He dedicates the decoy.
He will blow on the elderberry bell,
And the elderflower beckon rings, -
From the elderberry cover
The nightingale answers.
He will blow into the pine decoy,
And the pine decoy whistles, -
On the pine tree the tits respond
The bells are scattered.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
The lightest, most sonorous
Your own birch decoy.
He will check the frets gently,
The crack will blow a melodious air, -
Birch in a loud voice
Under his breath he will sing.
Behind the country road,
Where the roar of the carts has died down,
Over a pond covered with duckweed,
Didel laid out the nets.
And in front of him, green below,
Blue and blue on top,
The world rises up like a huge bird,
It whistles, clicks, rings.
Thus goes the cheerful Didel
With a stick, a bird and a knapsack
Through the forested Harz,
Along the banks of the Rhine.
Along the oak tree of Thurinia,
According to pine Saxony,
Through Westphalia elderberry,
In Bavaria, intoxicating.
Martha, Martha, should I cry?
If Didel walks in the field,
If Didel whistles to the birds
And laughs casually?
(No Ratings Yet)
More poems:
- In your room you can hear the noise of branches, and a white star looks there. The nightingale is crying outside your window, and it’s as bright as day in your room. Only silence, Only blue ice, And forever...
- I am a nightingale: I am without tendencies And without much depth... But be it old men or infants, They will understand me, the singer of spring. I am a nightingale, I am a serpentine bird, But my song is rainbow...
- I wanted to have a bird and saved up some money, and so I bought a finch at the Bird Market. My Finch sat in a cage and pecked grains and, like in a forest on a branch, everything...
- What silence! Knives are knocking in the kitchen, a distant saw is ringing and singing. And this evening, as always, will go out, the cooled ashes will scatter. But with the last effort of will I will take into myself the milky moon, Silvered...
- The birds look pitiful, We didn’t recognize them! Apparently, the Birds were in a squabble. - At least you sent some news from the way, birds! “We were locked up,” the tits say. - You...
- I'm tired of notes - it hurts a lot to write something. Without further ado, I offer a universal answer - everyone at once. If one or another wants to provoke us into war, our answer is: no! A...
- The drifting snow speaks to me carefully and quietly, the snow pokes at my feet, so that I don’t believe the clouds, so that I can’t go on a journey along the mountain steeps. Forgotten window, Closer to...
- But I wouldn’t want to become a bird, I don’t want to be a nightingale. Think for yourself - I would fly in, sit on the edge of the window sill, And you would say: “What kind of bird is on...
- Where the forests are preserved, Where the pine forest is alive, The clear eyes of the thoughtful lakes look there. And where the forests are cut down, the landscape is no longer the same: There is a painful strip of artificial swamps....
- It seems to me - The best of all friends is My hated, My tender enemy. He whips the truth on the cheeks. And I don't want to move with happiness. I'll wait until he gets stronger...
- Like a fire under fluffy ashes, as soon as the wind blows, a red heat lurks, so the old fire languishes in my soul - oh, only rustling with its dress... It goes deeper and deeper...
- I tapped my pocket and it didn’t ring. I knocked on another one - I couldn’t hear it. Thoughts of rest flew to their quiet, mysterious zenith. But I’ll wake up and go out the door and go into the wind...
Next is a conversation about the poem “Birdcatcher” by E. Bagritsky.
The text includes only informative materials on the topic, everything else has been removed.
===================================================
Mikael: This time I am pleased to post a poem by Eduard Bagritsky. Perhaps it is not so often that you come across such a capable poet among the authors of Stikhi.ru... I will be glad and ask all those present, as well as “passers-by”, to speak out about the poem.
BIRDKEEPER
The bird catcher's job is difficult:
Learn the habits of birds
Remember flight times
Whistle with different whistles.
But, staggering along the roads,
Spending the night under fences,
Didel is cheerful, Didel can
Sing songs and catch birds.
In the elderberry, raw and round,
The nightingale struck with his pipe,
The tits are ringing on the pine tree,
A finch beats on a birch tree.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
Three decoys - for each bird
He dedicates the decoy.
He will blow on the elderberry bell,
And the elderflower beckon rings, -
From the elderberry cover
The nightingale answers.
He will blow into the pine decoy,
And the pine decoy whistles, -
On the pine tree the tits respond
The bells are scattered.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
The lightest, most sonorous
Your own birch decoy.
He will check the frets gently,
The crack will blow a melodious air, -
Birch in a loud voice
Under his breath he will sing.
Behind the country road,
Where the roar of the carts has died down,
Over a pond covered with duckweed,
Didel laid out the nets.
And in front of him, green below,
Blue and blue on top,
The world rises up like a huge bird,
It whistles, clicks, rings.
Thus goes the cheerful Didel
With a stick, a bird and a knapsack
Through the forested Harz,
Along the banks of the Rhine.
Along the oak tree of Thurinia,
According to pine Saxony,
Through Westphalia elderberry,
In Bavaria, intoxicating.
Martha, Martha, should I cry?
If Didel walks in the field,
If Didel whistles to the birds
And laughs casually?
