Saturday, February 18, 2006

bERLIN tIERGARTEN


A Request From the Family and Estate of the Late Robert Walser
(Feb 18/06)
The family, the remaining family, of Robert Walser, his estate and trustees of said estate, has asked me to write a novel in Walserian verse and temper. Of course I will jump, or more to the point, leap at the opportunity, being a great lover and admirer of the now deceased Mr. Walser. I will need, however, to appropriate a Walserain mien and tone, which will no doubt require that I a) live out my remaining years in an asylum, b) wear a gray greatcoat at all times, regardless of temperature and climate, and c) become quite mad. The first and second of these may pose some difficulties, but as for the last, or C, I should have no inherent problems in said psychological appropriation, none whatsoever. Madness befits me, or more to the point, I befit madness, quite appropriately and without approbation. First I will need get a haircut, short at the sides and moppet-like at the crown and forehead; loose several unaccounted for pounds of flab and general flabbiness; and remove my beard; albeit a short and faint graying that befits a man of my age and temper, but a beard just the same. The mendicant that I am, I foresee no great difficult in taking on this most auspicious project, none whatsoever. The opening sentence will be the following, though I will still need rework the syntax and grammatical inlay, perhaps: Hello, my name is Robert, and I am quite mad, quite mad indeed.

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"Poetry is the short-circuiting of meaning between words, the impetuous regeneration of primordial myth". Bruno Schulz
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