It is good to have these stretches of time–to work on projects, go out on the bike, play cello, think about things. It is often said that humans are social beings. This is true, but we are solitary too; each of us has a different combination of the two, and in each of us, the combination changes. Somehow we are led to believe that we aren’t supposed to be alone–but certain projects, even ways of thinking, require a good bit of aloneness. This isn’t the same as being isolated or detached; it can lead to better company, since you have done your work (or part of it) and can enter clear and rich conversation.
Thanks to the streches of time this past week, I have been able to accomplish a few things. I finished the entire first draft of the translation of Kata Bajnai’s Farkasok, the first draft of a review of John Wall Barger’s The Mean Game, and the first draft of a translation of a poem by Gyula Jenei–the tenth that I have translated so far of his poems. I intend to revise all of these and translate two more poems in the next week–and then, by the end of the month, write the paper that I will present at the ALSCW Conference. There will be lots else to do this month–getting ready for teaching, going on a faculty trip to Serbia, etc., but all of this will be possible now. The projects have been enjoyable in themselves, and the focus only made them more so.
The fall is full of commitments and projects–including teaching, serving as vice form teacher–not the official form teacher, but rather the support person–for the incoming ninth grade bilingual class, leading services (about once a month, in addition to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur) at Szim Salom, participating in the ALSCW conference, going with my colleagues Gyula Jenei and Marianna Fekete to Dallas at the end of October (see the event descriptions here), and translating some poems by Tomas Venclova, whose work I translated in the past. In addition to that, I want to take some new steps with my writing and music–and bring my Hungarian to a much higher level.
And to ride the bike, too; the fall is my favorite time for that. Last week I bicycled to Besenyszög–not an especially long ride, but long enough in the heat. (Tonight and tomorrow’s rains should bring the temperatures down; there’s already a vigorous breeze.) I took the photos on the road. In the sunset photo, I like the way the grass picks up a tinge of the pink and orange of the sky. The farm machines are beautiful too. How much work gets done, and how many ways there are to do it, beyond anyone’s individual knowledge? Work of the mind, work of the fields, work of the stage, work of the bakery–wherever we go, there is some work that requires someone’s work; much of the time, we have only a fragmented idea of it, if even that much.
I was exhausted and thrilled to arrive in Szolnok, take a taxi home, enter the apartment, greet the cat (not the one pictured here), run down to the river, walk across the river to the SPAR, go back home, take a long nap, then walk around town in the wind, under the pressing clouds. I have said “home” three times so far, but for me Szolnok is a home in the making. I have lots to do before I can fully call this home. The plans are getting clearer and clearer.
In November 2020, when I will have been here three years, I intend to apply for permanent residency. Around that time–maybe sooner, maybe later–I will try to purchase an apartment. The prices for downtown apartments are now high (by Hungarian standards and my own), but it’s possible to find something roomy and inexpensive on the outskirts: for instance, near the old sugar factory, which would allow for a daily bike ride along the Tisza to school.
Assuming I can work something out with my school for the longer term, I would plan to teach for another 10 years–no more than that, since I want to retire with some force left in me. Upon retiring, I would devote myself to writing, music, Szolnok culture, biking, translation, and Jewish study and practice.
Also, while I won’t become fully fluent in Hungarian within the next year–fluency takes years–I hope, in this coming year, to read much more Hungarian literature and to speak comfortably on everyday subjects. I want to continue translating.
I hope that it will be possible to continue teaching at the Dallas Institute in July and to visit the East Coast before and afterward. This would be good not only for the known reasons, but for unknown and surprising ones too.
Any pieces of this could change. Emergencies come up; plans get thwarted or diverted. But these plans have been steady for a while. I look forward to seeing at least some of them take shape. In the meantime–particularly in the next few weeks–I have lots to do:
1. Finish at least a draft of a translation of Kata Bajnai’s play Farkasok. I have translated the first scene and intend to translate the whole play by August 15. That will leave time for revisions and adjustments–first on my own, and then in consultation with the author and others.
2. Write a review of John Wall Barger’s book of poetry The Mean Game. I hope to complete it by August 15.
3. Translate a few more of Gyula Jenei’s poems (by August 20 or so).
4. Prepare for the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture’s 2019 Education Forum, presented by the Dallas Institute’s Louise and Donald Cowan Center for Education.
5. Write the paper that I will be presenting at the 2019 ALSCW Conference (on Frederick Douglass and Robert Hayden, in Ishion Hutchinson’s seminar)–by the end of August.
6. Plan the seminar that I will be leading at the ALSCW Conference (on the nature of great literature).
7. Translate at least one of Tomas Venclova’s more recent poems, and then translate more over the coming months.
8. Read books in Hungarian, beginning with the books I have received as gifts or begun reading on my own.
9. Take bike rides, including long ones.
10. Go with my colleagues to Serbia for three days.
11. Get ready for the school year.
12. Write sketches for the next book.
13. Write some other things.
14. Play cello. (This appears in 14th place but should go higher.)
15. Learn Rachmaninoff’s “Vocalise.” (Thank you, Tonya Fisher!) This should go higher too.
16. See friends, answer emails, make a few phone calls.
That’s just a start.
