A WEEK ON THE CONCORD AND MERRIMACK RIVERS an excerpt
by Henry David Thoreau
Whether we live by the seaside, or by the lakes and rivers, or on the prairie, it concerns us to attend to the nature of fishes, since they are not phenomena confined to certain localities only, but forms and phases of the life in nature universally dispersed. The countless shoals which annually coast the shores of Europe and America are not so interesting to the student of nature, as the more fertile law itself, which deposits their spawn on the tops of mountains, and on the interior plains; the fish principle in nature, from which it results that they may be found in water in so many places, in greater or less numbers. The natural historian is not a fisherman, who prays for cloudy days and good luck merely, but as fishing has been styled "a contemplative man's recreation," introducing him profitably to woods and water, so the fruit of the naturalist's observations is not in new genera or species, but in new contemplations still, and science is only a more contemplative man's recreation. The seeds of the life of fishes are everywhere disseminated, whether the winds waft them, or the waters float them, or the deep earth holds them; wherever a pond is dug, straightway it is stocked with this vivacious race. They have a lease of nature, and it is not yet out. The Chinese are bribed to carry their ova from province to province in jars or in hollow reeds, or the water-birds to transport them to the mountain tarns and interior lakes. There are fishes wherever there is a fluid medium, and even in clouds and in melted metals we detect their semblance.
I remember as a little kid going to beaches like this on the New Jersey shore. Well, maybe not quite like this.
Fabulously honest camera work, sly editing, set to the tune La Mer by the great chanteur Charles Tr�net.
Here's Charles Tr�net singing his song himself later in his career. Apparently he wrote the song in 10 minutes in 1943 on toilet paper aboard a train running along the Mediterranean coast.
Bobby Darin did an English-language cover called Beyond the Sea in 1959. Totally different song.
The evolution continued with this video set to Beyond the Sea, sung by Robbie Williams.
Not the same song, except in name. A hypnotic beauty by Nine Inch Nails.
This is a slow, moody, beautiful music video for the song Doppelganger by Efterklang (Danish: remembrance, or reverberation), with choppy, haunting images of familiar shorelines, familiar species, topside and underwater. Not something to watch if you're in a hurry.
My recent post, Sunday Poetry: "Postscript," of Seamus Heaney's poem included the much-beloved photograph shot by Toni Frissell. A friend told me it was also the cover of the 1963 album by Bill Evans and Jim Hall called Undercurent.And here it is.
Well, that set me adrift and I found the photo was also the album cover for the 1988 Tears in Rain by This Ascension.
And for Osvaldo Golijov's Oceana.
And for The Beauvilles Whispering Sin.
But wait. The image was also colorized and used as a cover for the Kindle version of the novel Tethered by Amy MacKinnon.
I imagine one of the reasons this photograph is so popular (aside from it being gorgeous) is that it's in the public domain. So that got me started on Toni Frissell (1907-1988), whose portfolio was bequeathed to the Library of Congress upon her death. Here are a few of my favorites:
Frissell obviously liked to shoot around and even underwater. Wikipedia says she was a fashion photographer before WWII, the official photographer of the Women's Army Corps during WWII, and the first woman on the staff of Sports Illustrated in 1953.
Her much-used image of the woman afloat just under the surface is called Weeki Wachee Springs, Florida. And there's where it was shot in 1947, the first year the springs opened as a tourist attraction, complete with underwater performances by "mermaids." The place became one of those legendary roadside attractions of mid-20th-century America. Here's one of Weeki Wachee's 1950s mermaids.
It turns out that the British band Supergrass shot a music video at Weeki Wachee Springs in 2005, which conveys a history of the place in and around the band playing to the mermaids (and proves that Hans Christian Andersen had it wrong and mermaids, though lovely underwater, can't sing).
The Mermaid (1911) by Edmund Dulac captures the vulnerability of a beached water being... something most of us can probably relate to.
"... The little mermaid swallowed the bitter, fiery draught, and it was as if a two-edged sword struck through her frail body. She swooned away, and lay there as if she were dead. When the sun rose over the sea she awoke and felt a flash of pain, but directly in front of her stood the handsome young Prince, gazing at her with his coal-black eyes. Lowering her gaze, she saw that her fish tail was gone, and that she had the loveliest pair of white legs any young maid could hope to have. But she was naked, so she clothed herself in her own long hair."
A haunting underwater music video by Lhasa de Sela, who died last month of breast cancer at the age of 37. Her dusky soulful voice will be missed. Descanse en? paz.
Con Toda Palabra (a partial, rough translation) With Every Word
Con toda palabra Con toda sonrisa Con toda mirada Con toda caricia
Me acerco al agua Bebiendo to beso La luz de tu cara La luz de tu cuerpo
Es ruego el quererte Es canto de mudo Mirada de ciego Secreto desnudo
Me entrego a tus brazos Con miedo y con calma Y un ruego en la boca Y un ruego en la alma
With every word With every smile With every look With every caress
I draw near the water Drinking your kiss The light of your face The light of your body
To love you is a prayer The mute song The blind gaze The naked secret
I entrust myself to your arms With fear and with calm And a prayer in my mouth And a prayer in my soul
