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Archive O-P

«« Previous page · Gaël Octavia: La fin de Mame Baby · Absolutely on Music. Conversations by Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa · Litz Pisk: The Actor and His Body · Noam Chomsky and C.J. Polychroniou: Optimism over Despair · Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell · Orhan Pamuk: The Red-Haired Woman · Leif GW Persson: The Dying Detective. A Mystery · ‘De duistere winkel’ – 124 dromen van Georges Perec · Georges PEREC: Poging tot uitputtende beschrijving van een plek in Parijs · Genomineerden E. DU PERRONprijs 2016 bekend · Bonnie Parker: The Street Girl · Bonnie Parker: Outlaws — Billy the Kid and Clyde Barrow

»» there is more...

Gaël Octavia: La fin de Mame Baby

Le Quartier est une petite ville de banlieue où se croisent les destins de quatre femmes. Mariette, recluse dans son appartement, qui ressasse sa vie gâchée en buvant du vin rouge.

Aline, l’infirmière à domicile, qui la soigne et l’écoute. Suzanne, la petite Blanche, amante éplorée d’un caïd assassiné. Mame Baby, idole des femmes du Quartier, dont la mort est auréolée de mystère.

À travers la voix d’Aline, de retour dans le Quartier qu’elle a fui sept ans auparavant, les liens secrets qui unissent les quatre héroïnes se dessinent…

La fin de Mame Baby raconte avant tout, avec finesse, grâce et passion, l’art qu’ont les femmes de prendre soin les unes des autres, de se haïr et de s’aimer.

Gaël Octavia
La fin de Mame Baby
Collection Continents Noirs, Gallimard
Parution : 31-08-2017
176 pages
140 x 205 mm
Genre : Romans
Pays : Martinique
Époque : XXIe siècle
ISBN : 9782072737015
Gencode : 9782072737015
Prix € 16,00

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Absolutely on Music. Conversations by Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa

A deeply personal, intimate conversation about music and writing between the internationally acclaimed, best-selling author and the former conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

In Absolutely on Music, internationally Haruki Murakami sits down with his friend Seiji Ozawa, the revered former conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, for a series of conversations on their shared passion: music.

Over the course of two years, Murakami and Ozawa discuss everything from Brahms to Beethoven, from Leonard Bernstein to Glenn Gould, from Bartók to Mahler, and from pop-up orchestras to opera. They listen to and dissect recordings of some of their favorite performances, and Murakami questions Ozawa about his career conducting orchestras around the world. Culminating in Murakami’s ten-day visit to the banks of Lake Geneva to observe Ozawa’s retreat for young musicians, the book is interspersed with ruminations on record collecting, jazz clubs, orchestra halls, film scores, and much more. A deep reflection on the essential nature of both music and writing, Absolutely on Music is an unprecedented glimpse into the minds of two maestros.

Haruki Murakami is a best-selling Japanese writer. His works of fiction and non-fiction have garnered critical acclaim and numerous awards, including the Franz Kafka Prize, the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award and the Jerusalem Prize, among others. Murakami’s fiction is humorous and surreal, focusing on themes of alienation and loneliness. He is considered an important figure in postmodern literature. The Guardian praised Murakami as “among the world’s greatest living novelists” for his works and achievements. Murakami is the author of 1Q84, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, Men Without Women and many more.

Seiji Ozawa served as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra for twenty-nine years, and was music director of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s Ravinia Festival, and Wiener Staatsoper. With Kazuyoshi Akiyama, he formed the Saito Kinen Orchestra and is the director of the Seiji Ozawa Matsumoto Festival. Ozawa has been deeply involved in musical education through his work with the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, the Ozawa International Chamber Music Academy Okushiga, the Seiji Ozawa International Academy Switzerland, and as founder of the Seiji Ozawa Music Academy Opera Project, organizations which provide opportunities to outstanding students in Asia and Europe. Among his many honors, Ozawa has been awarded France’s Officier de la Légion d’Honneur, the Japanese Order of Culture, a Kennedy Center Honor, and a Grammy for Best Opera Recording.

Absolutely on Music
Conversations
By Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa
Translated by Jay Rubin
Part of Vintage International
Category: Music – Biography & Memoir
Penguin Random House
Paperback
October 2017
320 Pages

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Litz Pisk: The Actor and His Body

Litz Pisk was widely regarded as the finest and most influential teacher of modern theatre movement.