1918, 1926
Sarah Beth Bernard: Ah! This is encryption! From Eustace to Alex. Did Misha really manage to find an excerpt from the draft version of “17 Moments of Spring”? :)))
Mikael: Sarah, do you find some peculiarities in the work? Tell me!))
Alexey Rudov: BIRD CATCHER
The bird catcher's job is difficult: learn the bird's habits,
Remember the flight times, whistle in different whistles.
The beginning very clearly characterizes the author as a lover of classical music. I read a lot about Bagritsky, but I feel the undoubted influence of Mozart in this poem. It ends on the chord of “eternity,” just like the great composer.
But, staggering along the roads, spending the night under fences,
Didel is cheerful, Didel can sing songs and catch birds.
“From his youth they talked about Bagritsky, and he also spoke about himself, as a romantic, a lover of Alexander Greene, corsairs, long journeys, who dreamed of the Flying Dutchman. Bagritsky translated into Russian Robert Burns, Thomas Hood and Walter Scott, Joe Hill and Nazim Hikmet, M. Bazhan and V. Sosyuru."
In the elderberry, damp and round, the Nightingale struck with his pipe,
The tits are ringing on the pine tree, The finch is beating on the birch tree.
Three decoys - and he dedicates a decoy to each bird.
He blows on the elderberry bell, and the elderberry beckon rings, -
From the cover of the elderberry the nightingale answers.
He blows on the pine bell, and the pine beckon whistles, -
On the pine tree, in response, the tits scatter bells.
And Didel pulls out of the reserved knapsack
The lightest, most sonorous of your birch calls.
He will gently check the frets, blow through the melodious crack, -
The birch tree will sing with a loud voice under its breath.
Beyond the country road, where the rumble of the carts has died down,
Didel laid out his nets over a pond covered with duckweed.
“The poet’s friend Valentin Kataev, who dragged him from the provinces to Moscow, in the book “My Diamond Crown” (the reliability of the facts in which many perceive very critically) named Bagritsky, the author of the poems “Birdcatcher”, “Pigeons”, a great lover and connoisseur of birds, “ birdcatcher”: “I didn’t even have time to blink an eye when the name of the birdcatcher sounded loudly on Moscow Parnassus.”
And in front of him, green below, blue and blue above,
The world rises up like a huge bird, whistling, clicking, ringing.
This is where the poem turns into the metaphysics of eternity, perhaps this is the best quatrain in it. Is the world a bird? The world above and below. Contrasting colors and capacity. Flight of consciousness and departure into metaphysics.
So goes the cheerful Didel with a stick, a bird and a knapsack
Through the forested Harz, along the banks of the Rhine.
Through oak Thurinia, through pine Saxony,
Through Westphalia with elderberry, Through Bavaria with intoxication.
Next comes a description of the world and travel through it.
Martha, Martha, is it necessary to cry, If Didel walks in the field,
If Didel whistles to the birds and laughs by chance?
And the ending turns the metaphysics back into the relationship between he and she with the question blurred in time... Is Marta necessary?
Why cry? Although if you take the historical period of writing a poem, the irony about the Germans also comes to the surface. According to the descriptions of contemporaries, the text changed somewhat in people's understanding over time.
I, Mikhail, just gave some small explanations on the text. I wonder who sees him and how? All collectors are hunters of sorts. And Didel is like that.
and should I cry?
no need...heh
LG goes around the whole world in a short poem and speaks? Is it necessary?
After all, Didel is right: If the war is not outside, it is inside.
and the poem remains in history thanks to its metaphysics and lightness. The timelessness of this poem.
Mikael: Thank you, Alex. For a series of information and for a series of clear considerations. Mozart is undeniable, and considerations about the hunter, the war, the enemy within bring us closer to some essential things. By the way, Sara, intuitively, was not at all accidental when she said about Stirlitz, but she was just joking or something - I don’t know that))...
It is a fact that Bagritsky was called “Birder Catcher”. It is confirmed by K. Paustovsky: “Bagritsky told me a lot about his Odessa birds. But I knew it myself. I was once with him on Stenovaya Street and I remember continuous crackling, chirping, whistling and chirping in cages suspended high from the ceiling. Splashes water flew onto their heads from the cages where the birds washed themselves in zinc bowls, fluttering their wings. According to Bagritsky, these were all the rarest and most expensive birds, although they looked shabby and rather pitiful. He bought them at outlying bazaars and caught them in the steppe for Fountain, exchanged for salt and tobacco. He had spider nets for catching birds and a variety of pipes and decoys.
Catching birds with nets is a very delicate matter. A birder must know not only the voices and habits of birds, but also have the skill of a decorator. Having chosen a smooth place that looked like a small current, he scattered millet or bread crumbs over it, stretched a net over the current on high pegs, disguised it with grass (weeds and flowers), and sent some tame traitor to the current - a goldfinch or siskin, tied with a fishing line by the paw to the peg, and hid nearby."
I think it’s a very interesting quote... But I’m not a literary critic)) There is a text. What other considerations do our wonderful authors have?
Anuka: Mikael, ask me a question sometime.
Well, turn it somehow unexpectedly, like with shoes)
but it’s so difficult, good verse, this is psychedelic, in my opinion. It seems that the verse is also on George’s list.
There is also folklore stylization in it.
