(no subject)
Sunday, October 31st, 2021 08:21 pmI have happy memories of reading Takuboku's poems in Sad Toys and Romaji Diary lo these 30+ years ago, so I settled in for a happy reread. Alas, the Suck Fairy has visited and left her calling card. The poems may still be alright but Takuboku was a git even by Meiji standards. Self-absorbed, narcissistic, irresponsible, self-pitying, and of course a horndog. Actually, can I think of a Meiji intellectual who wasn't a git? No one comes to mind. Like, back in shogunate days guys, at least samurai guys, were trained to be devoted to their lord or their clan or duty or honour. Come Meiji and some people suddenly decided to be devoted to nothing but their own sweet selves. I suppose under both systems guys treated their wives badly, on the automatic assumption that women exist for men's convenience. But I don't have to read them doing it.
Turn back to Currelly and find him frolicking among the great. Petrie is a marvellous conversationalist but a dry lecturer. Weigell has a nervous breakdown from tunnelling into pyramids underground. Theodore Davis suborns 'dear old' Gaston Maspero. And of course Currelly excavates at Deir el Bahri, finding a gold-plated tomb, supposedly that of Tyii except the mummy is a guy, and generally serving as the model for Radcliffe Emerson. Even back home, there he is hobnobing with people who in my day had become University of Toronto landmarks: Burwash (Hall), Massey (College), Gertrude Lawler (Building), McLennan (Physical Labs). Like reading about Waley's young manhood: when there were giants abroad in the land.
Turn back to Currelly and find him frolicking among the great. Petrie is a marvellous conversationalist but a dry lecturer. Weigell has a nervous breakdown from tunnelling into pyramids underground. Theodore Davis suborns 'dear old' Gaston Maspero. And of course Currelly excavates at Deir el Bahri, finding a gold-plated tomb, supposedly that of Tyii except the mummy is a guy, and generally serving as the model for Radcliffe Emerson. Even back home, there he is hobnobing with people who in my day had become University of Toronto landmarks: Burwash (Hall), Massey (College), Gertrude Lawler (Building), McLennan (Physical Labs). Like reading about Waley's young manhood: when there were giants abroad in the land.