She was a director of movement at the Old Vic, National Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, English National Opera, and in television and films, including directing the movement for Vanessa Redgrave’s film role in Isadora. She was director of Vienna’s School of Art and Movement and a teacher at the Old Vic School, Bath Academy of Art, RADA and the Central School of Speech and Drama. The Actor and His Body, her seminal work, was first published in 1975.

‘Once you start working with someone like Litz you don’t ever want to stop if you can help it’ – Vanessa Redgrave

Pisk’s quest was to find expression for the inner impulse that motivated actors to move. Her teachings, as outlined in this book, offer insight on the specific craft of the actor, and the relationship between movement, imagination and the ‘need’ to move.

The Actor and His Body is also a practical manual for keeping the actor’s body physically and expressively responsive. In addition, there are a range of movement exercises, illuminated by her exquisite line drawings, and complete weekly programme which concentrates on movement practice within different timescales.

This fourth edition features the original foreword by Michael Elliot as well as a new introduction by Ayse Tashkiran, contemporary movement director and Senior Lecturer at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, which contextualises Pisk’s work.

The Actor and His Body
By: Litz Pisk
Introduction: Ayse Tashkiran
Published: 30-11-2017
Format: Paperback
Edition: 4th
ISBN: 9781474269742
Imprint: Methuen Drama
Series: Theatre Makers
Dimensions: 234 x 156 mm
RRP: $36.99
Bloomsbury Publishing

Litz Pisk: The Actor and His Body
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Noam Chomsky and C.J. Polychroniou: Optimism over Despair

Wide-ranging interviews on war, power, and politics with Noam Chomsky, the world’s leading critic of US foreign policy.

This volume offers readers a concise and accessible introduction to the ideas of Noam Chomsky, described by the New York Times as “arguably the most important intellectual alive.”

In these recent, wide-ranging interviews, conducted for Truthout by C. J. Polychroniou, Chomsky discusses his views on the “war on terror” and the rise of neoliberalism, the refugee crisis and cracks in the European Union, prospects for a just peace in Israel/Palestine, the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, the dysfunctional US electoral system, the grave danger posed to humanity by the climate crisis, and the hopes, prospects, and challenges of building a movement for radical change.

Noam Chomsky is Institute Professor (Emeritus) in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at MIT. His work is widely credited with having revolutionized the field of modern linguistics. He is the author of numerous best-selling political works, which have been translated into scores of languages worldwide.

C. J. Polychroniou is a regular contributor to Truthout as well as a member of Truthout’s Public Intellectual Project. He has published several books and his articles have appeared in a variety of journals, magazines, newspapers, and popular news websites.

“This fascinating series of interviews convincingly covers an astonishing range of fundamental and urgent issues of societal concern, demonstrating anew that Noam Chomsky is the world’s most humane, philosophically sophisticated, and knowledgeable public intellectual. I cannot imagine a better primer for anyone seeking a better, safer, fairer future.” —Richard Falk, Professor of International Law Emeritus, Princeton University

Optimism over Despair
On Capitalism, Empire, and Social Change
by Noam Chomsky and C.J. Polychroniou
Paperback,
180 pages
Haymarket Books
ISBN: 9781608467990
August 2017
$16.95

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Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell

A firsthand account of the brutal conditions of the Spanish Civil War.

Homage to Catalonia is Orwell’s personal account of his observations in the Spanish Civil War. The book was first published in the United Kingdom in 1938.

In 1936, originally intending merely to report on the Spanish Civil War as a journalist, George Orwell found himself embroiled as a participant—as a member of the Workers’ Party of Marxist Unity.

Fighting against the Fascists, he described in painfully vivid and occasionally comic detail life in the trenches—with a “democratic army” composed of men with no ranks, no titles, and often no weapons—and his near fatal wounding. As the politics became tangled, Orwell was pulled into a heartbreaking conflict between his own personal ideals and the complicated realities of political power struggles.

Considered one of the finest works by a man V. S. Pritchett called “the wintry conscience of a generation,” Homage to Catalonia is both Orwell’s memoir of his experiences at the front and his tribute to those who died in what he called a fight for common decency. This edition features a new foreword by Adam Hochschild placing the war in greater context and discussing the evolution of Orwell’s views on the Spanish Civil War.

