Walter Ruhlmann edits Datura

The French poet and independent publisher Walter Ruhlmann and I go back some years now, having first appeared together in the Belfast publication A New Ulster, edited by Amos Greig, we went onto edit together And Agamemnon Dead, an Anthology of early 21st century Irish Poetry. This was a wonderful opportunity to show case some fellow writers, such as Michael J. Whelan, Christine Murray, who by the way would appear to have started a new series of poems ( see Poethead ), and the extraordinary prose poet Michael McAloran.

Well, Walter went onto publish two of my own collections, namely The Dark Pool ( mgv2>publishing, 2015) and The Muse is a Dominatrix ( same imprint, 2016). Don't bother looking for either now, as they are both out of print! As Walter, quite rightly, is easing off on the publishing scene, at least for him, and is just focusing on his own work yet while still editing this wonderful little online literary journal which is bilingual; French/English. So, quite extraordinary. Ever the case with Walter!

Well, I sent Walter on a whole poem cycle taken from the same collection which the Telemachus Cycle comes from, namely Merrion Square. This book, still unpublished, is a companion piece to Henry Street Arcade yet while Baudelaire is the driving force behind Henry Street, Oscar Wilde is the centre of Merrion; he was born beside the old Georgian square in Dublin, and there is a wonderful monument to him standing proudly opposite the old family house, see link below.

As ever, Giambattista Vico ( 1668- 1744 ) was also very much behind the trilogy, I am currently working on the third installment Say Goodbye to the Blackhills. His idea, which he gets from Plato, that the cave is the origin of human civilisation, in connection with the Cyclops, so with criminal a association, corresponds very much with Baudelaire's, and no doubt Wilde's 19th century worldview that man was fundamentally corrupt, not innocent. While this viewpoint caused a kind of Copernican tilt one hundred years ago, I think that with the world very much as it is today, basically a hell hole, this view point can be no longer be described as eccentric. Why, only the other day, David Attenborough declared that the human race, in relation to the planet, was a plague.

Well, all of these ideas are behind Merrion Square. I work in the area, crossing over the square everyday ( pictured ), and one day the idea of a poem cycle inspired by the famous Georgian doors of Dublin came into my head. I was reading and translating some Ronsard at the time, the French renaissance poet, and I was very much struck by the correspondence between his sonnets and those of Baudelaire. So, there you have it. The following poem cycle of about ten or so poems was inspired by my very particular reading of the square.

I solicited many publishers here in the Dublin trying to get them to publish both books, yet to no avail. The content probably proved a little challenging. Bonne lecture! ....

http://daturaliteraryjournal.blogspot.com/

http://www.dublincity.ie/DublinArtInParks/English