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msodradek: Mole holes in Beckett’s garden at Ussy-sur-Marne. Photo by Larry Lund. (Via A Piece of Monologue) Ussy: a village sixty kilometers east of Paris, where SB after the war sometimes rented a house called the Maison Barbier. He used his mother’s legacy to have built a little house, “banal, austere, and aesthetically dull.” (Knowlson, 351). He retreated there to write and to escape the pressures of fame, calling it his “hole in the Marne mud” (Harmon, 6), into which he might “crawl” to take refuge in solitude and contemplation, amidst the snows and the crows, planting trees (see “The Gloaming”), building a stone wall, and combating the moles making mountains of his lawn (the “fodient rodents” of “Rough for Radio II”). He kept there a radio, a gramophone, a little German piano (a “Schimmel”), and books, including a 1911 Britannica and volumes on chess. Many later pieces, notably Comment c’est, found their inspiration in or are dated from Ussy. —C.J. Ackerley and S.E. Gontarski, “Ussy”, in The Grove Companion to Samuel Beckett, Grove Press, 2004, p. 601. Bold mine. We never should forget that while living at Ussy-sur-Marne, Beckett drove André the Giant to school and back.

msodradek:

Mole holes in Beckett’s garden at Ussy-sur-Marne. Photo by Larry Lund. (Via A Piece of Monologue)

Ussy: a village sixty kilometers east of Paris, where SB after the war sometimes rented a house called the Maison Barbier. He used his mother’s legacy to have built a little house, “banal, austere, and aesthetically dull.” (Knowlson, 351). He retreated there to write and to escape the pressures of fame, calling it his “hole in the Marne mud” (Harmon, 6), into which he might “crawl” to take refuge in solitude and contemplation, amidst the snows and the crows, planting trees (see “The Gloaming”), building a stone wall, and combating the moles making mountains of his lawn (the “fodient rodents” of “Rough for Radio II”). He kept there a radio, a gramophone, a little German piano (a “Schimmel”), and books, including a 1911 Britannica and volumes on chess. Many later pieces, notably Comment c’est, found their inspiration in or are dated from Ussy.

—C.J. Ackerley and S.E. Gontarski, “Ussy”, in The Grove Companion to Samuel Beckett, Grove Press, 2004, p. 601. Bold mine.

We never should forget that while living at Ussy-sur-Marne, Beckett drove André the Giant to school and back.

Why Our Baby Did Not Freeze...

Action:
10pm Board overnight train from Istanbul to Ankara with my husband and baby 2 moth old girl.

Thoughts:
Woohoo! We made it!

Speech:
"Chris, Iona, this is awesome!"

Blankets etc:
There are sheets and 2 enormous blankets on the bunks. The train compartment is toasty warm. Train conductor comes in, sees baby Iona and gives us another enormous blanket, I toss them all in the corner.

Action:
2.30am Train is stopped, Iona wakes up, chortles with delight as we're doing a diaper change.

Thoughts:
We've been stopped for rather a long time, Iona's fed, when we start up again it'll be easy for her to go back to sleep. There's no way Chris can sleep through Iona's happy squeals...

Speech (Chris, sleepily):
"Hey little Iona, are you wide awake?"

Speech (me):
"There's quite a kerfuffle outside, Chris, there's all these train personnel in the hallway messing with the electric board."

Blankets etc:
Train compartment is pretty warm but getting cooler. Electricity is out. Conductor comes in with a torch while I'm breastfeeding and gives us 2 more enormous blankets. Maybe I will need one after all...

Action:
4.30am I have moved all our blankets except the 2 for Chris onto the bunk I'm sharing with Iona. Iona's also swaddled with all her burping cloths, her snowsuit, her hat and is pressed against me.

Thoughts:
Fuck I'm cold and poor little Iona's face (the only part of her exposed) is getting cold.

Speech:
Groan, shiver.

Blankets etc:
If I make Chris come down to our bunk then maybe we can share body heat...and those 2 extra blankets? Could we even all fit?

Thoughts:
6am Argh! It's so cold! Iona's asleep but if she wakes up or needs a diaper change how in the world can we keep her warm?

Speech:
Chris! We have a problem!!! Iona's going to get really cold and our train won't get in for 2hrs...I don't know what else to do?

...Action:
Chris (dressed in running shorts, T-shirt and short white socks) awakes and gets a primitive look in his eyes. He leaps from the top bunk, races outside into the freezing train compartment and down the train screaming for a train conductor. A few compartments full of frozen Chinese tourists crack open and women swaddled in parkas and blankets watch Chris race about. Chris locates a train carriage which does have electricity and a few conductors. He explains we have to move into the other compartment right now.

