18:00 Vi spiser aftensmad og bruger resten af aftenen på at lytte til
radio, en morsom drama baseret på
oplevelserne af PG ”Plum” Wodehouse, den berømte engelske forfatter af
komisk romaner, teaterstykker og sange, da han blev hyret i 1929 af
MGM-filmselskabet i Hollywood.
Det var Wodehouses kone, Ethel, der tog initiativet til at få sin mand til
at indgå en kontrakt med MGM, og hun elskede Hollywood-livsstilen – at sidde
ved siden af svømmepølen, tagende en tår af sin cocktail, eller kostumefesterne
hos William Randolph Hearst osv.
”Plum” kunne ikke lide de mange store fester, som Ethel holdt selv på deres
hjemme – han gemte sig i sit værelse under eftermiddagen, kom ned kl 17 og
snakkede lidt med gæsterne, spiste maden og forsvandt op i soveværelset igen
ved 20-tiden. Det er den slags mand, jeg selv kan relatere til !!!
”Plum” Wodehouse og Ethel, hans kone, i 1940.
Ethel og Plum delte ikke sengen, og sov i adskilte værelser. Men Ethel
havde for vane at invitere parrets finansielle rådgiver, Bobby, til at
overnatte hos dem, hvilket er et tydeligt vidnesbyrd om hendes totalt
fraværende sexliv med Plum – du godeste, sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!
Plum var kun god til én ting, ifølge Ethel – til at skrive. Men, selvom MGM
betalte ham en masse penge, skrev han ikke ret meget under de to år, han
arbejdede der, og hans vigtigste projekt, en film Rosalie, blev aflyst af
MGM-cheferne, efter han var færdig med at skrive den.
Wodehouse kritiserede og satiriserede MGM senere i avisartikler og i en
bog, ”Bright City of Sorrows”, der handlede om Hollywood. Han beskrev
filmselskabernes ineffektivitet og spild af ressourcer. De hyrede en masse ”specialister”
(forfattere, scriptere, læsere, scenarioskabere, idémænd osv ), der hver dag ikke havde ret meget at
gøre. De vigtigste medarbejdere var ja-mændene og ”nikkerne” – deres job var at
sige ja, eller nikke, når filmselskabchefer foreslog noget.
En af studiecheferne besluttede en dag, at Wodehouse var den bedste mand
til at skrive dialogen for en ny film, og hans ansatte brugte en masse tid på
at telefonere til England for at komme i kontakt med ham for at tilbyde ham
jobbet – uden succes. Ingen i England vidste, hvor Wodehouse var. Kun senere
fandt studiechefen ud af, at Wodehouse arbejdede i chefens egne studie, og
tjente penge der – du godeste, sikke et vanvid!!!!
22:00 Vi går i seng – zzzzzzz!
03:45 Jeg står tidligt op og laver én af mine rutinemæssige danske ordforrådtest.
07:30 Jeg trisser ind i køkkenet og laver to kopper te. Jeg tager dem med
op i soveværelset og hopper op i sengen til Lois. Vi drikker teen og går i bad.
Vi står op og spiser morgenmad.
10:00 Vi går hen ind i byen og smutter ind i Waghornes, den lokale
slagterforretning, for at købe kød og brød. Vi kommer hjem igen.
12:30 Vi spiser frokost og bagefter går jeg i seng for at tage mig en
gigantisk eftermiddagslur.
15:00 Jeg står op og læser endnu 2 sider af den oldislandske/oldnorske
saga, ” Gunnlaug Ormstunges saga”, som vi 5 medlemmer af Scillas U3A oldnorske
gruppe netop er begyndt at læse.
Sagaen, der blev nedskrevet i sidste tredjedel af 1200-tallet, handler om
en kærlighedstrekant mellem to digtere, Gunnlaug og Hrafn, og en smuk islandsk
pige, Helga, en bondemands datter. Jeg
var i går meget glad for, at få at vide, at gruppen ville koncentrere os om at
læse Gunnlaug Ormstunges saga, fordi sagaen indeholder vigtige oplysninger om
det følgende spørgsmål: kunne det angelsaksiske folk og de indvandrende
vikinger forstå hinanden uden behov for tolke? Sagaen er omtalt flere gange i
en bog, jeg for nylig læste, ”Sprog og historie i vikingetidens England” af
Matthew Townend.