I took all four pictures in Szolnok on Tuesday, August 6.
In just a few minutes, I will board a plane to New York–so this is a quick post filled with thanks. I am grateful to the Dallas Institute, its Summer Institute, the Cowan Center, and everyone in and involved with them. The literary works, music, discussions, lectures, films, conversations, laughter, delicious meals, and overall spirit made this one of the most glorious summers yet. I learned from my colleagues, the participating teachers, the staff, the works we read, the songs we sang, and more. Thanks to Marcell Bajnai and all of 1LIFE for the song “Maradok ember,” which brought so much to our last two days here. I played it twice: first during my faculty remarks (the opening remarks before the main lecture) on Thursday, and then at the closing ceremony on Friday. Both times, people sang along in the chorus; the second time, there was a standing ovation! Here are two photos courtesy of the Dallas Institute (if you click on them, you can see them on Flickr and browse the other photos as well); here, also, is a short video taken at the closing ceremony by Leo Vaughns Jr. MEd.
Thanks to Dallas Strings, the wonderful place up in Allen where I rented the cello and purchased some sheet music for future playing (including cello pieces by Liszt and Farkas).
Thanks to Congregation Shearith Israel, the synagogue I have attended every summer when in Dallas, which has become a “shul away from shul” for me. I got to leyn (chant) Torah again–from one of my favorite parshiot, Balak (about which I hope to say something later). It was good to be there again—in the shul, community, liturgy, teachings, and text.
And thanks to the extraordinarily generous person who lets me stay in her apartment, summer after summer. This has made my Summer Institutes not only possible but fruitful, since there, in the quiet of her place, I could read, write, gather my thoughts, and sleep.
One more thanks: to Tom McLaughlin, who made one of these beautiful pieces for each of the faculty members, using pyrography and a branch from a nearby felled tree—and gave each of us a lovely antique book too. And to everyone who gave their works and thoughts.
I am leaving some things out, but that’s the nature of it, full and unfinished. From here into the air.
This morning, on the way to the Dallas Institute, I was listening to 1LIFE’s song “Kopog a szív” and getting caught up in the phrase “nyílik a szem” (“the eye opens”). The song lands on it, by surprise, and repeats it, and returns to it, and stays there; the song is about a lot of things, but part of it is about suddenly seeing what is going on. To me, its montage of images tells a story, or two; different listeners will hear different stories in it.
It fit well (though unintentionally) with today’s discussions of Sophocles’ Oedipus the King and yesterday’s of Aeschylus’s Eumenides, both having to do with the opening of the eyes (as tragedy generally does). When things (like a song and a play) come together without planning, they set off many thoughts. I was thinking all day about having the eyes opened and what this can mean in different forms and places: in the plays we are reading, in this song, and beyond. When your eyes are opened to yourself, whether in tragedy or in song, there are two sides to it: you realize what you have done, and you realize who you are. Also, this opening of the eyes can’t be taken back. It can be terrible or joyful, but it’s there for good.
It isn’t just an intellectual consideration; I think of vivid moments in my life when my eyes were opened in some way, through a meeting with another person, through accident, through loss, through poetry, through learning, through mistakes.
The song opened up to me slowly over the past months; I enjoyed its melody and rhythm from the start but needed some time to grasp the lyrics, since I am still far from fluent in Hungarian. I remember hearing it in concert (at Európa-nap, I think) and suddenly understanding “nyílik a szem.” The rest came from there. It is now one of my favorite 1LIFE songs. (I have previously commented here on “Maradok ember” and “Kapcsolj ki!“)
Here is a video of the song, which contains the lyrics; and below it, my tentative translation. I took a few liberties and may have made some outright mistakes. It is a start; I will make corrections and improvements over time. “Szem” can be taken in a singular or plural sense. I first translated it as “eyes” (“the eyes open”) but later my eye opened and I changed my mind. “Eye” in English can also have a general or plural meaning, and all the other images in the chorus are singular (or archetypal). “Nyílik a szem” could also be translated as “the eye is opened,” but that suggests that it has already happened, whereas here it seems to be happening right in the moment. “The eye opens” does not fit the rhythm of the song, even in translation–but it is more vivid and direct than the alternatives I considered. So I will leave it as is.
over the housetops, the sky
in the lonely streets, the wind
see our brain does not converse
gut and feeling, what goes with them?
infinity is in our cells
fear resides in our bones
suddenly a stroke of luck
makes our fingers interlock
winter comes, summer goes
it would come but can’t find its way
on goes the light, click of machine
the ice melts, but the heart knocks,
the heart knocks, the heart knocks
this is all that our eyes see
from the sky a cloud cries onto us
the truth has no clothes
our empty room is overcrowded
winter comes, summer goes
it would come but can’t find its way
on goes the light, click of machine
the ice melts, but the heart knocks,
the heart knocks, it stands in the door,
it waits for the key, the lock gives way,
quiet in the room, order on the shelf,
the eye opens, the eye opens,
the eye opens, the eye opens,
the eye opens, the eye opens,
the eye opens, the eye opens,
the eye opens, the eye opens
winter comes, summer goes
it would come but can’t find its way
on goes the light, click of machine
the ice melts, but the heart knocks,
the heart knocks, it stands in the door,
it waits for the key, the lock gives way,
quiet in the room, order on the shelf,
the eyes opens, the eye opens,
the eye opens
I took all three photos today. The first and third are of the Dallas Institute; the second, of the dashboard of my rental car. The video was made by Zsombor Papp; the song “Kopog a szív” is by 1LIFE, and its lyrics are by Marcell Bajnai.
