Customer Reviews

Tatlin! (Johns Hopkins: Poetry and Fiction)

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Originally published in 1974, Tatlin!, the first volume of history- and philosophy-drenched stories published by Guy Davenport (1927-2005) has none of the erotic energy animating some of his later work, but is not lacking in erudition.

The title piece is a series of vignettes from the life of Ukranian constructivist painter and architect Vladimir Yevgrafovich Tatlin. In Paris he encounters Picasso, Chagall, and Lipschitz. Davenport saw fit to include his drawings of Lenin and Stalin three times each.

Tatlin was interested in humans flying. In 1909 Franz Kafka and his friend Max Brod go to see the new phenomenon of airplanes at an air show at Brescia in the second piece. Ludwig Wittgenstein is also there, though Kafka and Wittgenstein do not meet in the piece.

Robot, the title character of the third (and best) piece is the name of a dog who finds the cave with paintings as Lascaux. (this is based on reality: a dog named Robot led four teenage boys into the cave in 1940). Davenport drew some cave animals that are strewn through the story of the boys, the local priest, and the archeologist the priest summons.

Its all downhill from there: a stilted visit to Heraklieitos (as Davenport spells it; Davenport published a translation of the ancient writer more usually rendered Heraclitus), 1830 Russian astronomy, and a long and dry exposition of Dutch philosopher Adriaan Floris van Hovendaal who is either a fictious character or very obscure. Davenport is often very difficult reading, but I found "The Dawn at Erewhon" outright unreadable

Cato, the day he eviscerated himself and still was happy.