Det synes at sagaens helt, Gunnlaug, en islandsk digter, er den klare favorit
til at vinde hånden af den smukke Helga, på trods af tilnærmelserne af
Gunnlaugs rival, Hrafn, en anden digter. Digtere var ”hotte” dengang i Island og
alle de smukke piger jagtede efter dem – det har jeg ikke nogen tvivl om !!!!
Gunnlaug og Helga bliver forlovet, men Gunnlaug beslutter at rejse
umiddelbart i udlandet – han lover at komme hjem igen om 3 år, så parret kan
gifte sig. Jeg har bemærket, at dette er et meget hyppigt tema i oldnorske
historier, og også i middelengelske historier. For det meste, skaber dette en
meget spændende situation i digtet, fordi mens kvindens kæreste er i udlandet,
dukker én eller anden rival op og prøver
at vinde kvindes hånd i fraværet af den første mand. Nogle tider resulterede
denne situation i en farlig duel, da den første mand kommer tilbage fra
udlandet, som i Gunnlaug Omstungas saga.
I begyndelsen var jeg lidt overrasket over, at så mange forlovede mænd ikke
umiddelbart giftede sig med kvinderne, mens de havde muligheden for at gøre
det. Så mindedes jeg, at det samme skete med Lois og mig. Vi blev forlovet i
1970, lige før jeg rejste til Japan for at læse i et år på et japansk
universitet. Da jeg kom tilbage i 1971, var der heldigvis ingen, der udfordrede
mig i en muligvis farlig duel, gudskelov.
tilbageblik til 1970: det sidste foto jeg tog af Lois
før
jeg rejste til Japan, hvor jeg boede i et år.
(Lois
sammen med Steve, min bror, og min mor)
Heathrow-lufthavnen
1971 - jeg ankommer tilbage fra Japan,
udmattet
efter et søvnløst rejse, men jeg åndede lettet op, da jeg
så
Lois og England igen
(sammen
med min søster Gill)
Vores
bryllupsrejse i Norge (1972)
Da Gunnlaug er i udlandet, besøger han også England og han fremsiger et digt foran Kong Æthelred. Sagaens forfatter
kommenterer, at det engelsaksiske sprog dengang var det samme, som det danske
og norske, så Æthelred og de engelske ædle kunne forstå ham og hans digt.
Matthew Townend henleder opmærksomhed på denne bemærkning i sin bog, ”Sprog og
historie i vikingetidens England”.
Gunnlaug fremsiger
sit digt foran andre (norske) konger i Irland, Norge, Shetlandsøerne osv. I
alle disse lande giver kongerne en rød kåbe til Gunnlaug, som belønning for
hans digt. Efter min mening er én rød kåbe nok – muligvis én for meget! Der er
begrænsede muligheder for at bære en rød kåbe, og ikke at se dum ud – det ved
jeg af erfaring!
16:00 Lois og jeg
slapper af med en kop te i sofaen.
English translation
18:00 We have dinner and spend the rest of the evening listening to
the radio, an amusing drama based on the experiences of PG "Plum"
Wodehouse, the famous English writer of comic novels, plays and songs, when he
was hired in 1929 by the MGM movie company in Hollywood.
It was Wodehouse's wife, Ethel,
who took the initiative to get her husband to sign a contract with MGM, and she
loved the Hollywood lifestyle - sitting by the swimming pool, taking a sip of
her cocktail, or costume parties at the home of William Randolph Hearst and so
on.
"Plum" did not like the
many big parties which Ethel herself held in their home - he hid in his room
during the afternoon, came down at 5pm and talked with the guests and ate
dinner, disappearing up to his bedroom again at 8pm. That's the kind of man I
can relate to !!!
PG “Plum” Wodehouse and his wife,
Ethel
Ethel and Plum did not share a
bed, and slept in separate rooms. But Ethel had a habit of inviting the
couple's financial advisor, Bobby, to spend the night with her, which is a
clear testimony to her totally non-existent sex life with Plum - my goodness,
what a crazy world we live in !!!!
Plum was only good at one thing,
according to Ethel - and that was writing. But although MGM paid him a lot of
money he actually wrote very little during the two years he worked there, and
his main project, a film called Rosalie, was canceled by MGM executives, after
he had finished writing it.