Blankets etc:
A wagon full of people, who look more like plaid blankets than people, follow semi-clad Chris to the warm wagon.

Action:
8 am We leave our toasty compartment in the new warm wagon and head out to find a cab.

Thoughts:
Mmmmm, my husband, my hero...

Speech:
"Hey look Chris, all those Chinese tourists are smiling at you!"

Blankets etc:
It's good to be home...

*Tragos footnotes:


** Chris = Tragos; "I"/OKImago" = Mrs. Tragos; Iona = Baby Tragos


*** The Chinese tourists, according to me, were frightened to death to see an American berserker running full speed down the train corridor. They were in parkas and I was wearing shorts. And my hair was standing up since I basically jumped off my top bunk and ran straight out our compartment.


**** When they smiled at me, I strongly suspect it was in the hope to appease the berserker soul they had witnessed early that morning.


***** My demand to change us to the new train car was probably stated in terms people would not describe as "diplomatic"

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okimago:

I’m back! With new pics of baby Iona from this week…she is nearly 3 mths now. This weekend we went to Istanbul, by train, just as we did when she was pickle-sized in my womb…
1 Chilling with my toy at home 2. Resting with Mommy before our big trip 3. Playing with Daddy on the train 4. Daddy found amazing Italian treats, Iona stretches out on the hotel bed 5. The mini bar area becomes a diaper/nappy changing area! 6. Crossing between Europe and Asia by ferry 7. Covered in one of the many plaid blankets from the train…
Iona also said her first words this weekend: “Oh boy!” ;)

Footnotes on the above post from Mrs. Tragos.

Baby Tragos (Iona) was a champion the entire trip. While Mrs. Tragos was hard at work at a studio in Istanbul, Baby Tragos and I walked around the city for hours. You can be a flaneur, sure. But you can also be a flaneur with your baby, which is a hell of a lot better. (Admittedly, thanks to the Baby Bjorn. I was skeptical at first, but I’ve been won over completely.)

nsomn: tragos: — Leah Nash for The New York Times The Official List of Tragos-Endorsed Russian Things: 1. Tolstoy 2. Dostoevsky 3. Turgenev 4. Chekhov 5. Stravinsky 6. Shostakovich 7. Sidecars Trivia: the Spanish word for sidecar is sidecar, only pronounced see-day-car. Gets me every time. I do know that. How do I know that? 16 years ago, I was living in Madrid. My brother came to visit me, and we decided to go on a mission. We took a train down to Sevilla, where we tried, first, to buy a used motorcycle with a sidecar, and then, in the absence of such dream transportation, a $500 car. It was a fool’s errand to be sure. We had a great time in Sevilla though. Scene change: 2 days later: Tragos and Tragos Frère, by the side of the road, hitchhiking.

nsomn:

tragos:

— Leah Nash for The New York Times

The Official List of Tragos-Endorsed Russian Things:

1. Tolstoy

2. Dostoevsky

3. Turgenev

4. Chekhov

5. Stravinsky

6. Shostakovich

7. Sidecars

Trivia: the Spanish word for sidecar is sidecar, only pronounced see-day-car. Gets me every time.

I do know that. How do I know that?

16 years ago, I was living in Madrid. My brother came to visit me, and we decided to go on a mission. We took a train down to Sevilla, where we tried, first, to buy a used motorcycle with a sidecar, and then, in the absence of such dream transportation, a $500 car.

It was a fool’s errand to be sure. We had a great time in Sevilla though.

Scene change: 2 days later: Tragos and Tragos Frère, by the side of the road, hitchhiking.

okimago: Can I get an encore? Tragos took me to Istanbul where people have Sunday afternoons down…let’s daydream about a little more Istanbul vice…Topkapı Palace dominates the top right of this pic and was where we toured about, oggled tiles for miles, gaped at emeralds and gold, and ran off from the cold to find balık ekmek (best sandwich!) and baklava…  I will only add that Istanbul vice requires complementing your balık ekmek with a healthy dose of Efes beer while gazing at freighters drift past on the Bosphorus. Thank you Mrs. Tragos for an ideal Valentine’s enterprise.

okimago:

Can I get an encore? Tragos took me to Istanbul where people have Sunday afternoons down…let’s daydream about a little more Istanbul vice…Topkapı Palace dominates the top right of this pic and was where we toured about, oggled tiles for miles, gaped at emeralds and gold, and ran off from the cold to find balık ekmek (best sandwich!) and baklava… 

I will only add that Istanbul vice requires complementing your balık ekmek with a healthy dose of Efes beer while gazing at freighters drift past on the Bosphorus. Thank you Mrs. Tragos for an ideal Valentine’s enterprise.