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As the Six Nonlectures begin, so they conclude, with the

nonanswerable question ‘“‘who, as a writer, am I?’’ That there is an answer, after all, is clear in all of these searchingly per- sonal evening disclosures of self; but with this final nonlecture before the students of Harvard, the fervor of Cummings’

affirmation of life resolves into the serenity of the final avowal. And so this unique and marvelous aural document concludes, leaving the listener with ineradicable insight into this ‘‘feel- ingly illimitable individual; whose only happiness is to tran- scend himself, whose every agony is to grow.”

Scene and subject strangely conspired in Cummings’ non- lectures, which were the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures de- livered by him at Sanders Theatre in Cambridge in 1952-53. ‘The balloonman street of his boyhood was three streets away, and the Victorian Gothic pile of Memorial Hall at evening had cast its stately shadow partway to his house. As he sat now before the stiff semi-circles of pew-like benches and be- tween the marble statues of James Otis and Josiah Quincy, the scene conveyed not so much his college years as a greater inheritance which he had simultaneously rejected and kept. He was as intransigent a Yankee as Thoreau; Paris and Greenwich Village might without much exaggeration be thought his Wal- den; and his return for the nonlectures brought back, in

both his rebellion and his authenticity, a son of Cambridge. His haunting voice and spare, contained figure in the pool of

light between the white statues expressed at once dependence and independence, form and non-conformity, edge, pride, American hilarity at some things called American and, above all, love. The wild New England apple tree flowering in a lonely pasture was not more at home. His choice in each lec- ture first to describe stages of his life, then to read verse, both his own and others’, was surprising for lectures—hence his title. The evenings seemed half idea, half music, but the

division did not necessarily correspond to the parts. Form gave his verse idea, feeling gave his life music. His characteris- tic surprise was, among other things, one face of his inde- pendence. What conventional, much less unconventional, poet would have closed the account of his youth by quoting in the original from Sappho, Horace, Dante, Shakespeare, and Goethe? The spirit of Charles Eliot Norton, at home in Sanders, might have smiled. There followed “my father

moved through dooms of love”, “if there are any heavens my mother will (all by herself) have one”, and the bird-flight of the successive poems that marked his way from youth for- ward. With something like the sureness of sleepwalking, the nonlectures turned into a non-autobiography and, the beau- tiful voice still guiding, Sanders Theatre opened on his life’s enormous room.

—John H. Finley, Jr. Eliot Professor of Greek Literature Harvard University

CUMMINGS ESSAY QUOTED BY THE POET IN NONLECTURE SIX

facefacefaceface hand-

fin- claw

foot-

hoof

(tovarich)

es to number of numberlessness(un -smiling)

with dirt’s dirt dirty dirtier with others’ dirt with dirt of them- selves dirtiest waitstand dirtily never smile shufflebudge dirty pause- halt

Smilingless.

Some from nowhere(faces of nothing)others out of somewhere(somethingshaped hands)these knew ignorance(hugest feet and believing)those were friendless(stooping in their deathskins)all—

numberlessly —eachotherish

facefacefaceface facefaceface

faceface Face

:all(of whom-which move-do-not-move numberlessly)Toward the

Tomb

Crypt

Shrine Grave. The grave.

Toward the(grave.

All toward the grave)of himself of herself(all toward the grave of themselves)all toward the grave of Self.

Move(with dirt’s dirt dirty)unmoving move un(some from no- where)moving move unmoving(eachotherish) |

:face Our-not-their faceface;

Our-not-her ,facefaceface

Our-not-his —toward

Vladimir our life!Ulianov our sweetness!Lenin our hope! all—

(hand-

fin-

claw foot-

hoof tovarich)

es:to number of numberlessness;un -smiling

all toward Un- moveunmove,all toward Our haltpause;all toward All budgeshuffle:all toward Toward standwait. Isn’tish.

The dark human All warped(the Un-)toward and—facefaceface- face—past Arabian Nights and disappearing . . . numberlessness;or may possibly there exist an invisible,a final,face;moveunmovingly which after several forevers will arrive to(hushed)look upon its maker Lenin?

““pahjahlstah”—voice?belonging to comrade K. Said to a most tough cop. Beside shufflebudging end of beginninglessness,before the Tomb of ‘Tombs,standunstanding.