I made a few additions and an important correction to this piece after posting it: “kopog a szív” means “the heart knocks,” not “the heart beats.”This correction is important because first of all, it’s accurate; second, it’s a fresher image than “the heart beats”; and third, it goes with the door, lock, and everything else. It affects everything. Also, I commented a little more on “nyílik a szem” (which I first translated as “the eyes open” but then changed to “the eye opens”).
On this blog I recently started a song series, in which I intend to present songs I have introduced in class, am planning to introduce, or wish to include for any reason. My main purpose is to draw attention to songs themselves and what they can hold and do–but purposes aside, this is fun. The first post focused on songs that I had brought to various classes and that we had sung along with cello.
This time, I will introduce three songs that remind me of each other in some way, whether musically, lyrically, or otherwise. All three are tremendous (they come up to you slowly and then shake something up in you); all have to do with love in a broken and transitory world. They all convey hope in some way without sidestepping loss and sadness. The Gábor Presser and Art of Flying songs remind me of each other melodically and rhythmically (in the chorus); the Presser and Tom Waits, lyrically. The Art of Flying lyrics stand apart. The similarities between these songs compelled me to consider them together; their differences are even more interesting than what they share.
The song “Te majd kézenfogsz és hazavezetsz” (“You will take my hand and take me home”), written by Presser, has to do with two people staying together even after everything and everyone else leaves them–youth, money, comfort, health, family, friends. Here are two different renditions; each one brings something different out of the song. It was Marcell Bajnai’s cover that introduced me to the song; I then heard it in a concert by the band Csík (this past Saturday night). Although I love the instrumental parts of the Csík version (and the way they transform the song), Marcell’s cover brings out the lyrics and gives them room. The mood of his rendition is different too: more reflective or matter-of-fact than exuberant.
Now listen to Art of Flying’s “Tomorrow” (one of my favorite songs in the world, on their wonderful album “Garden of Earthly Delights“); you will hear how the two choruses remind me of each other. As far as I know, there’s no video of the song; the recording is up on their Bandcamp site, where you can listen to all of their albums. I am proud to have played cello on one of their songs. Here, by following the link below (in an image of the record cover), you can listen to “Tomorrow” and read the lyrics, which begin:
I leaned my back against an oak
I thought it was a trusty tree
& first it bent & then it broke
my true love had forsaken me
my dream of peace could not come true
the wind had swept our hearts away
& so I sing this song to you
tomorrow blows us all away
These lyrics, like many Art of Flying lyrics, hold a range of times; they are ancient and modern, immediate and evocative at once. The vocal harmonies go so gently along that you hardly realize what is happening to you until the song is over and you think, wait, what? How did that song get into my bones?
Finally, here is Tom Waits’s “Time.” The similarity between these and Presser’s lyrics lies not just in the theme, but in the relation between verse and chorus; in both, the verses (mostly) hold the brokenness, and the choruses the simple affirmation. Also, both speak of the future in some way; although Csík refers to physical action (taking a person’s hand and bringing the person home) and Waits to some metaphysical state (of it being “time” for something), they both speak of something that will endure or come into being. It was the Presser/Csík song that reminded me of the Waits song and how great it is.
That wraps it up for the second installment of the song series. Next time, unless some other ideas occur in the meantime, I intend to present a few songs that have had special importance to me over the decades, songs that have stood out as favorites over time.
I took the photo by the Zagyva river on Sunday night.
Update: After writing this post, I realized (on my own) that I had made an error: “Te majd kézenfogsz és hazavezetsz” is written by Gábor Presser; this is stated in Marcell Bajnai’s video credits, but I mistakenly thought he was a member of Csík. The Csík version is a cover; in the video, Presser performs it with them. I adjusted the post and title accordingly (and made some other edits too, while I was at it). Here is Presser’s own recording of the song. This adds to the correspondences; his voice and Waits’s have a similar texture.
My laptop is still in repairs (I should get it back tomorrow), so I am writing on the phone. To make this easier, I wrote a draft on paper first, a good idea in general. The pen is a kind of mediator, the typewriter too. The electronic keyboard somehow shirks this role. Moreover, the pen and typewriter are messy in an enjoyable way. You get to cross things out, squeeze things in.