“And Goethe, whistling on the winding path,” also emerges.
and, of course, this is a verse about poetry.
but this, in my opinion, is so obvious that it’s even indecent to say)
but Alex started talking about Mozart.
Well, so does he.
"and Mozart in the din of birds."
Of course, too.
and also.. this verse would also suit translators very well)
poets, too, yes, but even more so for translators.
setting snares for someone else's language, choosing the right decoys, luring the verse, camouflaging yourself, not spooking - that's the real job of a translator.
Maybe it’s about different languages - one speaks from the elderberry, another from the birch. oh how great))
I love translators.
and any translator, of course, Stirlitz))
so Sarah's version is also on topic))
We all got very well-coordinated versions.
Alex Rudov: hmmm interesting interpretation Anya... what is clear about poetry and the language of birds is “multidimensional”, although I like the version of forest Babylon. Hello.
Anuka: yeah) bird Babylon - well said)) birds are all so multilingual))
Mikael: Well, I’ll turn it around... I don’t know almost any more terrible work. Of course, many will not like what I say, especially Anya. And, in the end, everyone will again “gain a clear understanding” and will think about the wonderful “shirt-guy” Birdcatcher, some “nice German landscape” with quiet houses, meadows, cheerful birds...
But... the very name “Birdcatcher”, isn’t it associated with the “Pied Piper”, the legend of Hamelin. However, in that poem there is a motive for the action - the magistrate’s failure to pay the bill for “removing rats” using a pipe... And here? “He blows into the elderberry bell, / And the elderberry beckon rings”... There is no motive here, this is some internal, and even joyful movement of some dark essence, especially since the verse itself is clear, bright, refers to Mozart... Or another, darker one side?
This poem is about double-thinking, and double-being, about the desire to imprison birds, singing and free, in a cage. Of course, one can say about hunting, hunters, the inability to move away from one’s predatory nature. It is possible to “save the image” by talking about fairy tales... yes... but even the most terrible of Andersen’s fairy tales, say about the girl who stepped on bread and fell into hell with spiders for it, is timeless... but even there she was still given freedom, she became a swallow , a bird.
And her Birdcatcher is a decoy, a “traitor goldfinch”, a net, that is, involuntarily...
And it would still be nothing if, but the measure of the claims of this Ratbird Catcher:
“And before him, green below,
Blue and blue on top,
The world rises up like a huge bird,
It whistles, clicks, rings."
Is the whole world in a cage? What a revolutionary scope! And what an incredible and difficult experience of the author... Edgar Allan Poe? Yes, have mercy. Children's pranks... Kafka? Maybe. Only here the darkest is written with great skill in the brightest, the brightest. Yes - this is a psi-text... Even more so.
“Martha, Martha, should I cry?” We need Marta, there’s something for that….
I remember my impression, youthful, even childish, when I first read these poems. I felt uneasy, I felt this darkness, this deprivation of will... And now I can only say a little better about that impression...
That's enough for now.
Anuka: Yes, Mikael.
why do you think that I won’t like what you say.
I really like it.
I don't like fishermen or bird catchers. There is no talk about hunters.
you speak very well.
but I only read the poem metaphorically - the bird catcher is a poet, a translator, a speech catcher.
again my beloved Mandelstam comes - I forgot the word that I wanted to say - the blind swallow will return to the palace of shadows (c). if from this point of view, then the verse (word) is the bird. and writing a poem is like catching a swallow and then releasing it. I release the bird into the wild on a bright holiday, and so on. this is a kind of covenant.
and if you don’t catch it (or forget it), then it will remain in the palace of shadows.
but you speak very well, Mikael.
The original essence of words is often lost behind metaphors.
if you reveal the original essence - a creepy image. It’s no coincidence that Alex mentioned a collector who is simply a maniac.
Yes, you're right.
but I confess that I didn’t see this dark side.
I see it now.
Alex Rudov: I gave a tip... yes, Mikhail is also Andersen and the Pied Piper, but I see her as one very interesting thread... Martha? Nobody remembers any March?
Alexandra Inina:))) The same Munchausen
Alex Rudov The famous literary critic Nikolai Ivanovich Khardzhiev, who had known Bagritsky since childhood, winced and put the textbook aside. According to the testimony of his wife, the famous sculptor Lydia Chaga, the old critic uttered only one phrase: “Edward is deceitful, like all revolutionary romantics are deceitful. He invented a life for himself. It’s more useful to know about the Russian officer Gumilev, who was on the other side of the Kronstadt ice.”
Another hint... Sash, you’re almost right, almost, but not quite...
Dmitry Demkin: Where is the contradiction between the catcher, the “depriver of freedom” and the poet? The poet also catches the world and encloses it in his work. Through the “deprivation of will” of a single moment, picture, thought - after all, everything else is reflected in them, because without “everything else” they are impossible.
And here’s another thing - it’s not only the bird catcher who is interesting (scary) with his “dark” side. The whole world (“bird”) is also drawn, and underneath it is meaninglessness and ruthlessness, an unblinking bird’s eye (greetings from surveyor B. - and Hitchcock))
It’s interesting, does anyone see in this verse (and in Bagritsky in general) the “invariant beginning” of the verses of one of the “those present, as well as the “passers-by””?