(Voice?continues)I,American correspondent . . . (the toughest cop spun:upon ail of and over smallest me staring

all 1 awful moment—salutes! And very gently shoves)let the skies snow dolphins—nothing shall confound us now!(into smilelessly the entering beginning of endlessness:

—between these 2 exhausted its:a bearded,and a merely

unshaven)now who emotionlessly displace themselves. Obediently and now we form a dumb me-sandwich. & now which,moves

3 comrades move;comrade before me(comrade I)comrade behind me...un-...and move...and un-...and _ always(behind comrade behind me)numb-erl-ess-ness

(at either side of the Portal:rigidity. Armed soldier attentioning) —stink;warm poresbowels,millionary of man-the-unanimal

putresence. Floods up from dark. Suffocatingly envelopes 3 now (unmovemoving past that attentioning twain each(& whose eyelids moveunmove)other facing rigidities) comrades

as when a man inhabits,for stars and moons,freely himself

(breathing always round air;living deeply the colour of darkness and utterly enjoying the sound of the great sun;tasting very slowly a

proud silence of mountains;touched by,touching,what never to be

comprehended miracles;conversing with trees fearlessly and fire and rain and all creatures and each strong faithful thing)as when the man

comes to a where tremulous with despair and a when luminous with dissolution—into all fearfulness comes,out of omnipotence—as when he enters a city(and solemnly his soul descends:every wish covers its beauty in tomorrow)so I descended and so I disguised myself;so (toward death’s deification moving)I did not move

bearded’s cap slumps off. Mine. Beardless’s . - . now,Stone;polished(Now)darklyness . . . —leftturning:

Down

(the old skull floating(the old ghost shuffling) just-in-front-of-me in-stink-and-glimmer &

from)whom,now:forth creeps,som(ething,timi)dly . . . a Feeling tenta-

cle cau,tiously &,which,softlytouchtry-ing fear,ful,ly how the polished the slippery black,the—is it realP—(da)amazedly & with- draws;diminishes;wilt

-ing(rightturn)

as we enter The Place,I look up:over(all)us a polished slab reflecting upside(com(moveunmoving)rades)down. Nowsa. Pit:here . . . yes—sh! .

under a prismshaped transparency lying (tovarich-to-the-waist forcelessly shut rightclaw leftfin unshut limply & a small-not-intense head & a face-without-wrinkles & a

reddish beard).

(1 appearing quickly uniform shoves our singleness into 2s)yanks bearded to the inside pushes to the outside me . . . & as un(around the(the prism) pit)movingly comrades the move

(within a neckhigh wall in a groove which surrounds the prism)

stands,at the prism’s neuter pole,a human being (alive,silent) with a real rifle: —comrades revolve. Wheel we. Now I am somehow(for a moment)

on the inside;alone—

growls. Another soldier. Rightturning us. Who leave The Place (whose walls irregularly are splotched with red frieze)leave the dumb saccharine porebowel ripeness of stink ... we climb &

climbing we ) ’re out.

Certainly it was not made of flesh. And I have seen so many wax- works which were actual(some ludicrous more horrible most both) sO many images whose very unaliveness could liberate Is,invent Being(or what equally disdains life and unlife)—I have seen so very many better gods or strangersmany mightier deeper puppets;every-

where and elsewhere and perhaps in America and(for instance) in Coney Island...

from EIMI (Covici, 1933; William Sloan Associates, 1949)

Note: Six Nonlectures has been published in full by Harvard University Press.

This is one of a series of six records, covering the six Charles Eliot Norton “nonlectures” delivered by Cummings at Harvard. The other records in this set are:

CAEDMON TC 1186 NONLECTURE ONE i & my parents

CAEDMON TC 1187 NONLECTURE TWO i & their son

CAEDMON TC 1188 NONLECTURE THREE i & selfdiscovery

CAEDMON TC 1189 NONLECTURE FOUR i & you & is

CAEDMON TC 1190 NONLECTURE FIVE i& now & him

E. E. Cummings can also be heard reading from his own works on the following albums:

CAEDMON TC 1017 EIGHTEEN POEMS « scene from HIM - RUSSIAN DIARY (EIMI) « SANTA CLAUS “The laurels go to E. E. Cummings. The lowercase poet reads in a deliberately slowed-down tempo that is absolutely right, in a voice that is clear as elementary arithmetic.” :

—HARVEY BREIT, The New York Times

CAEDMON TC 2006 THE CAEDMON TREASURY OF MOD- ERN POETS READING THEIR OWN POETRY includes Cum- mings’ readings of ‘““what of a much of a which of a wind” and “sweet spring is your”

Cover photograph by Marion Morehouse; design by Ben Robin- son. © 1965 by Caedmon Records, Inc. Performance and repro- duction rights information available from Caedmon Records, Inc., 461 Eighth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10001. Made in U\S.A.

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