First of all, congratulations to everyone who took part in the Hamlet performance—three scenes and discussion—at the Verseghy Ferenc Könyvtár on Friday! I was sitting next to Katalin Cserfalvi, who works at the library and made this event possible. At moments we gaped at each other in awe. These scenes came alive, not only in the actors’ expressions and gestures, but in their rendition of the language. Last year’s performance was full of spirit and enjoyment, but this year’s reached a new level.
This took long and intense work. We have been rehearsing for about two months (mostly in class, and not in every class session), but before that, we read the entire play and then reread a few scenes multiple times. The students who weren’t in the performance—who served as audience members during our classtime rehearsals—deserve commendation too, because without their attention, listening, and comments, not only would we have been unable to rehearse, but we would have missed some of their insights. Also, the two students who introduced each scene at the performance, Luca Regina Gazdag and Dorina Kata Nagy, helped out in numerous ways behind the scenes, as did Petra Rónafalvi, who provided some of the costumes. When putting on a play, even a few scenes, one becomes aware of the different kinds of work that go into it and the importance of each.
After Hamlet, I went upstairs to hear a performance by Zsolt Bajnai and Marcell Bajnai (father and son): stories and songs alternating in a kind of dialogue. There seemed to be connections between Zsolt Bajnai’s stories and Marcell Bajnai’s songs; while not explicit or obvious (to me), they brought the separate works togethet into something new. I didn’t understand everything—some songs were familiar, some not, and I had read just one of the stories, the wonderfully satirical “Korrupcióterápia,” but I loved the different tones and the atmosphere of enjoyment in the room. Next time, whenever that may be, I will understand much more. (I didn’t take pictures, but there should be some coming from the library soon; when they appear, I will add the link.)
One exciting thing: the last song that Marcell played was one I hadn’t heard before. I was so taken by it that I tried to find it online later (by looking up the few words and phrases that I remembered). I had no luck, so I wrote to him to ask about it. He replied that he had written the song a week before and that this was the first time he played it in public! I now realize that he said this when introducing the song, but I didn’t catch it at the time. I hope to listen to the song many times.
All of this would have been enough for me for a weekend, but the festivities continued at full tilt. Yesterday, late in the afternoon, after a quiet day at home, I took the teain to the nearby village of Zagyvarékas for the Margaréta folkdance festival, followed by a concert by the band Csík. One of my students, an accomplished folk dancer and a member of the Rákóczi dance group, was in three of the dance performances—and I was eager to see them all and hear the band. It was my first real folkdance event in Hungary. I have seen a few short performances here and there, but nothing like this. I eas moved not only by the dancets’ skill (in singing as well as dancing), not only by the colorful costumes, not only by the gorgeous rhythms and melodies, but by the vitality and “nowness” of it all. Folkdance in Hungary is not some relic of a dying tradition; people of many ages put their hearts and lives into it.
What to say about the Csík concert? It was fantastic; they played so many instruments, and combined musical styles with such ease and in such interesting ways, that I wanted to rush home and start playing too. Their music opens up possibilities. The audience adored them (except for one disgruntled drunk man on the sidelines who ranted in a few brief sputters about how he wanted pure Hungarian music, not music from all over the place). Many songs were the band’s own, others by others; many had folk motifs, while others had a jazz, blues, rock, or other feel, or a mixture. One song (by Gábor Presser) I had heard before; Marcell Bajnai had played it in his recent solo concert, at the very end. It was exciting to recognize it and hear it in these two different ways.
Mosquitoes were swarming all around—it has been a bad few weeks, mosquito-wise—and audience and musicians alike were getting bitten every split second, from every angle. But we stayed until the end and beyond, cheered for an encore (which they played), and kept on applauding after that.
It was a long journey home (but a pleasant one, except for the mosquitoes). I had made the uncharacteristic mistake of leaving my bike at the Szolnok train station (or rather, train stop), thinking that the Zagyvarékas train station would be near the village center. Wrong! They are about four kilometers apart; in fact, you have to leave Zagyvarékas and then enter it again. The walk didn’t feel long, but on the way back I just barely missed the train I had hoped to take and had to wait an hour for the next one. Lesson learned: bring the bringa!*
P.S. On top of it all, this evening I went to Pest for the Budapest Festival Orchestra’s annual Dancing on the Square event, which brings Roma and non-Roma, economically advantaged and disadvantaged children together from all over Hungary to dance to music played by the orchestra. This year, the BFO played Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7; in the final movement, the children performed a dance. This Beethoven symphony, and especially the outdoor performance, brought back strong memories of playing it in high school, at Tanglewood—the thick summer air, the feeling of being in the middle of the music, all of this came back—but the performance made me hear the work in a new way. It is hard to describe, but I have it in my ears. The dancing worked so well with the fourth movenent, the children danced with such glee, that it turned into something more than I can name, something that goes with the rest of the weekend. We do not have to hold back in music, stories, poems, dance, plays. So much is waiting to be created, performed, and heard. So much is already here, in the air, on stages, in books and notebooks, in the feet and hands, in the mind. The train back to Szolnok has stopped, the window is open, and I hear the loud wind in the leaves. They are there too, the songs..