Alex Rudov: real name is Dzyubin, but the distorted nickname was not that... Dzyuden. The most eternal legend about the Eternal Jew in the subconscious of people.
Agasfer's wanderings through world literature were summed up at the end of the 19th century by Rudolf Kassner in his dissertation on the image of the Eternal Jew in the poetry of various nations (1897). In the 20th century, the image of Ahasfer was developed, among others, by Kipling in the short story “The Eternal Jew”... The Eternal Jew was hacked to death by the Petliurists on the Dnieper bank in 1919, claimed the well-known Ostap Bender. Almost an eternal wandering Jew guys... Well, who is Martha. And the image of Sasha is clearly collective.. Bird Babylon.. the image of the dark, well marked by Mikhail /// very much on topic
thanks Dmitry..also on topic
The Eternal Jew covered the bottomless wells of his well-worn eyes with his owl eyelids and seemed to fall into a hypnotic sleep
Alexandra Inina: Whore of Babylon... not... somehow too much
Alex Rudov: but it seems to me that this is somewhat ironic - Agasfer and Martha...jokingly called the ministers of the provisional government Martha during the revolution...I don’t remember exactly, but Sash also wrote about Berdyaev about this..
War-Revolution. Human Babylon - solid revolutionaries, either Germans or Jews. The Eternal Jew or Ahasferus wandering from Russia around the world and Martha.. The shy provisional government that came in March.. I think then this poem also had a stunning success and it was with the revolutionaries.. Cry don’t cry Martha, Didel the brave and treacherous hunter is already in the field , remember Makhno of the same. And in Thüria and Saxony the revolution will take place and how. No wonder Bagritsky is a revolutionary romantic. The horror hanging over Europe. Bird hunter.
Mikael: ... Bagritsky is a great poet, I don’t know about romance. He had a good sense of time and its tragedy. I thought first of staging “February”, a brilliant poem, reading which is emotionally equivalent to watching an incredible performance... but I settled on “The Birdcatcher”. His hero is almost not a man, a kind of superman, that’s how they portray the rat catcher as tall as a house... When I wrote the lyrics for the music of the “Children’s Crusade,” it was the comparison of the Rat and Bird Catchers that gave me a generalized image of the betrayal of children by adults. These children walk through a world where no birds sing. Of course, we can talk about poets and poems, or artists, or simply freethinkers, or lovers in connection with this verse...
Alex Rudov something like this) the nuances of that time and the thread of reasoning... and maybe Munchausen Sash... it’s possible too. This is a version, not a statement
Alexandra Inina He's scary to me... hard to read
Black Georg: I have always said that Bagritsky is one of the most underrated poets of the Silver Age. He managed to write too little, of course. In terms of his relative position in the polygonal matrix of literary influences, he is located somewhere between Babel, Andrei Bely and Yesenin. And to be honest, I can’t even imagine a better point. This is Leonid Andreev with Shalom Aleichem, and with an incredible penchant for experimentation and progressive versification techniques, which are at least decades ahead of their contemporaries. His experiments are not as radical as Mayakovsky’s, but they are generally more successful, and most importantly, they are aimed at the UNIVERSAL reader, and not at himself or others like himself.
Be that as it may, The Birdcatcher is one of his most successful poems, and it is not without reason that it adorns so many different anthologies. It is both Russian and somehow very Western European in essence. And in terms of ideas, and in terms of technology, and in terms of presentation to the reader. And - yes, of course, it is psychedelic; one of its best examples among texts that have become classics. I know only one poet whose natural penchant for psychedelics manifested itself, perhaps even more clearly than Bagritsky: Yesenin. None of the other classics come close to them - in terms of understanding how psychedelics are written and how they work.
And in Ptitselov itself many different interesting allusions can be found, but the most obvious is, of course, to Mozart’s Magic Flute. In which Mozart and his friend, who wrote the libretto, also managed to hide a lot of all sorts of allusions and hints - and not all of them were of a Masonic nature. The image of the bird catcher in both Flute and Bagritsky is extremely ambiguous, although at the same time very attractive. Perhaps this is the devil-tempter himself, parading in front of the audience and stunning with that very illusion of unlimited freedom - freedom from EVERYTHING in this world - which each of us for some reason so desires. And at the same time, both Mozart and Bagritsky refrain from trying to classify their main characters, and due to this they acquire the features of Ahriman - in other words, if evil, then evil is necessary and inevitable, and not intentional and criminal.
Alex Rudov yeah...that's actually right on point. Yesenin and Mozart... I just didn’t bring it up (the version about Yesenin), since they were compared a lot... this is definitely only due to the multidimensionality of the psychedelic (this poem).
so-called "dark romanticism"
Mikael: That's right, that's what we're talking about. About the natural tragedy of both the moment and existence in the multilayeredness of the text as a literary device. But personal tragedy, already beyond the boundaries of the text, takes place. This fusion - it produces texts that can influence and amaze. And mind you, it’s not a far-fetched scheme, yes, but the real fate of the author. These complex destinies among writers are now more than all measures.
