Prospero se skiereiland

Deur Roon Lewald

(Scroll down for an English Translation)

1. This isle is full of noises…

Jy wonder soms watter skalkse geeste
hierdie skraal vinger land geskep,
van die hand van Afrika geskei het
deur die hoe kneukels van sy berge

en geplaas het tussen wêreldmere
wat hier kop-aan-kop baklei oor
die besit van dié besondre plek,

waar hul wisselstryd van wind en weer
sy see- and bergtonele telkemaal vertower
en besiel met sy unieke plant- en dierelewe.

The Zen-Lunatic Art of Building Eva’s Cupboard

By Roon Lewald

Assiduous readers of this blog may remember “Eva” (pseudonym), who shared several important chapters of my life and accompanied me during a magic tour of the Land of Oz (see “Arguing with God at Coffs Harbour”) before we broke up. Plain-spoken, argumentative Eva, whose wilful nature charmed me, buoyed me up and shattered my nerves by turns – thankful as I am to have anchored in calmer waters since we parted, I often think of her with deep affection and gratitude for what she meant to me during some very difficult years of my life. My mingled memories of her are best illustrated by a letter I wrote to some friends shortly before Christmas 2003, a year or two before our final rupture:

Alice-aus-dem-Wunderland

Roon Lewald

Scroll down for an English translation

(Für Alice Markja – 3 Tage alt)

Liebe Alice!

Dass wir so lange auf dich warten mussten

ist kaum wunderlich, denn wer

möchte schon das Wunderland,

aus dem du kommst,

mit dieser öden Welt vertauschen?

Hier suchst du ja vergeblich nach dem weissen Hasen,

der mit stets gezuckter Taschenuhr

und geplagter Miene

so nervös vorbeihetzt, um die wunderlichen Wünsche

seiner stets erbosten Herrin zu erfüllen.

Leipoldt: The Universal Afrikaner

by Roon Lewald

Louis Leipoldt

In one of my latest visits to the blog of an American friend, I was intrigued by a sensitive description of her visit to the remote grave of Afrikaans poet C. Louis Leipoldt, sheltered by an overhanging ledge of sandstone at Pakhuis (Storehouse) Pass in the rugged Cedarberg mountains some 200 miles north of Cape Town.

Christian Frederik Louis Leipoldt (1880-1947) is revered by Africa’s only white tribe as one of its finest poets. He was a leading luminary of the “Second Movement”, the generation of language pioneers which produced the first poems of genuine literary value in Afrikaans immediately after the 1899-1902 Anglo-Boer War. His name is hardly known outside an estimated 10 million or so native speakers spread over South Africa and the now rapidly expanding diaspora of Afrikaner emigrants to the USA, Europe, Australasia and elsewhere. But blog hostess Jenny Bennett has such wide interests that I wasn’t too surprised by her tribute to such an exotic poet.

Inyoni

In memory of my sister, Deanne Seneschal Raszat, née Lewald, born 31 Jan. 1940 in Durban, South Africa; died 26 Sept. 1996 in Leimen-Gauangelloch, Germany

By Roon Lewald

Deanne

After cancer won a five-year battle for my elder sister’s life, my brother-in-law sent me a parcel of old studio recordings of Deanne’s singing recitals made by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC/SAUK) between 1953 and 1958. Apart from a pile of yellowed newspaper clips and eistedfodd certificates, they were all that remained of the years when my mother’s coaching of Deanne’s voice propelled her into brief local prominence as a promising young singer. My dutiful elder sister had already been slaving away at her piano lessons for nearly five years when, at the age of 10, our Ma yoked her girlish lyrical soprano too into the musical harness of our parents, both of them singing teachers. At the age of 13, she piped German Lieder and Afrikaans liedjies into an SABC mike for the first time and was introduced on the nationwide “Young South Africa” programme as a young singer with a great future.