I woke up too early, but with good reason: some of my first translations from the Hungarian have been published in Literary Matters, a superb online literary journal! You can now read Gyula Jenei’s “Standing Point” (“Ahol állnék”) and “Chess” (“Sakk”) in English translation, as well as Marianna Fekete’s essay “A Crack in Eternity? Béla Markó’s Grass Blade on the Rock.” The latter quotes 21 haiku poems, which I translated as haiku. I hope you enjoy them! There will be more.
Does life get a whole lot better than this: listening to a terrific band in one of the most beautiful cities in the world? If it does, I hope to be there for it; but if not, I have already lived well.
Established late in the tenth century, Esztergom was Hungary’s capital until the Mongol seige of 1241. It towers above and alongside the Danube; you quickly encounter its steep hill and cliffs (I was generally able to bike uphill; I just had to watch for cars). When I arrived, it was just early afternoon, so I had time to see the Basilica (up high) and bike along the Danube below.
The Basilica, planned in 1822 and completed in 1869, stands on the foundation of a much older church, built in the eleventh century, that suffered burning, sacking, and ultimate ruin, with renovations in between. Esztergom itself, for all its splendor, has been through war after war, trouble after trouble. Later, when I commented on its beauty to the staff at the Atrium, the bed-and-breakfast place where I stayed, they replied, “Szép lesz.” (It will be beautiful.)
The synagogue, which I did not get to see (I mistook another building for it) is supposedly Hungary’s oldest—I have yet to verify this—but with the deportation and killing of almost the entire Jewish community in World War II, it stopped being a place for services. Today it functions as a cultural center.
After coming down from the hill, I walked through the Comedium Corso festival grounds to get my bearings. I heard an organ grinder, saw children riding Shetland ponies, and found the large stage where the bands were to play. I checked in at the Atrium before biking back down for the concert.
1LIFE ascended the stage through billows of fog and began to play up a storm. Within seconds or minutes, the audience (ranging in age from about 3 to 60, with a large teenage contingent) was tapping, dancing, singing, cheering along. Some of these songs, such as “Nincsen kérdés,” are heartbreaking and exhilarating at once; the hard-edged sound combines with the raw and thoughtful lyrics. Their sound reminds me a little of Nirvana and a little more of Son Volt (especially the Wide Swing Tremolo album) but their mixture of music and lyrics is unlike any other I have heard.
Several little kids were dancing through almost the whole show—and really dancing to the beat, not just randomly jumping around; teens were singing along to every word; and I was thrilled to be there. I realized, in a new way, that 1LIFE had “it”: the combination of music, lyrics, zest, stage presence, and knowhow that makes you enjoy every moment and want still more. They have more to discover and try out—this is always true for good artists—and they are clearly doing this. They show it through their appreciation of others’ music, their range of textures and tones, and their willingness to go for it, play shows, work with each new situation. They are professional in the best sense of the word: not staid-professional, but live-out-the-art professional.
They played most of the songs from their album, including “Kapcsolj ki!” and other favorites; one still-unrecorded song whose name I didn’t catch (I think it has “bölcsesség,” “wisdom,” in it) and which begins with “Na na na”—I love it so far and can’t wait to hear it again—and another song, “Londoni idő,” that is not on the album either but can be found on video. Midway through “Álmok a parton,” in the chorus, Marcell Bajnai changed “A Tisza-parton éjsaka….” to “A Duna-parton éjsaka” (in accordance with Esztergom’s location on the Danube). I don’t know if this was planned, but it felt spontaneous and perfect. There were memorable moments between the songs, too: quick stage banter, an eloquent impromptu song introduction by Marcell Jankó, the bassist—and then the one sad moment: they announced that they would play their next-to-last song, “Maradok ember,” but a festival staff person apparently told them that they were out of time and could only play one more song. So they skipped “Maradok ember” and played a gorgeous, exuberant “Táncolunk a végtelenben,” which turned responsive toward the end—that is, we sang back when we were supposed to, with full voice. And then cheered and cheered. And hoped for an encore. It did not come, but the concert didn’t go away quickly either. The pictures I took of the show (below) are limited in quality, but Kitti Berényi (kittiphoto) took some great ones.
After the concert, I biked along the Danube again, walked over the bridge to Slovakia and back, got some beef stew from one of the festival food stands, ran into the band and congratulated them, and then walked and biked through sloping alleys, up and down steps, until the sun went down. I got a good night’s sleep; early in the morning, I set out for Budapest (by train), where Rabbi Katalin Kelemen and I led Szim Salom’s Shavuot service. I had been preparing for this daily (it involved, among other things, leyning the Ten Commandments and chanting the first chapter of Ruth), but I didn’t realize that Esztergom would be part of the preparation too. I arrived so rested and happy, and met with such cheer and warmth from the others (regulars and visitors) that it went the way a Shavuot festival should. From festival to festival, the bridge was not long.
Some may think it’s eccentric of a 55-year-old to travel to Esztergom to hear a band led by one of her former students. Well, it is eccentric, but it’s part of my nature, and I don’t regret a second of it. Good music reaches people of all ages. This does not mean that I would go to all their shows. For instance, if they were playing at a young people’s nightclub or party, I wouldn’t want to step into their space. But a festival is meant to bring people together; age is less important there than other things.
