Edwin Muir: A Scottish Poet in Prague

From Radio Praha, David Vaughan

https://www.radio.cz/en/section/books/edwin-muir-a-scottish-poet-in-prague


The Cloud 

One late spring in Bohemia,
Driving to the Writer’s House, we lost our way
In a maze of little winding roads that led
To nothing but themselves,
Weaving a rustic web for thoughtless travellers.
Only a chequer-board of little fields,
Crumpled and dry, neat squares of powdered dust.
At a sudden turn we saw
A young man harrowing, hidden in dust; he seemed
A prisoner walking in a moving cloud
Made by himself for his own purposes;
And there he grew and was as if exalted
To more than man, yet not, not glorified:
A pillar of dust moving in dust; no more.
The bushes by the roadside were encrusted
With a hard sheath of dust.
We looked and wondered; the dry cloud moved on
With its interior image.
Presently we found
A road that brought us to the Writer’s House,
And there a preacher from Urania
(Sad land where hope each day is killed by hope)
Praised the good dust, man’s ultimate salvation,
And cried that God was dead. As we drove back
Late to the city, still our minds were teased
By the brown barren fields, the harrowing,
The figure walking in its cloud, the message
From Urania. This was before the change;
And in our memory cloud and message fused,
Image and thought condensed to a giant form
That walked the earth clothed in its earthly cloud,
Dust made sublime in dust. And yet it seemed unreal
And lonely as things not in their proper place.
And thinking of the man
Hid in his cloud we longed for light to break
And show that his face was the face once broken in Eden,
Beloved, worth-without-end lamented face;
And not a blindfold mask on a pillar of dust.

Edwin Muir.


A personal postscript, 1987 (before the Velvet Revolution):

November Cloud

For Peter Butter, On the Occasion of the Edwin Muir Centenary Lecture, Prague

On the way to the Writers' House -

Bohemia in mid-November -

Professor Butter, Muir's biographer,

Sat beside me in the car.

We talked of the poem called The Cloud,

Of what Muir meant, of what he'd seen.

The Dobříš Mansion had hardly altered

Since its use had changed in '45

From residence of Reich's Protector

To haven for the harassed writer,

Reserved these days for the Party-favoured -

Those writers blessed by the Union-Reich,

The loyal-elect, the Committee-chosen,

With three books to their names at least,

Sound author's of the State's persuasion,

Rewarded by a stay at Dobříš

With stipend and a stately room;

The privilege of elegance

For the price of a cribbed, diminished soul.

Today the seminar's behind closed doors;

Young eager writers have been assembled,

They're being shown the prizes and rewards

To be won for staying in line and silent.

For the mansion of Comfort is not twenty miles

From the cancerous mines of uranium towns,

Where dissenting scribblers were sent for correction,

Příbram, seat of the Dissidents' Mines.

But we were given the royal treatment,

In Dobříš' fine reception halls.

We were glad to see the guest-book there,

The first they'd had, from forty-five.

Aragon and Eluard, their signatures were all too clear: -

Near theirs we found it, Edwin Muir's!

In '46 and '47, Edwin Muir and Willa too.

Who here remembers Edwin Muir?

Perhaps a man in a cloud of dust?

We presented two books to the lady custodian,

They were gladly accepted by the Keeper of Keys:-

Muir's poems, prose of life in Prague.

I wonder what they'll make of them,

The comrades in their graceful suites,

Looking for honest inspiration,

Unguilded themes which suit the times,

But which won't offend the Party chiefs?

Let them read The Good Town and The Cloud.

As they stroll French Garden or English Park,

Casting backward looks and sideways glances,

As they search for the wire in the antique vase,

Rococo mirror, baroque writing-desk.

Let them remember, as they shred each draft:

The labyrinth begins right here.