Yesenin, you are right, and he is a more psychic author than Eduard, but technically Yesenin rhymes “hand-guarantee”, there is a difference. But the attitude towards Pushkin... There is a memory, Odessa writers, passing by the house where Pushkin visited, took off their hats... where are they all?..
I read that Dontsova was the most successful this year, 144 books, 5 million copies in circulation, Shilova - similar, and then... Conan Doyle. And Dumas was in a good position. Well, thank God))
Alex Rudov: in general, Mikhail, literary scholars and critics have the opinion that the best in poetry and literature is born in times of wars, revolutions, shocks or natural disasters... I was thinking about this topic... the best confirmation of this is probably the Silver Age
Mikael: Perhaps. Only history is such that there are no other moments)) Each generation has its own war, and 1812, and the Caucasus of Pushkin and Lermontov, and Tolstoy, near the guns, has its own... and power, and Dostoevsky on execution... but here, I think, there is no complete connection, many did not have such a bad life, like Goethe... but around... To be born and find out that you are mortal is already enough.
Anya - I’m very glad that you liked it... And somehow it brought something into the understanding of the verse. It's already done)))
Ayuna Ayuna I don't know. You can probably consider this text as scary. You can interpret it as lack of freedom, you can link both Bagritsky and Germany, you can say a lot of things. But I remember my childhood impressions - they are bright and joyful. For me, this text is a journey along endless roads and the joy of meeting the world. And, although the bird catcher catches birds, for some reason I don’t feel any lack of freedom in this text. Rather, I see a connection between birds and birders.
And Didel pulls out
From a reserved knapsack
Three decoys - for each bird
He dedicates the decoy.
- the key word here for me is DEDICATE, it does not reflect capture, but rather some sacred aspect.
He will blow on the elderberry bell,
And the elderflower beckon rings, -
From the elderberry cover
The nightingale answers. – nightingale - ANSWERS
He will blow into the pine decoy,
And the pine decoy whistles, -
On the pine tree the tits respond
The bells are scattered. – Tits are scattering bells ON THE PINE
He will check the frets gently,
The crack will blow a melodious air, -
Birch in a loud voice
Under his breath he will sing.
Where are the caught birds? The tramp Didel wanders along the roads and talks to the birds. Unlimited by anything.
And in front of him, green below,
Blue and blue on top,
The world rises up like a huge bird,
It whistles, clicks, rings. In my opinion, he is catching a huge bird of peace in a net;)
Before my eyes - a wanderer, a madman, a Jester, a tramp, a Magician. And catching birds - well, you need to legalize yourself somehow;))
If you analyze verbs, then everything rings, sings, whistles, responds, answers,
It crumbles, rattles, clicks.
Mikael: Yes, Ayuna, that's right. But if it weren’t for all this, but just poems about the “villain uncle”, then there would be nothing to talk about... Only... why does the magician need a network? The birds, after talking, will sit on your shoulders and on your hand, and they are birds - “With a stick, a bird and a knapsack,” it is cleverly written, “a bird,” maybe one bird, maybe a crowded cage... the author is a huge master , why didn’t he write about a companion, because on the roads, wandering characters have companions, so he would have walked with what a goldfinch... And why should a magician become legalized? Stirlitz needs this))
The fact of the matter is that the text has two layers, very clear, and one of them, the “merry tramp”, “interlocutor of the birds”, is based on such a developed tradition that it dominates the perception of the verse. The poem is completely balanced, but in such a way that as soon as you show its other side, it already occupies the entire “text space”...
As for the Jester, including in the deck, I was going to talk about it)) But - a separate conversation, there are moments that are quite exhausted for our sophisticated colleagues.
Ayuna Ayuna Mish, where is this reverse side? Yes, the name. Birdcatcher - catcher of souls. One word of advice. Show me at least a hint in the text. Not cultural speculations and research, but in the text? I can't see it myself.
Why is this an allusion, I can’t find it, I can’t find it.
Alexandra Inina) There is a network there for the whole world)))
Ayuna Ayuna Martha, why are you crying about the Free One? He is quite happy :)))
If this is world evil, what does joy have to do with it? Where are the shadows in the text?
Alexandra Inina It seems to me that the one who tries to capture the whole world himself becomes its prisoner. They are already inextricably linked and the Birdcatcher will not return. But he is happy there... And Martha is alone... Returning him to her will not bring happiness either, if he laughs casually and he needs birds (ideas), not Marta and a quiet life. Should we cry... It is impossible to live in these ideas, no matter how beautiful they are and no matter how loudly they chirp. I draw a parallel between the fact that the revolutionary ideas that then spread throughout the world turned out to be unsuitable for a peaceful normal life, they are suitable only for mad philosophers, but not for the harmonious life of society.
This is the happiness of a madman, utopian. He sleeps under the fences, he is alone... From the point of view of a normal person, he feels bad, he suffers from hunger and cold, but he follows these birds and laughs. To be happy for the madman that he is happy in his madness? or cry for him?
Ayuna Ayuna Here it is - the paradox of the name and the idea of freedom embedded and supported in the text. Movement and limitation.
