Pierre Albert-Jourdan
The Straw Sandals
Selected Prose and PoetryEdited, Introduced, and translated by
John Taylor
Paperback, 334 pages
ISBN 978-0-9823849-8-5
$20
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Selections from Fragments, Pages de Journal 1981, L'angle mort (The Dead Angle) and Les sandales de paille (The Straw Sandals), plus the complete texts of La langue des fumées (The Language of Rising Smoke), L'entrée dans le jardin (The Entryway into the Garden), À la merci des sentences (At the Mercy of Maxims), and L'approche (The Approach).
PIERRE-ALBERT JOURDAN (1924-1981) worked from 1947 to 1981 as the manager of a mutual insurance benefits program, spending his non-working hours in pursuit of spiritual understanding and literary clarity. He was known as a poet only by a small group of well-known fellow poets. His focus was on nature, particularly his garden in the Vaucluse village of Caromb and the surrounding landscape, which included the snow-capped Mount Ventoux. In 1981 he received a diagnosis of lung cancer and decided to note down his thoughts as it progressed. Thus resulted L'approche. In the first decade after his death, the prestigious firm Mercure de France astonished the poetic world by publishing two collections of his work, each more than 500 pages and prefaced respectively by Yves Bonnefoy and Philippe Jaccottet. Offering a generous selection from the first volume of these two collections, John Taylor introduces this singular and self-effacing poet to English-language readers.
JOHN TAYLOR is the author of the three-volume Paths to Contemporary French Literature and Into the Heart of European Poetry-all four books published by Transaction. He has also written five books of stories, short prose and poetry, and sometimes mixes the genres, as in The Apocalypse Tapestries (Xenos Books, 2004). Among his translations are books by Jacques Dupin, Philippe Jaccottet, Laurence Werner David and several modern Greek writers. His work is highly acclaimed and has won prestigeous awards. He lives in France.
REVIEWS
"How is it that writing so fresh, so spontaneous and with such deep friendship for the best of what mankind and world can offer-writing that always strikes the right note-is not harkened to more attentively?" ~ Philippe Jaccottet
"What Jourdan experiences in his morning garden, and records as an experience of the absolute, is […] the surprise of one who has returned to a beloved countryside after long months of absence, his marvel following upon the fatigue of highways and a sleepless night… ~ Yves Bonnefoy
"For Jourdan, writing was a tool for exploring what it means to have come into being, for determining how to live in the world every single day and thus how to die, and for intuiting possible spiritual truths in our midst. This task was always more important than seeing his work in print and establishing a name for himself. This radical genuineness now radiates from all the pages that, thankfully, are in print." ~ John Taylor, Introduction.
"For Jourdan, paradox and its close kin aphorism were ways to approach the ineffable, the immanent, and above all the state of unity between self and world that he devotedly, passionately sought. [. . .] Between moments of disgust with the human (and human-made) world, moments of rapture for the natural world, and, at the end, moments of fear at losing that very self's ability to sense, he writes in hope that the paradoxes he has provided will help to free us as well as himself: 'Writing throws out a bridge that it destroys with every page.'" ~ Kate Schapira, The Arts Fuse
"Each sentence sends the imagination spiraling off into a different spectrum of images and memories. Each phrase may be savored and contemplated as a separate poem :The fragrance of cypress beneath the eyelids.
[. . .] We are deeply indebted to Chelsea Editions for making this important body of work available, and to John Taylor for supplying not just a literal translation into English sentences, but a luminous transmutation into English poetry." ~ Martin Abramson, Book/Mark
Selections from
The Straw Sandals
Poet Pierre-Albert Jourdan
From L'angle mort (The Dead Angle)
Chants d'oiseaux invisibles. Seules voix pures. Peut-être parce qu'ils sont flammes dans l'air. Qu'ils brûlent sans déchets. Oiseaux condamnés dans un mond encombré. Un rêve que je fais: que ce soit eux qui m'accueillent, que je m'avance dans un nuage de plumes. (Que ce soit la dernière image.)
Invisible birds chirping. The only pure voices. Perhaps because birdsongs are like flames in the air that burn up completely. As for birds themselves, they are doomed in this crowded world. One of my dreams: that birds be the ones who greet me. that I go forward through a cloud of feathers. (That this be my final sight.)*****
Tu as été conduit en aveugle prè de ce paysage. Alors tu l'as reconnu. Comme on se transmet une lampe allumée avec prècaution, ainsi, peut-être, seras-tu conduit prè de cet paysage—le tien depuis toujours.
You were led like a blind man near this landscape. And you recognized it. Even as a lighted lamp is handed over cautiously, perhaps you will similarly be led near that other landscape—yours from the beginning.
From L'entrée dans le jardin (The Entryway into the Garden)Vraiment le paysage vient à toi—qui n'est plus enfermè dans ton regard. Un immense troupeau d'arbres est lâché dans l'espace. Le berger dort dans ta pointrine.
The landscape really comes to you—it is no longer locked up in your eyes. An immense herd of trees is released into space. The shepherd sleeps in your breast.
From Les sandales de paille (The Straw Sandals)Jeudi 10 janvier.
Il faut se hisser jusqu'à la brance trop fragile pour percevoir avec nettetè ce qui se passe en dessous.
Thursday, 10 January.
You have to climb all the way up to the branch that is too fragile if you wish to perceive clearly what is happening below.
From L'approche (The Approach)Situation somme toute banale. Mais n'interrogez pas trop la banalité. Vous risqueriez de buter sur une terrifiante énigme.
Ultimately, an ordinary situation. But don't question ordinariness too much. You risk running up against a terrifying enigma.