There’s another aspect of this too. In his essay “Self-Reliance,” Ralph Waldo Emerson writes of the individual: “The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray.“ That is, it is given to each of us in life to appreciate particular things, to see them in a particular way. No one else can do this for us. It’s each person’s choice whether to live this out or not, but for me it’s the difference between full life and a sort of whimpering hesitation. Live modestly; be thoughtful of others; remember life’s stages, necessities and losses; but live out that life that is only yours, because that’s what it’s there for, briefly.
(I added links to this piece and edited it here and there after posting it.)
Rest will be scarce over the coming months (or plentiful, from some perspectives), so I will be looking to make the most of it. I have three different translation projects ahead and am excited about them all. I am participating in two literary events in the U.S. in October: the ALSCW Conference in Worcester, Massachusetts, and a series of events at the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture featuring two of my Hungarian colleagues (more about that soon!). In addition, I have a few writing deadlines, will continue my synagogue responsibilities as usual, and may hold another event at the Szolnok Gallery/Synagogue in September. The event on May 23 went beautifully. The audience was enthusiastic, everyone joined in the singing, and the acoustics lifted the voices.
Yes, and there’s the upcoming Hamlet performance and discussion–by some of my tenth-grade students–at the Ferenc Verseghy Public Library on June 14! They will perform three scenes from Hamlet, followed by discussions and interviews with the characters. We are now heading into our final rehearsals.
All of this is in addition to regular teaching, which is in an irregular state right now, since I am meeting frequently with seniors to help them prepare for their oral exams.
The next few weekends will be packed. Next Saturday I go to Esztergom to enjoy the Comedium Corso festival–where 1LIFE will be performing–and explore the surroundings, which look stunning in the photos I have seen. (I will take my bike on the train so that I can explore more easily.) From there I go to Budapest to lead Szim Salom’s Shavuot service on Sunday. The following weekend, we have the Hamlet performance on Friday; right after that, also in the library, there will be a performance by Zsolt Bajnai and Marcell Bajnai (father and son)! On Saturday, June 15, I plan to attend a folk dance festival in Zagyvarékas; one of my students, Dániel Lipcsei, will be performing in three groups, and there will be many more groups from all over the country. Some of it might look and sound like this:
Then on Sunday, June 16, I go to Budapest for the Budapest Festival Orchestra’s annual Dancing on the Square event. Later in the week, Szolnok’s Tiszavirág Fesztivál begins; I look forward to its concerts–including an acoustic show by 1LIFE–and other festivities. The following Shabbat (on June 22) I lead a service–with a bat mitzvah ceremony–in Budapest; on June 30, I leave for the U.S. I will be teaching, for the ninth consecutive summer, at the Dallas Institute’s Sue Rose Summer Institute for Teachers; this year we focus on tragedy and comedy, as we always do in the odd-numbered years (the even-numbered summers are devoted to epic). Those will be an intense, focused three and a half weeks, with lectures, seminars, panel discussions, films, and more. A few days on either end for visiting people–and then back to Hungary on August 5!
Back to the topic of rest: there are different levels and kinds. One of the reasons that I find Shabbat challenging (and important) is that it takes me about a day to wind down from the week. Resting on Friday evening and Saturday takes planning, focus, and determination (and I don’t always succeed at it). On Sunday, a greater calm sets in, but by then it’s already time to gear up for Monday. I have found it difficult, even in “free” time, to read books unrelated to my teaching, projects, and other preparations; several books have been waiting for months, not because I lacked time for them, but because my mind would not fit them in. I have now returned to The Book of Why by Judea Pearl and Dana Mackenzie; this time I hope to stay with it instead of letting more months go by. It gets more and more interesting as I get farther into it; I will have more to say about it later. I am also overdue with Cynthia Haven’s biography of René Girard, Evolution of Desire, not to mention books in Hungarian, which I read especially slowly.
Reading a long book (for pleasure and interest) takes a particular kind of restfulness. It’s different from reading a poem or short story; while these require intense focus and attention (and time), they tend to take less time on the initial reading than a novel or nonfiction book; thus you can reread them many times. I enjoy rereading more than I enjoy first-time reading, because of the new understandings that come with the repetition. To come to know a long book, you have to be willing to dedicate many hours just to the first reading. This is especially true for slow readers like me. I know people who can read a 350-page book in an afternoon or two; I am not one of these.
So there’s the rest that involves unwinding and the rest that makes room for reading. What other kinds are there? Writing, playing music, and other creative activities require stretches of time for trying things out, going back and revising, etc. There’s also the rest that comes through exercise: biking, for instance, over long distances. There’s the rest that comes from spending time with others: laughing with them, playing music with them, sitting down for a meal with them. There’s the rest that comes from doing something different: going somewhere on vacation, for instance. There’s the rest that comes from attending a concert, reading, or other performance. There’s the rest that comes from sorting things out in the mind: reflecting on the week, remembering important things, and putting less important things in their place. Then there’s the rest that comes with pure laziness: puttering around, doing what you feel like doing, whether or not it’s productive. There’s the rest that comes from sitting quietly and doing nothing. There’s structured, time-bound, hallowed rest, such as the rest of Shabbat. Finally, or near-finally, there’s sleep, and, at the end of life, death.