Alexandra Inina) The fact of the matter is that the idea of freedom is imaginary - a deception (decoy), different for each bird, which in reality turns out to be a noose, a net that has caught the birder himself in the snare of madness. This is scary... he is the most unfree there, and wants to catch the whole world in his net. And all this, whistling cheerfully, joyfully... this makes it even worse and more scary... to the accompaniment of a cheerful song, something walks across the earth, catching everything that chirps in a snare, luring it with native speeches... And now politicians are doing the same thing - they promise what what do birds want to hear...
Now I thought that the picture was very similar to the advent of fascism in Germany under “Oh my dear Augustine”...
Mikael: Yes, very interesting conversation between Ayuna and Alexandra. Much is true, in my opinion, and correct... Only things are social, they are well known after all.
I'm curious about this circumstance related to the structure of the text. It has two points of stability - and can, as it were, “overpay” to the reader. And read with a “reverse sign”. This or that layer ends up at the top... As for me, if anyone is interested, the “human”, warm feeling is much closer to me than abstractions, even if they are embodied masterfully and figuratively. But such things often evoke my admiration and respect.
Regarding the poem, I would also add that at one time psi texts and “cipher texts” were synonymous for me (as well as for some authors now), although in practice, the writing of psi texts by ChG and a number of remarkable authors was already carried out consciously, terminology and theoretical things have not yet been sufficiently formulated... These verses show very clearly - the text must be correctly organized, have a precise structure and be read “excitedly”, and the presence of other layers of the text is introduced by special “distribution” tools in its body, text, and after some reading they become basic...
…….
Alex Rudov: Bagritsky is interesting because of his unusualness and revolutionary romanticism. What did you bring? to prove your reading. Here.
It reads to me like Ahasfer and the officials, in short, bastards in the highest echelons of power, I, too, can be a revolutionary.
And this version of mine does not at all fit in with the generally accepted and described one. I tried to explain my vision of this poem. And by the way, I usually only cite what I checked. Because he was interested in “silver” and was engaged in a general analysis of the events of the history of that time. Well, it’s like if you take not only a piece of Russian history, but look at it more broadly, through the prism of historians, classics, religion and philosophy. Otherwise you will again say that I have “chaos” in my head. It's not true, it's yours. I think logically. Well, for some reason I always don’t have a straight path, but some threads and shades around the bush. Something like this.
What’s not to like about my version?.. It seems to me that in the revolutionary circles of that time this verse was not only on topic, but cooler.
It translates practically as: the world international will show everyone Kuzka’s mother, in the person of a hunter. By the way, by the year 26, attempts to spread the world revolution, especially after the failures in Poland, practically failed, and with the death of Lenin, the hungry and impoverished country began to try to build something in the country. But that keen mood of the revromantics to go through all the countries in a world fire failed. If Trotsky had written this verse, it would have been no worse. Not worse at all. Well, comparisons and allusions, my assumptions. But in many ways they are similar to the truth. Since the official story changed not so long ago.
Anuka: hmm. The version of the revolution is, of course, strange.
However, some people also saw a revolution in Pasternak’s candle - hostile whirlwinds, in fact, around a home oasis.
this is probably the cost of Soviet education - every verse is about the world revolution))
….
Mikael: I don’t know Alex, it could all be like this, maybe like that... but I don’t listen to the parties’ speeches about which side the egg broke long ago on TV. As for “Pasternak’s whirlwinds,” they were talked about differently, in the context of the novel “Doctor Zhivago,” of which that verse is an integral part. Bagritsky... the analysis can be limited to what was said in the TSB: “In the lyrical poems and poems of this time (“The Birdcatcher”, “Till Eulenspiegel”, “Tavern”, “Watermelon”, etc.) romantic images of freedom-loving, courageous people were created.” And okay)) Anything is better than talking about the creepy Agaspheres))
... Here is a poem by the same author, “Poems about the Nightingale and the Poet.” The ending of the poem is:
"We're both caught
We are both online!
Your whistle near Moscow will not ring out in the bushes,
The hills and lakes will not tremble from the thunder...
You've been listened to
Weighed
Priced in rubles...
Rumble in the green pieces of calico,
How I rumble through the newspaper sheets!..”...
Black George: About this Birdcatcher, guys, both in The Magic Flute and here, I wanted to say this: a birdcatcher is not a hunter. He doesn't kill birds, he only catches them. From this comes, to a certain extent, its ambiguity. Yes, on the one hand, he deprives them of freedom, but on the other, he does not harm them, but on the contrary, he takes care of their good condition, feeds them (even if in cages). And most importantly, it is impossible to imagine that a bird catcher can somehow exterminate birds, as hunters do. He is, of course, bad in some sense - he is dangerous. But in the bigger picture, it is a fairly organic part of nature, since its activities cannot affect the ecological balance, cannot lead to the extermination of some (rare) bird species. But the “collectors” of eggs are a different matter; from the “collected” eggs of rare birds, chicks will never be born, and these eggs will decorate someone’s collections. With captured birds, the situation is not so sad - although, of course, not all birds can live long, and especially reproduce, in captivity.
