----- Original Message -----
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Wednesday, April 14, 2004 11:44 AM
Subject: Re: Para-Nabokoviana: Claude lisait Gary, Ada ou l'ardeur de Nabokov ...

Hello, Ed and List
 
What a wonderful idea, VN´s Collected Works by Machine Translation! 
 
I´ve recently enjoyed VN´s own reticence concerning Montcrieff´s translation of Proust´s "In Search of Lost Time" (VN) or  " Remembrance of Things Past " (Montcrieff).
 
Wrote Nabokov: " Montcrieff died while translating the work, which is no wonder, and the last volume was translated by a man called Blossom who did quite well".  
 
In the most recent issue of The Scientific American there is a text about patent rights concerning a kind of air-borne transportation along palm trees. The guy who owns the patent wants to stop the employment of these tourist-enticements unless a fortune in rights is paid to him, but someone discovered that before he had obotained his patent for his apparatus, it already existed as part of the country´s culture and that this would invalidate his claims ( I have not the article by me so I´m not being very precise, I just want to convey the general idea).
Without naming actors and titles, I also heard another interesting story about a movie where a Hollywood musician was able to get an enormous amount of money because of a successful jingle he had composed for a movie. One day he gave a party and his friends were puzzled after hearing the musician´s neighoboring nuns chanting while at work. They thought that these nuns had appropriated his tune, but it came out that they were chanting a 12th Century Mass Responsory, a "Miserere" which the musician himself, while stationed in France during the war, might have heard and registered in his memory unaware of its origin.  The musician was devastated by the discovery, but I don´t think it would have happened because he was afraid to pay any amount of copy-rights to the nuns or to the Pope... He was wounded in his artistic pride.
That´s what I fear would happen to VN if he found himself coupled to Lichenberg and, in this case, with such a poor predecessor.  
I´ll try to check the date of publication of  " A Presença de Anita", which had recently been considered  a work that could have inspired  "Lolita" ( I was never curious about it! ) and, if it is really similar to VN´s and if it comes before Lichenberg´s, then...  heavens, what a bore !
Jansy
 
---- Original Message -----
From: D. Barton Johnson
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Sent: Wednesday, April 14, 2004 1:28 PM
Subject: Para-Nabokoviana: Claude lisait Gary, Ada ou l'ardeur de Nabokov ...

EDNOTE.  In a 1937 group photo
VN was  misidentified as the writer Jacques Audiberti, mentioned below. 
Also, do note the charming machine translation of "Mineur, mais mineur de fond!" as "Minor, but underground worker! I propose a new Nabokov "Collected Works" all in machine translation versions.
 
----- Original Message -----
From: Sandy P. Klein
To: spklein52@hotmail.com
Sent: Wednesday, April 14, 2004 3:19 AM
Subject: Claude lisait Gary, Ada ou l'ardeur de Nabokov ...

Mercredi 14 avril 2004
 
http://www.lefigaro.fr/culture/20040413.FIG0217.html
 
SOUVENIRS Hommage d'un écrivain, intime du chanteur qui était aussi un grand lecteur de poésie
«Je n'ai jamais vu Nougaro sans un livre»
A un journaliste qui lui demandait si la chanson n'était pas un «art mineur», Claude Nougaro avait répondu : «Mineur, mais mineur de fond! Permettez que je me rende au charbon de mon langage et que je suce le gravier des mots pour en faire des émeraudes.» Christian Laborde fut très proche de celui qu'il surnomme «l'homme aux semelles de swing». Il évoque le goût jamais démenti de Nougaro pour la poésie et sa passion pour la littérature.

Christian Laborde (*)
[13 avril 2004]

Je n'ai jamais vu Claude Nougaro sans un livre à portée de la main, livre posé sur la table de sa loge, à côté de la bouteille d'eau de Botot, sur la banquette arrière de sa voiture, ou enfermé dans ce vanity-case qu'il trimballait lors des tournées. Les mots trouvaient ainsi leur place entre les tubes et les pots de fond de teint, «le cambouis de l'artiste», disait l'auteur de Locomotive d'or.


Claude lisait Gary, Ada ou l'ardeur de Nabokov et tous les romans de Jacques Audiberti : Les tombeaux ferment mal, Le Maître de Milan, ou encore le très luxuriant Abraxas, odyssée d'un peintre transportant d'Italie en Espagne les cendres d'un saint. Pour Nougaro, le maître, c'était Audiberti, athlète complet du langage, à la fois poète, romancier et dramaturge. Un poète dont la découverte émerveilla Gaston Bachelard : «Quand ma langue s'emparesse, j'ouvre La Pluie sur les boulevards et le monde se remet à tourner.» Claude rencontre Audiberti à Paris aux Deux- Magots. Audiberti n'a pas de toit. Claude se propose de l'héberger : il pourra passer la nuit dans la chambre de sa grand-mère. «Quel bonbon de silence !» s'exclame Audiberti en franchissant le seuil de cette chambre qu'il occupera... un an. Venu à Paris rencontrer les poètes, Nougaro héberge l'un des plus grands d'entre eux. Audiberti dit de lui : «Avec le taureau Nougaro, la poésie débouche dans la noire arène du disque !»


Cette force poétique fauve ne sera guère saluée comme telle par une critique prompte à promouvoir les produits frelatés, par une télévision qui, de préférence, invite sur ses plateaux des artistes calibrés. De cela Claude souffrait-il ? Il ne souffrait que de ce qu'il savait de lui, de l'homme : «Tant qu'il y aura des hommes, il y aura des tanks !» répétait-il volontiers, coiffé d'un chapeau de cow-boy, un verre de Bordeaux à la main. L'homme est doué pour faire le mal. Cioran le dit et le redit dans des livres que Claude lisait dans sa loge avant d'entrer en scène. Oui, tant qu'il y aura des hommes, il y aura des tanks ! De cette «percussion», il fera une chanson qui figure dans son album posthume, sous le titre Les Chenilles. Car, chez Nougaro, tout finit par des chansons, c'est-à-dire par de la beauté, de la légèreté.