“One of Orwell’s very best books and perhaps the best book that exists on the Spanish Civil War.” — The New Yorker

George Orwell (1903-1950) served with the Imperial Police in Burma, fought with the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War, and was a member of the Home Guard and a writer for the BBC during World War II. He is the author of many works of non-fiction and fiction.

Homage to Catalonia
George Orwell
Penguin Classics
2013
256 Pages
£6.99
Paperback
ISBN10 0141393025
ISBN13 9780141393025

Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
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Orhan Pamuk: The Red-Haired Woman

From the Nobel Prize winner and best-selling author of Snow and My Name Is Red, a fable of fathers and sons and the desires that come between them.

On the outskirts of a town thirty miles from Istanbul, a master well digger and his young apprentice are hired to find water on a barren plain. As they struggle in the summer heat, excavating meter by meter, the two will develop a filial bond neither has known before –not the poor middle-aged bachelor nor the middle-class boy whose father disappeared after being arrested for politically subversive activities. The pair will come to depend on each other and exchange stories reflecting disparate views of the world.

But in the nearby town, where they buy provisions and take their evening break, the boy will find an irresistible diversion. The Red-Haired Woman, an alluring member of a travelling theatre company, catches his eye and seems as fascinated by him as he is by her. The young man’s wildest dream will be realized, but, when in his distraction a horrible accident befalls the well digger, the boy will flee, returning to Istanbul. Only years later will he discover whether he was in fact responsible for his master’s death and who the redheaded enchantress was.

Orhan Pamuk, is the author of many celebrated books, including The White Castle, Istanbul and Snow. In 2003 he won the International IMPAC Award for My Name is Red, and in 2006 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. His most recent novel, The Museum of Innocence, was an international bestseller, praised in the Guardian as ‘an enthralling, immensely enjoyable piece of storytelling.’ Orhan Pamuk lives in Istanbul.

The Red-Haired Woman
Orhan Pamuk
£16.99
Format Hardback
Published 07/09/2017
Length 272 pages
ISBN 9780571330294
Publisher Faber & Faber

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Leif GW Persson: The Dying Detective. A Mystery

Lars Martin Johansson is a living legend. Cunning and perceptive, always one step ahead, he was known in the National Criminal Police as “the man who could see around corners.” But now Johansson is retired, living in the country, his police days behind him.

Or so he thinks.

After suffering a stroke, Johansson finds himself in the hospital. Tests show heart problems as well. And the only thing that can save him from despair is his doctor’s mention of an unsolved murder case from years before. The victim: an innocent nine-year-old girl.

Johansson is determined to solve the case, no matter his condition. With the help of his assistant, Matilda, an amateur detective, and Max, an orphan with a personal stake in the case, he launches an informal investigation from his hospital bed. Racing against time, he uncovers a web of connections that links sex tourism to a dead opera singer and a self-made millionaire. And as Johansson draws closer to solving the crime, he finds that he will have to confront not just a mystery but his own mortality as well.

Leif G.W. Persson’s previous novels include Backstrom: He Who Kills the Dragon, Between Summer’s Longing and Winter’s End, and Another Time, Another Life. He has served as an adviser to the Swedish ministry of justice and is Sweden’s most renowned psychological profiler. A professor at the Swedish National Police Board, he is considered the country’s foremost expert on crime.

The Dying Detective
A Mystery
By Leif GW Persson
Translated by Neil Smith
Category: Crime Mysteries
Paperback + Hardback
May 2017
432 Pages
Published by Transworld Publishers Ltd
ISBN10 085752089X
ISBN13 9780857520890

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‘De duistere winkel’ – 124 dromen van Georges Perec

Georges Perec (1936-1982) was ernstig getraumatiseerd door het verdwijnen van zijn ouders tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog, en onderging diverse psychoanalytische behandelingen tijdens zijn leven.

Het verklaart iets van het belang dat hij hechtte aan zijn dromen, die hij tussen mei 1968 en augustus 1972 noteerde in zijn dagboek, ook om in het reine te komen met een stukgelopen liefde

Perec kwam al doende een nieuwe manier van schrijven op het spoor die een verontrustende intensiteit had. De gefragmenteerde grondstof van nachtelijke hersenspinsels vormt in De duistere winkel een compleet verhaal, gedrenkt in humor en overlopend van stilistische hoogstandjes.