Time for Sowing

By Roon Lewald

Funeral Dirt

It’s the first of the four Advent Sundays, when folks here in Germany light the first of four candles on their Advent fir-branch wreaths and get into the pre-Christmas spirit. Even agnostics can’t help reflecting on the meaning of it all on a quiet Sunday evening when Christmas-minded people take a short break from their gift-shopping labours before plunging back into the seasonal shopping rush again on Monday (illuminations are already up and Christmas markets are booming in the city centers, and reports say Germans are spending this year as if we weren’t heading for a long recession). With the terror bombings in Moombai vying with the global economic crisis for attention, the news is so depressing nowadays it’s hard to believe that there’s any room left in the world for the human love, friendship and compassion we hear so much about at Christmastime. I can only draw comfort from the knowledge that many people like myself are at least linked to other individuals by such bonds.

In this mood, I was reminded of a short story by a South African author named Charles Bosman.

Arguing With God at Coffs Harbour

By Roon Lewald

A few years ago, I had one of those near-death experiences you keep reading about. In Australia of all places, with Eva. Eva, my blunt-speaking, pig-headed, lovely-ugly partner of many years whose strength, warm-heartedness and abundant physicality put me on the road to recovery when I stumbled out of the emotional ground-zero of my divorce into her arms. We were very close at times and poles apart at others. Her relatively limited education and lack of intellectual curiosity locked her out of interests which loomed large in my mind. Besides limiting our conversational range, this exposed me to frequently voiced, unfounded suspicions that I was looking down on her.

Amanzimtoti

deur Roon Lewald

‘n Vreemde oom haal vir sy trossie kinders
kwiksilwer vissies uit ‘n rotspoel.
Hy gee my wraggies ene!
Dis my eie, eie kreatuurtjie wat nou
spartel in ‘n blik
- so wonderlik
dat ek hom altyd-altyd wil behou,
al roer die diertjie binnekort nie meer
as jy hom met ‘n stokkie por.

Met die huistoe-ry, sat van my gesoebat
om hom saam te neem,
vou Ma hom toe in ‘n koerant, en bêre hom
vêr agter in die bak van Wilhelmina,
ons oerou, waardige swart Oldsmobile.

Tuis, as die frommelpakkie
onder al die stranddag-rommel
uit Willemien se songebraaide bak
uitgehaal word, daal daar neer op my
‘n groot Besef, oud soos Adam se geslag:
Siedaar, o mens,
hoe vlietend is al aardse prag!

Want die pakkie ruik so sleg! -
en waar’s my towerdiertjie dan?
Hierdie nare ding is mos
net ‘n stywe, dooie vis!

Durban 1947

By Roon Lewald

1947 was a good time to be a white five-year-old in Durban. The beaches offered halcyon days beside the Indian Ocean. The Durban July turned the town into an exciting tourist mecca. The Bioscope was still the gateway to Hollywood’s dream factory of the world. In that stronghold of English speakers, blimpish super-patriots of Empire basked in the last rays of the setting Empire, and the 1947 Royal Visit whipped monarchist enthusiasms to fever pitch. “Our magnificent Zulu” were complacently thought to be quite content with white overlordship, and one of the few blots on white horizons was the rapid encroachment of increasingly prosperous Indian merchants on previously all-white shopping and residential areas.

Europa, Europa

deur Roon Lewald

As ek na 40 jare in Duitsland in Afrikaans dig of skryf, gaan dit meesal oor nostalgiese herinneringe aan my Suid-Afrikaanse geboorteland. Nou-die-dag het ek egter ou briewe aan Afrikaanse vriende oor my ervaringe in Europa herlees en weer besef hoe belangrik my tweede tuiste vir my geword het. Europa: watter unieke eensheid van gemeenskaplike waardes, nywerheid, wetenskap, kunsskatte en geskiedenis, maar watter onvergelykbare veelvoudigheid van tale en tradisies wat van land tot land, streek tot streek en selfs distrik tot distrik so verskillend is! Hierdie paar uittreksels uit my ou briewe bewys watter houvas hierdie bakermat van ons westerse kultuur op ‘n mens se siel kan kry….