La légèreté, oui, celle de Cocteau qu'il appréciait, des anges qu'il dessinait sur ses cahiers. La légèreté, oui, celle de la pluie qui le faisait danser. Nougaro, c'est une pluie d'images, un festival de mots swingants. Qui dit swing dit boxe. La légèreté de Claude est celle, foudroyante, de Marcel Cerdan, le mec à Piaf. La boxe, oui, la sueur, les poings qui partent, les jambes qui, sur scène, avancent, fléchies.


Un poète de chair, de sang et de sons qui lisait volontiers «les poètes de papier» : Kenneth White, dont la maigreur syllabique, le refus de toute rhétorique attirait «le baroque troubadour à guitare éclectique» qu'il demeurait, Jean-Pierre Verheggen, dont le Ridiculum vitae le faisait rire, Serge Pey, dont il appréciait la voix, Ludovic Janvier, dont je lui tendis, quelques jours avant sa mort, rue Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, le tout récent recueil, Des rivières plein la voix. Il l'avait ouvert, regrettant de ne pouvoir sentir sous ses doigts engourdis par les médicaments le grain du papier, la peau de la page.


La page est tournée. Je vais relire les mots que Ludovic Janvier consacre à la Garonne qui, il y a peu, accueillait les cendres de Claude Nougaro.

(*) Ecrivain. Les éditions Fayard viennent de rééditer deux ouvrages que Christian Laborde a consacrés à Claude Nougaro : L'Homme aux semelles de swing et La Voix royale.

 
--------------------
Machine Translation:
 


Culture & Spectacles


MEMORIES Homage of a writer, intimate of the singer who was also a large reader of poetry
"I never saw Nougaro without a book"
A journalist who asked to him whether the song were not a "minor art", Claude Nougaro had answered: "Minor, but underground worker! Allow that I go to the coal of my language and that I suck the gravel of the words to make emeralds of them." Christian Laborde was very close to that which it calls" the man with the soles of swing ". He evokes the taste ever contradicted of Nougaro for poetry and his passion for the literature.

Christian Laborde (*)
[ April 13, 2004 ]

I never saw Claude Nougaro without a book with range of the hand, delivers posed on the table of his cabin, beside the water bottle of Botot, on the back bench of his car, or locked up in this vanity case which it trimballait at the time of the rounds. The words thus found their place between the tubes and the basic pots of dye, "the dirty oil of the artist", said the author of gold Engine.


Claude read Gary, Ada or the heat of Nabokov and all the novels of Jacques Audiberti: The tombs close badly, the Master of Milan, or very luxuriant Abraxas, odyssey of a painter transporting of Italy to Spain ashes of a saint. For Nougaro, the Master, it was Audiberti, complete athlete of the language, at the same time poet, novelist and playwright. A poet at which the discovery filled with wonder Gaston Bachelard: "When my language emparess, I open the Rain on the boulevards and the world recovers to turn." Claude meets Audiberti in Paris with the Two Nest eggs. Audiberti does not have a roof. Claude proposes to lodge it: he will be able to spend the night in the room of his grandmother. "Which candy of silence!" exclaim Audiberti by crossing the threshold of this room which it will occupy... one year. Come in Paris to meet the poets, Nougaro lodges one of largest of them. Audiberti known as of him: "With the Nougaro bull, poetry emerges in the black arena of the disc!"


This fawn-coloured poetic force will hardly be greeted like such by a prompt criticism to promote the adulterated products, by a television which, preferably, invites on its plates of the gauged artists. From did that Claude suffer? He suffered only from what he knew of him, of the man: "As long as there will be men, there will be tanks!" it repeated readily, capped of a hat of cow-boy, glass of Bordeaux to the hand. The man is gifted to make the evil. Cioran says it and repeats it in books that Claude read in his cabin before entering in scene. Yes, as long as there will be men, there will be tanks! Of this "percussion", it will make a song which appears in its posthumous album, under the title the Caterpillars. Because, at Nougaro, all finishes by songs, i.e. by beauty, lightness.


Lightness, yes, that of Cocteau which it appreciated, of the angels that it drew on its books. Lightness, yes, that of the rain which made it dance. Nougaro, it is a rain of images, a festival of words swingants. Who says swing known as boxes. The lightness of Claude is that, striking down, of Marcel Cerdan, the guy with Piaf. Boxing, yes, sweat, the fists which leave, the legs which, on scene, advance, bent.


A poet of flesh, blood and sounds which readily read "the paper poets": Kenneth White, whose syllabic thinness, the refusal of any rhetoric attracted "the baroque troubadour with eclectic guitar" which it remained, Jean-Pierre Verheggen, of which Ridiculum vitae made it laugh, Serge Pey, of which it appreciated the voice, Ludovic January, of which I tended to him, a few days before its death, street Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, the very recent collection, Of the rivers full the voice. He had opened it, regretting to be able to feel under its fingers engourdis by the drugs the grain of paper, the skin of the page.


The page is turned. I will read again the words that Ludovic January devotes to the Garonne which, it there has little, accomodated ashes of Claude Nougaro.

(*) Writer. The Fayard editions have just republished two works that Christian Laborde devoted to Claude Nougaro: The Man with the soles of swing and the royal Voice.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


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