Georges Perec geldt als een van de meest ingenieuze moderne Franse schrijvers. Hij legde zich bij het schrijven vaak bewust formele restricties op. In De dingen bijvoorbeeld wordt geen dialoog gebruikt, wat aan het verhaal een fascinerende, zuiver epische transparantie geeft. Hij liet zich erop voorstaan dat hij nooit twee eendere boeken had geschreven. Toch draagt elk van zijn boeken het onloochenbare stempel van zijn scheppend vernuft.

Van Perec verschenen voortreffelijke vertalingen van de hand van Edu Borger, o.a. Het leven een gebruiksaanwijzing en De dingen.

Georges Perec
De duistere winkel
124 dromen
vertaling Edu Borger
Privé-domein nr 293
Uitgeverij De Arbeiderspers, Amsterdam
ISBN 9789029507554
240 pag. – juni 2017
paperback € 24,99

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Georges PEREC: Poging tot uitputtende beschrijving van een plek in Parijs

Drie dagen lang, in oktober 1974, posteerde Georges Perec zich in het Café de la Mairie in Parijs, dat uitkijkt op de Place Saint-Sulpice. Hij stelde zich tot doel álles te noteren wat hij waarnam. Het resulteerde in Tentative d’épuisement d’un lieu parisien.

‘Mijn bedoeling op de volgende pagina’s was vooral al het andere te beschrijven: dat wat je gewoonlijk niet opmerkt, wat er niet toe doet: wat er gebeurt wanneer er niets gebeurt, behalve tijd, mensen, auto’s en wolken.’

Georges Perec  (1936 – 1982) was een Franse schrijver, essayist en film- en documentairemaker. Hij was een vooraanstaand lid van de Oulipo-groep (Ouvroir de littérature potentielle), een los verband van Franstalige schrijvers en wiskundigen, dat als doel heeft literaire werken te maken die aan bepaalde voorwaarden of beperkingen onderhevig zijn: littérature sous contraintes. Het kan daarbij gaan om beperkingen inzake het gebruik van letters, woorden, klanken, stijlen, enz. Deze beperkingen zijn niet alleen bedoeld als woord- en taalspelletjes, maar ook om de inspiratie en het vakmanschap van de auteurs aan te scherpen.

De vader van Perec stierf vroeg in de Tweede Wereldoorlog, de moeder werd vermoord in de Holocaust. In veel werken van Perec komt dit terug in een thematiek omtrent afwezigheid, verlies en identiteit.

Georges Perec
Pogingen tot uitputtende beschrijving van een plek in Parijs
Vertaling: Kiki Coumans
Uitgeverij Vleugels, 2017
ISBN: 9789078627319
48 pagina’s
Prijs: € 19,45

# meer info website uitgeverij vleugels

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Genomineerden E. DU PERRONprijs 2016 bekend

Genomineerden E. du Perronprijs 2016: Rodaan Al Galidi, Stefan Hertmans en Carolijn Visser – Arnon Grunberg houdt bij de prijsuitreiking de E. du Perronlezing donderdagavond 13 april 2017 in Tilburg

De schrijvers Rodaan Al Galidi, Stefan Hertmans en Carolijn Visser zijn genomineerd voor de E. du Perronprijs 2016. De prijs wordt toegekend aan personen of instellingen die met een cultuuruiting in brede zin een bijdrage leveren aan een beter begrip van de multiculturele samenleving. De uitreiking vindt plaats op donderdagavond 13 april 2017 bij het brabants kenniscentrum kunst en cultuur (bkkc) in Tilburg. Dan houdt Arnon Grunberg de E. du Perronlezing met als titel ‘Het paradijs’.

 

Rodaan Al Galidi – Hoe ik talent voor het leven kreeg (Uitgeverij Jurgen Maas)
Rodaan Al Galidi doet ons verslag van de leerschool die de Nederlandse asielprocedure is. Negen jaar wacht de hoofdpersoon Semmier Kariem op een beschikking in een van de vestigingen van het AZC. Negen jaar tussen aankomst in Nederland op de vlucht voor fysieke bedreiging en definitieve toelating wordt in dit verhaal invoelbaar als een oneindige mentale nekklem. Dat is het leergeld voor vluchtelingen die niet op uitnodiging de landsgrenzen passeren. Leerschool of wachtkamer, het talent van Rodaan Al Galidi is gerijpt. Deze vertellingen in de vorm van brieven aan een geïnteresseerde buitenstaander gericht laten ons alle kanten van hoop, lethargie, opstandigheid, beklag en ironie zien. De bewoners van het AZC leven op een mix van herinneringen, volharding, wanhoop; kortom overlevingsdrift. Het verslag is introspectief, zakelijk, ironisch en soms ronduit Kafkaësk. Met zijn stijl schraagt de verteller zijn bestaan en geeft hij vaart aan een eindeloos vertraagde tijd.

