This article is based on this Dutch article of Martinus Benders:
https://martijnbenders.substack.com/p/betelbero
Aoife
La sua pelle bianca come un Betelbero.
Voleva farne un merletto.
Trasformare tutto in merletto.
L’ho sollevata.
Come in tutto, alfa nel finito.
Lasciai il mondo inclinarsi sul suo corpo.
Fuori,
gli squali torvi del cielo.
Il suo velo siderale si tese, vicinante.
L’ho assorbita di nuovo.
Vieni, amore mio, filiamo sul fuso.
Il mondo è comunque così piccolo.
Aoife
Haar huid wit als een beitelboom.
Ze wou het van kant maken.
Alles van kant maken.
Ik nam haar op.
Als in alles, alpha in het affe.
Liet de wereld kantelen op haar lijf.
Buiten,
de bitte oenekaalhaai.
Haar nieme rekte, hidder.
Ik nam haar weer op.
Kom mijn lief klos met mij.
De wereld is toch zo klein.
We have arrived at part 2 of Ginneninne, in which the tailor Konnely provides robes for various girls from the village, who in turn symbolize different research chemicals.
How do you translate beitelboom? We chose Betelbero, because it somehow sounds right in Italian. But of course, something is lost as well—the whole “coke-cutting” chisel aspect, and the idea of “making lace” becomes too literal in Italian. Alpha in het affe, as in alpha in the aperige. And then de bitte oenekaalhaai—practically untranslatable.
It became:
Outside,
the grim sharks of the sky.
That’s not the same at all, but at least it sounds good. Konnely nods approvingly and considers it good enough.
A journalist from the Eindhovens Dagblad is coming to interview me today.
ChatGPT finds Betelbero a brilliant choice:
“Haar huid wit als een beitelboom” → “La sua pelle bianca come un Betelbero.”
This opens the poem with a rare and enigmatic image, something both earthly and extraterrestrial. The fusion of Betelbero (Betelgeuse + boom, tree) is a brilliant invention—it evokes the feeling of a tree carrying a star within itself, as if she is connected to something greater than her body.
I no longer remember which research chemical Aoife was associated with. It was an amphetamine, that much I do recall—a kind of artificial concentration. But it’s not as if the poems are descriptions of the substance’s effects or anything like that.
(Update: it was 3FEA—still available.)
I fear that education has deteriorated so much over the past few decades—something everyone knows and no one doubts—that the increasing autocratization of the educational order is a direct consequence of it. In other words, people who, based on nothing more than a long-ago checkmark, present themselves as specialists in a newly emerged virus and then resort to a random flu protocol.
It’s nothing more than Luizenmoeders in real life. They have no grasp of actual science, and that’s what makes it all the more painful that a true talent like Ronald Meester, who does know what he’s talking about, has to waste his time engaging with these trolls—trolls who, in reality, are being directed by shadowy agencies.
https://robindeboer.substack.com/p/gedenkwaardige-bijeenkomst-bij-het
By now, it has unfortunately become clear that people today literally have a whole plastic spoon lodged in their brains. No, that’s not a “symbol”—it is, quite literally, an entire plastic spoon inside the brain. Literally. Proven.
Given these circumstances, is it any wonder that they can hardly keep up with or process anything at all? Because it’s no longer just about literature. I can measure how long people actually listen to something. And they don’t listen at all: they skip as soon as the voice in their head tells them, “This isn’t what I’m looking for.”(1)
And they think that voice is their own.
And then there’s the insidious engagement as a marketing formula, which means that on social media, you’re constantly surrounded by people asking questions—not out of genuine curiosity, but because they’ve learned that asking questions attracts more audience. Pretending to be interested in people to boost visibility. Cynical, isn’t it?
(1) So what are they looking for? The dopamine feedbackloop they live in, which calls them to return on their phone. Come back, come back, don’t waste your precious time on…art!