These all overlap, yet they are distinct, taking different forms and playing different roles. Yet each one can be well or poorly carried out. It’s all too easy to compromise rest, to try to make it serve something else. To rest well, you have to rest with all your heart. Or maybe that’s what makes something restful in the first place: doing it with all your heart, instead of pulling it this way and that.
THIS is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done,
Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best,
Night, sleep, death and the stars.
The immediate occasion for this post is a new online vote–and while I don’t trust in online votes or their results, I vote for 1LIFE, because they deserve the chance to play at East Fest–Mezőtúr. (Update: they will perform there on July 27!) I will not get to hear them, because I will be in Dallas for the month–but others will be able to enjoy the occasion. Enough of that; I am here to say a few things about “Kapcsolj ki!,” a song that has intrigued me for months. In particular, I see an interesting relationship between the poetic form–particularly the stanzas and rhymes–and the meaning. Parts of the song are especially difficult to translate–and it’s always hard to convey music in words–so anything I say will be a rough approximation. (The lyrics are by the band’s lead singer, guitarist, and lyricist, Marcell Bajnai.)
The video, by the way, is my favorite of all of theirs, because it’s taken in the studio, and it’s so well put together, from different times and moments in the recording session. Over the course of the video, the recording comes into being, and yet you’re listening to the finished thing all along.
Now for the song: it moves from looking outward toward looking inward (though both are present throughout); it seems to speak, at first, of a relationship where the other person is afraid to notice the speaker–and if only that person were willing to take the risk, things would become possible. But then it shifts; in the second verse and the bridge, the speaker begins to see the obstacle in himself. This gives the chorus (and the entire song) a new meaning. By the end, you hear everything in a new way.
The translation is rough, intended just to give some access to the original. I want to draw attention to the rhyme pattern and its relation to the meaning. The song’s rhythm breaks the lines into stanzas of three, with clearly audible line divisions. The first stanza has a strict rhyme (the “án” sound) throughout; in addition, the three lines sound like a tight unit:
Monoton mozdulatok során,
Zavaros gondolatok taván,
Úgy érzem elnyel az óceán
(In the course of monotone motions,
In the lake of confused thoughts,
I feel the ocean swallow me)
The next stanza has slant rhyme; the vowels rhyme, but the consonants do not:
Hajóm süllyed még egyszer
Engedd meg, hogy megértsem
Ne tégy úgy mintha féltenéd
(My boat is sinking once again
Give me a chance to understand
Don’t pretend to be afraid)
In the third stanza, there is slant rhyme once again, but for the first time, the stanza’s unity is broken, since the sentence is incomplete; the final word, “könnyedén,” leads directly into the fourth stanza (and gets repeated there). This is especially difficult to translate because of the incompleteness of the thoughts; I hope that I have conveyed the overall gesture. (See the first footnote for a comment on “kérdeznék.”)
Tudom jól, ha kérdeznék*
De inkább nem mert én,
Azt is tudom, hogy könnyedén
(I know well, if I would ask
But I would rather not, since I
know too well how easily)
And then, in the fourth stanza, the rhyme falls away, just as it says that “the dream easily evaporates” (“Könnyedén elillan az álom”). So the evaporation of the dream is accompanied by the slipping away of the rhyme–and the breakdown of the stanzas–over the course of the entire first verse. (I took some liberties in the translation to capture the repetition of “könnyedén.”)
Könnyedén elillan az álom
Amit annyira vártunk
Mintha nem is lenne rég
(How easily it turns to air,
The dream we waited for so long,
As if it were not long delayed)
Then, in the pre-chorus and chorus, a new pattern gets set up, that also gets broken slightly, at just the right time.
Valamit akkor is mondanék
Valamit az égbe kiáltanék
Csak hogy te is halld a hangom
Valamit akkor is kérdeznék
Érted bármit megtennék
Csak hogy te is észrevedd
(Something then I would say
Something I’d shout into the sky
Just so you would hear my voice
Something then I would ask
I’d do anything for you
Just so you would notice [me])
It works really well in the ear to have “Valamit” occur three times here but not four; if it were “Valamit” instead of “Érted,” it would be too much, but here it’s just right. Similarly, in the chorus:
Kapcsolj ki mindent, nézz fel az égre
Legyél most bátor, én várok rád
Dobd el a kulcsot, kezedben a sorsod
Legyél most bátor én várok rád
Kapcsolj ki!
(Turn off everything, look up at the sky,
Be brave now, I am waiting for you
Throw away the key, your fate is in your hand
Be brave now, I am waiting for you
Turn [it all] off!)*
The chorus has a series of commands (“turn everything off,” “look up at the sky,” “be brave now,” “throw away the key”), three of them with a different preposition in the verb (ki, fel, el), and one with no preposition at all. But “kezedben a sorsod” breaks the pattern; it’s a declaration rather than a command. This variation, once again, works well in the ear. (See the second footnote for a little more about “kapcsolj ki.”)
