MILOSZ'S WO RLD T ODAY
107
Dog
and " bark up," with as mu ch jubilati o n as possibl e, th e accompli sh–
ments o f others o f thi s magnitude. T hank yo u .
Madeline Levine:
Th e titl e o f m y paper is
"A bccndlo Miloszn
and Milosz's
Third Unw ritte n N ove l." Th e ABC boo k is a famili ar ge nre in Po li sh
letters, a loose fo rm th at all ows th e auth o r to chat , po ntifi ca te, be wi tty
or sentimental , and
to
mi x ex tensi ve biog raphi ca l essays with summary,
often ac id , judgm ents abo ut th e fa mo us o r no t-so-famo us peopl e he has
known o r th o ught abo ut. T he auth o ri al vo ice ca n va ry fr om page to
page so th at o ne mom ent th e rea der is made pri vy to th e co lo rful ram–
blings o f an avun cular
,(!n ll'l'd;::inr;::,
w hil e in th e nex t mo ment a sin gle
trenchant sente nce des troys w ith mo rdant w it any sublime no ti o ns the
reader may have e ntertain ed. Entri es in th ese boo ks are arranged in
alph abeti ca l o rd er, co nve ni e ntl y o bsc urin g w hateve r prin cipl e o f sel ec–
ti on o r lac k th ereo f underli es th e fini shed vo lume. A mo re permi ssive
va ri ant o f th e ge nre incl udes se ri o us mini -essays o r expansive riffs o n
any topi c of interest to th e auth o r. It is a genre idea ll y sui ted to a w ri ter
in sea rch o f a mo re spac io us fo rm .
A bccn dlo 1\1ilos;::n,
hi s rece ntl y pub–
li shed ABC boo k w ith its 133 alphabeti zed entri es, fits square ly into that
genre.
Opening it at random , one ca n find entri es o n famous w riters such as
Balzac, Baudel aire, Maritain . There's an entry o n Ameri can poetry, whi ch
is mainly abo ut Whitman, and o ne on the Po li sh language. Th ere's a wo n–
delf ul vignette about a community o f
Dl/choborts),.
Isado ra Duncan is
reca ll ed and Mary McCa rthy; Arthur Koes tl er gets an entry and so do
Anna and Do rcio Druzyno, th ose two spinster sisters first evoked in verse.
A du ty to preserve th eir memo ry is proclaimed: " N o one but me recalls
their names anymo re." Th ere are entri es label ed Unhappin ess, Economi cs,
The C ity, Martinique and G uadalupe, and o f course Alcoho l. Th e one
call ed Bi ographies instructs us: "Of course all biographi es are fa lse, not
excludin g m y own whi ch th e reader mi ght fee l inclin ed to divin e from thi s
ABC boo k." " Th e valu e o f bi ographies," the entry concludes, " res ts sol e–
lyon their abili ty
to
revea l mo re o r less the epoch during whi ch a given
life was lived." Most of th e ABC book entri es are bi ographi ca l, but auto–
bi ographi ca ll y so. Th e individuals recall ed are fo r the mos t part linked
directly to Mil osz's life. Hi s readers have met them befo re, so that the
A bccndlo
is a regathering, a reuni o n of sorts o f the poe t' s fri ends and
acquaintances w ith th e updates and reconfirmati o ns appropriate to such a
soc ial ga th erin g.
It is fun
to
play with
'n, l'
A BC Book
as if it were a kind o f hypertext
novel , igno ring its alphabeti ca l o rdering and imposing an o rder o f one's
own. One can marshal its entri es into themati cally o rga ni zed subsections,