 

Stefan Hertmans – De bekeerlinge (Uitgeverij De Bezige Bij)
Bekering is een van de meest ingrijpende keuzes die een mens kan maken. Zij rukt het individu uit zijn vertrouwde verband dat bepaald wordt door afstamming en traditie. Toebehoren biedt vertrouwdheid en bescherming. Dit aanbod, deze burcht af te wijzen en te verlaten, te vluchten is een onomkeerbare daad. De bekeerling moet koersen op onbekende instrumenten: een nieuw geloof, een vreemde taal, een onbekend bestaan in een onbekend gebied. Stefan Hertmans voert ons mee in het historische verhaal van Vigdis Adelaïs, die uit liefde besluit een Joodse jongeman te volgen. Het is het einde van de 11e eeuw. Het sentiment van kruistochten hangt in de lucht. Een millennium later volgt Hertmans deze vlucht, fysiek door het landschap met gebruikmaking van bronnen en verbeelding. Verstoting, bedreiging en vlucht zijn van alle tijden. Hertmans is in staat om op heel persoonlijke manier het universele en bijzondere hiervan open te schrijven in een overtuigende roman.

 

Carolijn Visser – Selma. Aan Hitler ontsnapt, gevangene van Mao (Uitgeverij Augustus)
De titel van deze documentaire vertelling herinnert ons onmiddellijk aan het literaire cliché dat niets zo onwaarschijnlijk is als het leven zelf. Selma, een Joodse overlevende van de Holocaust, besluit met haar Chinese echtgenoot mee te gaan naar China in de jaren vijftig. Wat haar te wachten staat is het lot van intellectuelen en buitenlanders in de periode van de Culturele Revolutie. Het is de verdienste van Carolijn Visser om het onbeschrijfelijke glashelder aan ons te presenteren. Dat doet ze door vaardig te beschrijven wat er aan informatie bewaard is gebleven, maar net zo goed door betekenisvolle leemtes achter te laten. Selma is twee keer slachtoffer geworden van etnische uitsluiting. Ze staat niet voor grotere gehelen, ze was een individu dat voortdurend onder bedreiging van grotere verbanden, ideologieën leefde en uiteindelijk ook vermalen werd. Selma is een monument voor het kwetsbare individu.

 

E. du Perronprijs
De E. du Perronprijs is een initiatief van de gemeente Tilburg, de School of Humanities van Tilburg University en brabants kenniscentrum kunst en cultuur (bkkc). De prijs is bedoeld voor personen of instellingen die, net als Du Perron in zijn tijd, grenzen signaleren en doorbreken die wederzijds begrip tussen verschillende bevolkingsgroepen in de weg staan. De prijs bestaat uit een geldbedrag van €2500 euro en een textiel object, ontworpen door [NAAM] en vervaardigd bij het TextielMuseum. In 2015 won Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer de prijs voor zijn dichtbundel Idyllen, zijn pamflet Gelukszoekers en zijn columns in NRC Next. Andere laureaten waren onder meer Warna Oosterbaan & Theo Baart (2014), Mohammed Benzakour (2013), Koen Peeters (2012), Ramsey Nasr (2011), Alice Boot & Rob Woortman (2010), Abdelkader Benali (2009) en Adriaan van Dis (2008).

# Meer informatie over de du Perronprijs op website Tilburg University

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Bonnie Parker: The Street Girl

BonnieParker09

Bonnie Elizabeth Parker
(1910 – 1934)

The Street Girl

You don’t want to marry me honey,
Though just to hear you ask me is sweet;
If you did you’d regret it tomorrow
For I’m only a girl of the street.
Time was when I’d gladly have listened,
Before I was tainted with shame,
But it wouldn’t be fair to you honey;
Men laugh when they mention my name.