Now for the second verse. If the first verse represents a breaking down, the second verse represents a building up, but only in the imagination, in the apprehension of possibility. Here the rhymes and verse structures move in the opposite direction, from dissociation to unity. At first the lines do not rhyme (well, there’s off-rhyme in the first two, but not in the third, unless you listen to the middle of the line as well):
A nap szárítja a könnyeket
Áradnak már a tengerek
De mi lesz ha betörnek a házba?
(The sun is drying up the tears
By now the seas are swelling up
And what if they break into the house?)
Then the rhyme begins to build up: you hear the “o” and “a” sound.
Víz folyik be az ablakon
Hallok egy távoli dallamot
Hallom pedig messze van
(Water flowing through the window
I hear a distant melody
I hear that it is far away)
Notice the difference between “hallok” (indefinite) and “hallom” (definite). Both mean “I hear.” Since it is “a” distant melody, not a specific one, “hallok” is required in the first instance–but in the second instance, something specific is heard, namely, the fact that it is far away; hence “hallom.” This seems just a grammatical detail, but it adds to the musicality and richness of the verse.
From here on, for the rest of the verse, the off-rhyme with the “e” sound prevails. The phrase and line repetitions give a sense of building and climbing, but then, once again, loss and absence. (“Bárcsak most is itt lennél,” “I wish you were here”).
Közelebb nem is lehetne
Akár el is érhetem
Akár el is tehetném
Akár el is tehetném
Többé el sem engedném
Bárcsak most is itt lennél
(It couldn’t get closer
If I could reach it
If I could preserve it
If I could preserve it
I would no longer let it go
If only you were here)
This was by far the most difficult part to translate. I am not sure that I have conveyed “akár” correctly. “Akár… “akár” usually means “whether … or,” but that sounds awkward here. “Akár” can also indicate an emphasis, something along the lines of “even.” But here, in the song, its meaning seems to shift as it repeats, and the best way to convey that, I think, is through a simple “if,” even though that isn’t as emphatic as “akár.”
Then come the pre-chorus and chorus again, followed by the bridge, which (as I hear it) holds a key to the whole song–somewhat buried in vocal distortion effects, so you have to pay even closer attention than usual. (“Mi van ha tényleg velem van,” “What if it really is with me?”)
Mi van ha tényleg velem van
A baj csak nem látom magam
Szó nélkül elmenni hagytalak
Mi van ha mást is tehetnék?
Rögtön hozzád rohannék
Talán te is megértenéd
(What if it really is with me
The problem is I can’t see myself
I left you without a word
What if I could do something else?
I would rush to you right away
Maybe you would understand)
In more than 1500 words, I have barely grazed the surface of the song. “Kapcsolj ki!” tells itself through the music; one can analyze it up to a point, but from there it takes off. This is probably my favorite 1LIFE song after “Maradok ember” (though there are other close contenders); while I don’t expect to play it on cello, I can’t wait to hear it live for the first time. I may have heard it at the school gala last year, but at that point I did not know who the band was and did not understand any of the lyrics. The upcoming Esztergom show (at the Comedium Corso festival) will be the first time that I knowingly hear them in concert. I wish many others this joy, and I wish 1LIFE many more shows and songs!
*The lyrics posted with the YouTube video–which I take as the official lyrics–show “kérdeznék,” but in the recording and video I hear “kérdezném,” the definite form of the verb. This alters the meaning slightly, since it suggests asking something specific.
**(“Kapcsolj ki” can also be translated as “disconnect,” which is both transitive and intransitive. I thought, though, that this translation would distort the meaning slightly, since at the end of the chorus, “Disconnect!” would seem purely intransitive, pointing back to the subject. “Disconnect!” also has connotations that I don’t think are present in the Hungarian. In the Hungarian, as I hear it, “Kapcsolj ki!” still implies a direct object.)
The photo appears courtesy of 1LIFE’s Facebook page.
I made a few edits to this piece after posting it–and added a rough translation of the song, which I subsequently revised in a few places. I will likely continue revising this over time. If you see any glaring errors or misinterpretations, please do not hesitate to let me know.
As of November 2017, she teaches English, American civilization, and British civilization at the Varga Katalin Gimnázium in Szolnok, Hungary. From 2011 to 2016, she helped shape and teach the philosophy program at Columbia Secondary School for Math, Science & Engineering in New York City. In 2014, her students released the inaugural issue of their philosophy journal, CONTRARIWISE, which has international participation and readership.
On this blog, Take Away the Takeaway, I discuss culture, education, literature, and other things.
When I revise a piece substantially after posting it, I note this at the end. Minor corrections (e.g., of punctuation and spelling) may go unannounced.
Some of the pieces on this blog are satirical and assigned (for clarity) to the blog's satire category. For a full list of my satirical pieces, please see my website.