But here’s what comes to mind: remember the Christian symbol that many of us put on the trunks of cars, in the form of a stylized fish? This is how people show that they are Christians. This is a direct reference to the words of Jesus addressed to the Apostle Peter: “And Jesus said to Simon: Do not be afraid; from now on you will catch men.” (Luke 5:10) And in the Gospel of Mark (1.17) it is said a little differently: “And Jesus said to them: Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
Usually, Russian-speaking readers do not understand that Jay. Di. Salinger, in his novel “The Catcher in the Rye,” refers to precisely this allusion when speaking about the “catcher in the rye.” This is not at all some abstract character catching children over a cliff; this is a direct reference to the well-known metaphor of the Savior. And it seems to me that both Bagritsky and Mozart - in their birdcatchers - had the same allusion in mind. The catcher is not the hunter; his part is much subtler and more skillful. Was Bagritsky a religious person at heart? To be honest, I don't know. But Mozart certainly was. And, be that as it may, in a world filled with reflections and reflections of reflections, such things - directly, or through numerous refractions - will still find their way, the way to the reader through the work of completely different “artists” from different times. So they find it, thanks to the more or less unified nature of European culture, even in the form in which we know it.
How can this not be fascinating? How can you not want to decipher this, even without competitions.
I don't understand.
Mikael: You see, Georg, the memory of Peter is appropriate, but there is some difference. Birds in the Gospel are not an object of fishing, but an example for imitation or reproach. From Yandex.
“Look at the birds of the air, they neither sow nor reap, nor gather into the barn; and your heavenly Father feeds them,” says the Lord (Matthew 6:26). ... the words of the Savior are rich in content and deeply instructive: “... foxes have holes and the birds of the air are nests; but the Son of man has no place to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20).” Well, “Be like the birds of the air”...
And Peter did not catch birds singing loudly in the azure, but fish, that is, dumb ones. Deprived of the Word.
Bagritsky was not religious in the sense of belonging to Judaism or Christianity (“Death of a Pioneer”). He was a supporter of a new religion - communism. Some semblance of the original Christian ideas, quite passionate, but not having a powerful cultural foundation.
Black George: Mish, it seems to me that in any case we are not talking about birds or fish, but about catchers. The fact is that catchers are not hunters. The hunter lies in wait or stalks. The catcher lures. The hunter kills. Catcher - under no circumstances. The hunter's function is simple: he is a predator. The function of the catcher is by no means simple; The “sequence of operations” does not end with catching it.
But words or the Word are somewhat different. Jesus and the apostles weren't catching dumb people, were they? But it is noteworthy that Jesus himself did not attach a negative connotation to the meaning of “fishers” (not fishermen or anglers, mind you! - although the metaphor was related to the fish that Andrew and his brother were catching, and not to other animals), otherwise he would not have used this term.
I don’t know about Bagritsky’s religious views, Misha. For some reason I think that not everything there is as simple as they write about it in encyclopedias. In general, literary critics picture him in a fundamentally wrong way - as a sort of romantic proletarian poet. I am afraid that this is not just a simplification, but a fundamental misunderstanding of his attitude to life. Remember: Mayakovsky, too, judging by his poems, comes out as a kind of shirtless guy without a second bottom, sneezing at everyone and everything except the spiders in his own head, but his biography testifies to something completely different. So it is with Bagritsky: you cannot judge him by the Death of a Pioneer; It’s not himself he’s painting in the second part of February. Or, more correctly, he draws only PART of himself.
Mikael: You, Georg, understand perfectly well that I, in principle, was talking about something similar. About the complexity and inconsistency of Bagritsky, undoubtedly a great poet. And he opposed the primitiveness of his understanding. But this understanding must be achieved; it is not given immediately. This is what this extremely interesting conversation shows. The terms are easy to understand - this is “multi-layering”. But what really stands out is binary. Not much attention is paid to the possibility of completely different readings. And here is a great opportunity to talk about it. We are discussing your “dipole” - here it is. Look...
This whole classics thing has a purpose. Visually demonstrate the meaningfulness of the psi theory. That's the point. But strong poems have their own “decoys”; everything turns out to be alive and modern. Actually, what struck me most were the phrases about “blurred eyes on the classics”, “the inability to perceive these texts”... Where? That's the interest. We just need to “revive” these wonderful texts...
Poems grow throughout the “field of language.” And we can already evaluate them in all the drama of their content and complexity of the solution. If this does not happen, then all the efforts of many authors are doomed to be secondary and of little significance. The promotion of literary movements such as psi, in addition to their own tasks, also have a general significance; I think it is necessary to continue trying to move here too...
Black George: Yes, I found another interesting piece about the catchers in one English-language source. It says that in the original Greek text Mark uses the term "fisherman" - something like "fishermen of men." And Luke uses a completely different word, which roughly means “fisher of men,” but in a completely different sense: it was a term for those who catch (pick up) people in battle - and then release them, free them. That is, there is no hint of captivity or slavery after capture, but on the contrary, there is an indication of liberation.
You know, it’s curious how, when translating from language to language, the meaning is distorted - even though the translators both understand and convey the general idea of the text.
And psychedelics - you’re right - also in a sense “catches” the reader, and also gives him not captivity, but freedom, even fleeting and relative - freedom from the oppression of language itself, since it transcends its framework, breaks through its restraining fascia and shells. And on the mind of the reader, accustomed to living in linguistic oppression, such liberation undoubtedly has the most beneficial effect - showing him in sensations, and not in abstract terms, spaces that are outside the boundaries of speech fields (here I put the plural because psychedelics are not specific to one or more languages, but is universal and can be used as a tool for mental development by representatives of any linguistic culture).