Wodehouse criticised and
satirised MGM later in newspaper articles and in a book, "Bright City of
Sorrows", which was about Hollywood. He described the film companies'
inefficiency and waste of resources. They used to hire a lot of "specialists"
(writers, script guys, readers, scenario creators, ideas men" etc.), who had very little to do every day. The most important employees were the yes-men and the
"nodders" - their job was to say yes or nod when the film company
managers suggested something.
One of the studio bosses decided
one day that Wodehouse would be the best man to write the dialogue for a new
film, and his staff spent a lot of time making phone calls to England to try
and get in touch with him and offer him the job - without success. No one in
England knew where Wodehouse was. Only later did the studio boss find out that
Wodehouse was working in the boss's own studio, and drawing a salary there –
good grief, what madness !!!!
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!
03:45 I get up early and do one
of my routine Danish vocabulary tests.
07:30 I toddle into the kitchen
and make two cups of tea. I take them up to the bedroom and hop into bed with
Lois. We drink the tea and take a shower. We get up and eat breakfast.
10:00 We go into the village and
pop into Waghornes, the local butcher's shop to buy meat and bread. We come back home.
12:30 We eat lunch and afterwards
I go to bed and take a gigantic afternoon nap.
15:00 I get up and read 2 more
pages of the Old Norse saga, "Gunnlaug Ormstunges saga" that we 5
members of Scilla's U3A Old Norse group have just begun to read.
The saga, written in the
last third of the 1200s, is about a love triangle between two poets, Gunnlaug
and Hrafn, and a beautiful Icelandic girl, Helga, a peasant's daughter.
I was
yesterday very pleased to learn that the group would be concentrating on
reading Gunnlaug Ormstunges saga, because the saga contains important
information about the following question: could the Anglo-Saxon people and the immigrant Vikings understand each other without the need for interpreters? The
saga is mentioned several times in a book I recently read, "Language and
History in Viking Age England" by Matthew Townend.
It seems that the saga's hero,
Gunnlaug, an Icelandic poet, is the clear favorite to win the hand of the
beautiful Helga, despite the approaches of Gunnlaug's rival, Hrafn, another
poet. Poets were "hot" back then in Iceland and all the beautiful
girls used to chase after them - I have no doubts about that !!!!
Gunnlaug and Helga get engaged,
but Gunnlaug decide to travel abroad immediately - he promises to come home in
3 years, so the couple can marry. I have noticed that this is a very frequent
theme in Old Norse stories, and also in Middle English stories. For the most
part, this creates a very interesting situation in the poem, because while her
boyfriend is abroad, one or another rival pops up and tries to win the woman's
hand in the absence of the first man. Sometimes this situation results in a
dangerous duel when the first man comes back from abroad, as in Gunnlaug
Omstungas saga.
At first I was a little surprised
that so many engaged men did not immediately marry the women, while they had the
opportunity to do so. Then I remembered that the same thing happened with Lois
and me. We got engaged in 1970, just before I traveled to Japan to study at a Japanese university for a year. When I came back in 1971, there was fortunately
no one who challenge me to a potentially dangerous duel, thank God.
flashback to 1970: the last photo I took of
Lois
before I traveled to Japan, where I lived
for a year.
(Lois with my brother Steve and my mother)
Heathrow Airport in 1971 - I arrive back
from Japan,
exhausted after a sleepless trip, but I breathed a sigh of relief
when I saw Lois and England again (with my sister Gill)
Our honeymoon in Norway (1972)
When Gunnlaug is abroad, he also visits England and he recites a poem in front of King Ethelred. The saga's
author comments that the Anglo-Saxon language was the same as the
Danish and Norwegian ones at the time, so Ethelred and the English nobles could understand him
and his poem. Matthew Townend draws attention to this remark in his book,
"Language and History in Viking Age England".
Gunnlaug recites his poem in
front of other (Norse) kings also, in Ireland, Norway, Shetland and so on. In
all these countries the kings give a red robe to Gunnlaug, as a reward for his
poem. In my opinion, one red robe is enough - possibly one too many! There are
limited opportunities to wear a red robe, and not look stupid - I know that
from experience!
16:00 Lois and I relax with a cup
of tea on the sofa.
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