Back there on the farm in Nebraska,
I might have said yes to you then,
But I thought the world was a playground;
Just teeming with Santa Claus men.
So I left the old home for the city,
To play in its mad, dirty whirl,
Never knowing how little of pity,
It holds for a slip of a girl.

You think I’m still good-looking honey!
But no I am faded and spent,
Even Helen of Troy would look seedy,
If she followed the pace I went.
But that day I came in from the country,
With my hair down my back in a curl;
Through the length and the breadth of the city,
There was never a prettier girl.

I soon got a job in the chorus,
With nothing but looks and a form,
I had a new man every evening,
And my kisses were thrilling and warm.
I might have sold them for a fortune,
To some old sugar daddy with dough,
But youth called to youth for its lover,
There was plenty that I didn’t know.

Then I fell for the ‘line’ of a ‘junker’,
A slim devotee of hop,
And those dreams in the juice of a poppy;
Had got me before I could stop.

But I didn’t care while he loved me,
Just to lie in his arms was a delight,
But his ardour grew cold and he left me;
In a Chinatown ‘hop-joint’ one night.

Well I didn’t care then what happened,
A Chink took me under his wing,
And down there in a hovel of hell —
I laboured for Hop and Ah-Sing
Oh no I’m no longer a ‘Junker’,
The police came and got me one day,
And I took the one cure that is certain,
That island out there in the bay.

Don’t spring that old gag of reforming,
A girl hardly ever goes back,
Too many are eager and waiting;
To guide her feet off of the track.
A man can break every commandment
And the world will still lend him a hand,
Yet a girl that has loved, but un-wisely
Is an outcast all over the land.

You see how it is don’t you honey,
I’d marry you now if I could,
I’d go with you back to the country,
But I know it won’t do any good,
For I’m only a poor branded woman
And I can’t get away from the past.
Good-bye and God bless you for asking
But I’ll stick out now till the last.

Bonnie (from Bonnie & Clyde) Parker poetry
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Bonnie Parker: Outlaws — Billy the Kid and Clyde Barrow

BonnieParker08

 Bonnie Elizabeth Parker

(1910 – 1934)

 

Outlaws 

Billy the Kid and Clyde Barrow

 

Billy rode on a pinto horse
Billy the Kid I mean
And he met Clyde Barrow riding
In a little gray machine

Billy drew his bridle rein
And Barrow stopped his car
And the dead man talked to the living man
Under the morning star

Billy said to the Barrow boy
Is this the way you ride
In a car that does its ninety per
Machine guns at each side?

I only had my pinto horse
And my six-gun tried and true
I could shoot but they got me
And someday they will get you!

For the men who live like you and me
Are playing a losing game
And the way we shoot, or the way we ride
Is all about the same

And the like of us may never hope
For death to set us free
For the living are always after you
And the dead are after me

Then out of the East arose the sound
Of hoof-beats with the dawn
And Billy pulled his rein and said
I must be moving on

And out of the West came the glare of a light
And the drone of a motor’s song
And Barrow set his foot on the gas
And shouted back, ‘So long’

So into the East, Clyde Barrow rode
And Billy, into the West
The living man who can know no peace
And the dead who can know no rest
Bonnie Parker

Outlaws — Billy the Kid and Clyde Barrow
Billy rode on a pinto horse
Billy the Kid I mean
And he met Clyde Barrow riding
In a little gray machine

Billy drew his bridle rein
And Barrow stopped his car
And the dead man talked to the living man
Under the morning star

Billy said to the Barrow boy
Is this the way you ride
In a car that does its ninety per
Machine guns at each side?

I only had my pinto horse
And my six-gun tried and true
I could shoot but they got me
And someday they will get you!

For the men who live like you and me
Are playing a losing game
And the way we shoot, or the way we ride
Is all about the same

And the like of us may never hope
For death to set us free
For the living are always after you
And the dead are after me

Then out of the East arose the sound
Of hoof-beats with the dawn
And Billy pulled his rein and said
I must be moving on

And out of the West came the glare of a light
And the drone of a motor’s song
And Barrow set his foot on the gas
And shouted back, ‘So long’

So into the East, Clyde Barrow rode
And Billy, into the West
The living man who can know no peace
And the dead who can know no rest

 

Bonnie Parker poetry
fleursdumal.nl magazine

More in: Archive O-P, Archive O-P, Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie Parker, CRIME & PUNISHMENT


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