Mikael: The most remarkable thing about discussions of this kind is that some points are interesting and could pass, but their “speakers” themselves are cheerfully “running on a new trail.” So, at the beginning of the discussion, Anya spoke about a paradise for translators, Alex about “forest Babylon,” and Ayuna about “discordant voices.” And these are the points that I immediately noticed, but the discussion would have gone in a different direction... Poets are a special people. They are intuitive, images arise according to their own rules and rules of language, but “we hurry and sing”.... I thought (so in parentheses) that if the authors had the goal of writing a poem based on what was analyzed or analyzed, it would be nice. Maybe think about a “poetry application” in the form of some kind of assignment... or a competition that I don’t like))
But further. Babylon. Tower. This is associated with Nimrod. "Cush also begat Nimrod; he began to be strong on the earth; he was a mighty hunter before the Lord; therefore it is said: a mighty hunter like Nimrod is before the Lord." (Gen. 10, 8-9)
As for me personally, I remain in the position of my general analysis. The biblical and other associations are incredibly interesting, yet... I don't like catching birds. And I wouldn’t talk about catcher poems. Including psi-verses. The reader remains free. I would consider it more correct to say - he sits freely on his hand, he may be free, but he remains silent, spellbound by the text. So I agree)))
Anuka: Mikael, why are they “running on a new trail”?
that light, let’s say, reading also hasn’t gone away. but you also showed something else. and it is, yes. I don't see anything good in catching birds either.
catching souls is a metaphor.
bird catching - not at all.
you simply removed the metaphorical nature (with languages and poets) and read the verse literally - the way a child could probably read it.
and also, I think, there is a certain... out-of-dateness of the concept, or something, well, who has ever seen a bird catcher in life?
precisely from a verse - hung with nets, snares, cages with birds fighting in them. nobody.
and at the beginning of the last century, they probably were.
If you meet someone like that, it’s an unpleasant sight, of course.
Here, I think, there is something similar as with the word corsair, for example. Now it is perceived as sea romance. what a corsair. even a pirate. For us, this is also literature - splashes in the face, salty wind, barrels of rum, risk, such a thrill, in short.
and if you remember the Somali pirates, then there is no romance, greedy, puny, poor people on
rusty boats. small, dirty sea shantrap.
I think that’s what happened to bird catchers.
I’m reading Bagritsky here. thanks to you, Mikael.
I’m re-reading some things, some for the first time.
Here is a seemingly harmless poem - autumn.
and the finale -
I'll whistle the dog, I'll take the gun
And I’ll put bread in my bag...
The autumn heat will fall again,
Thick as flower honey -
And over the gardens and over the water
The hunting day is rising...
So it wasn’t limited to decoys there.
He loved to shoot them - birds - it turns out.
Who else can you shoot over water - only birds.
so you’re right, Mikael, you sensed some kind of bloodthirsty instinct in him.
Mikael: You need to sleep at night. But there were times when I didn’t sleep very well, and the poet of the first magnitude, Eduard Bagritsky, was able to speak about these times, like few other poets of that time. It was his poems that became the main support of front-line poetry in the next war with the Nazis.
That fragment about the hunter confirms absolutely nothing. What about hunting? An ancient male occupation. Personally, I don’t like him, but it is very possible that people who killed people in war have a completely different attitude towards hunting animals, people get used to weapons, to the recoil of a butt in the shoulder. And there is nothing terrible about this. And in the verse that you cited, there is a previous fragment in which the poet is hunted, he is the victim.
“I know how the darkness is stitched with paths,
And midnight is empty as a tomb;
There's game and fog
In the grassy wilderness,
The wind is jumping in your forehead!”...
In conclusion, I will formulate my opinion on the poem “Birdcatcher”, which was formed even before the poem was exhibited here and has not undergone any special changes..
First of all, these are real poems. Innovative poetics. New ways of word existence. Then there is the dual nature of the poem, the presence of a powerful background. The “power level” of this plan is determined for me by the main stanza, which gave me the idea to exhibit “The Birdcatcher” in the revue:
“And before him, green below,
Blue and blue on top,
The world rises up like a huge bird,
It whistles, clicks, rings."
Of course it's great. Extraordinarily beautiful. Connected with the word “rises” with the sunrise... And together - scary. Because just imagine this colossal bird, it’s not some kind of King Kong... It will peck at the “two-legged” one like a dead worm...
In many ways, these are poems about freedom and lack of freedom, will and captivity. About networks, cobwebs, cages, free singing and prisoners, prisons, about the transformation of dreams. .. Bagritsky, I think, worked with the word quite consciously, but also often intuitively. They highlight complex and deep connections between words and images. And this is true - in terms of word density, color and volume of text, his poems are very modern.
And, in conclusion. As with Pasternak's poem, the text "resists" (or we resist) changing our "simple understanding." We don’t want to “get into the subconscious of the poem”; we don’t want to change anything in our perception. All reasoning and other “words” are dispelled, but the text remains intact. A certain “law of text inertia.” Very interesting.
