Muireann Ní Bhrolcháin’s Book on Early Irish Literature.

Early Irish Literature by Muireann Ní Bhrolcháin

This is a wee link to Dr Ní Bhrolcháin’s book on early Irish literature
which I shall go to the trouble of buying before I review it, rather than
begging for a free copy (which isn’t a nice thing to do).

As the blurb says this book is suited to both the serious student and
to the general reader with an interest in the area. I shall put a link
in here at the base of the small piece and a huge congragulation
to Muireann on the publication in what have been incredibly difficult
times. The latter part of the statement alludes to her years of
commitment to the Tara campaign and unlike ex-Taoiseach Bertie
Ahern she really is well worth the read. She wrote it herself…

Put it on the Christmas stocking list:

An Introduction to Early Irish Literature , Muireann Ni Bhrolcháin,
Four Courts Press 2009.

Save Tara Campaign.

Blue Moon.

Harry Clarke Links at bottom of Poem .

Blue Moon

The blue moon, the blue moon
low strung and the late roses.

It was either Marc Chagall or Harry Clarke for the heartbreaking blues,
thus Clarke :
The Pics on this new Clarke site are indicative of his Blues

RB Kitaj : Excerpt from ‘The First Diasporist Manifesto.’

I have mentioned before the work of RB Kitaj both as a writer in his Manifesto
and as an Artist whose work The Death of Rosa Luxemburg profoundly
effected both my interest in Art and my political view. Indeed I had stated that I
would excerpt his short piece on Diaspora some time ago.

[First Diasporist Manifesto, RB Kitaj: Thames And Hudson 1989]

The Almond Tree

“I always keep a picture, tacked to my wall, of the gorgeous little painting
of The Almond Tree which Bonnard was working at on his last day,
to remind me of another fate, a more sublime and fixed one than that of Jews or that
of my own particular Diasporism, where pinting marks on canvas may spell
peripatetic danger instead of peace in the sun. In fact, I return this day to a tiny picture
of a False messiah I thought I’d finished, taking up Bonnard’s little tree to infuse my messiah
with hopeful white paint, befitting the End of Days, prolonging its poor prospects and
smothering the negative constraints of Diaspora for a moment; these negative aspects by
the way, which in traditional interpretations are due to be resolved in the messianic end of time.
I just came a cross a Biblical Allusion to the flowering Almond interpreted as the white head of an
old man….so my poor Messiah can be aged and maybe even something more false.”

Rosa
Luxemburg and Kitaj.
Kitaj Glyphs Site.
Obit
from London Independent.

MnaFile: TwitterFile of Poethead !

I shall paste the First Page into my Ephemera Section when I have
five minutes but in the meantime I have just started Tweeting and
can see the possibilities of application already:

Poethead’s Twitter (!)

a Moorhen with Emerald Stockings.

Twitter Updates

follow me on Twitter

Modern Visionary Women’s Writing: Barbro Karlén.

There are short posts with the most minimal information on Poethead giving glimpses
(albeit briefly) of women’s visionary writing. They include Marguerite Porete,
(a Beguine who was burned at the stake in the French Inquisition), excerpts from the beautiful Anna Livia Plurabelle
Soliquoy, which shares a set of images and ideas with Porete. I have mentioned the antiphons
of Hildegard of Bingen and the gorgeous vision laden writings of Ursu,Touminen and Julian Of
Norwich. Mostly they were Women in the Wall (apart of course from the wonderful James Joyce
whose tropes and archetypes do share similarities). I have been reading the Karlén for a week
or two- I must admit studiously avoiding the poetry and focussing instead on the symbols;
but I am finding it really difficult, not least because I reluctantly accepted it as a gift from an old
friend whom recommended it in the highest terms. Its not that I am unused to non-verbal
communication, the use of word and tone by women whose communication is not academic
but it exhausts me and I do not know why. I am going to expand out this brief introduction and
include a few excerpts in The Saturday Woman Poet/Writer Section tomorrow, I hope.
On a not unrelated note I see in the Guardian of last weekend that Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s
The Yellow Wallpaper is going to be re-issued, the review of same was excellent
because the reviewer disussed her initial reaction to the story in terms of shock and curiousity.
The Gilman short Story can be accessed in Scribbling Women, Short Stories by 19th Century
American Women, edited by Elaine Showalter/Christopher Bigby.

Back then to Karlén, I wonder if it because it is easier to read those whom are removed from
us historically such as Porete and Julian that breaks the tension in reading visionary books?

Whilst the storm is raging and completing its work, this book will tell you more about this artist.

He was the artist who had decorated the whole of the king’s palace with images of eternal beauty.
The artist whose wisdom and power was able to transfer the highest eternal beauty and justice down
here to the lower planets. The artist who periodically came to the world of human beings, to bring
them visions of eternal truth. I shall now write down the poem that the good king wrote
whilst he lived here on earth. A poem that is about the artist who made the statue..

(From : A Moment in the Blossom Kingdom and When the Storm Comes , by

Barbro Karlén.

I will excerpt some of the poem onto the blog tomorrow along with an excerpt from Liliana Ursu,
a modernist writer in the immediate post WWII period.

Discussion of Hildegard Von
Bingen’s Music; but try and get the CDs/LPs

: Marguerite Porete