In other posts on this site I’ve attempted translations of a number of Gerard Ceunis’ youthful literary works, including the poems ‘De Bleeke Kaarsen’ (‘The Pale Candles’) and ‘t Avendt’ (‘In The Evening’), and the prose poem ‘Droom’ (‘Dream’). All of these were originally published in the Belgian literary journal, Vlaamsche Arbeid (‘Flemish Labour’) in 1907 or 1908, when Ceunis would have been in his early twenties.
The excellent Digitale Bibliotheek voor de Nederlandse letteren (DNBL) – the digital library of Dutch literature – includes one other early piece by Ceunis, a second, longer prose poem entitled ‘Legende. Gedicht van den avond op de Leie’ (‘Legend. Poem of the evening on the Lys’). It was published in a different literary journal, the Antwerp-based De Vlaamsche Gids (‘The Flemish Guide’) a few years after the other pieces, in 1911. (For a detailed analysis of the rise and fall of Flemish literary magazines, including Ceunis’ own short-lived journal Iris, during this period, see Christophe Verbruggen’s Schrijverschap in de Belgische belle epoque: een sociaal-culturele geschiedenis, which I wrote about in this post). The Lys is the French name for the river that flows through Ghent and the surrounding region: in Dutch it is called the Leie, which is the term Ceunis uses in this piece, though I have used the French version in my translation since it is better known internationally.
Emile Claus (1849 – 1924), ‘Fog on the Lys’, Musée de la Chartreuse, Douai
‘Legende’ has many similarities with ‘Droom’, Ceunis’ other published prose poem, similarities which make it particularly difficult to render into English, especially if (like me) your knowledge of Dutch is limited and you’re forced to rely on Google Translate (which doesn’t have a specifically Flemish option). Occasionally I’ve had to guess at the meanings of words and I apologise in advance to Flemish speakers for any inaccuracies.
Like ‘Droom’, ‘Legende’ is clearly influenced by French Symbolism in its use of synaesthetic imagery, with colours used to describe sounds, and emotions ascribed to natural objects such as trees and flowers. At the heart of both pieces is an idealised female figure (one can see, perhaps, why Ceunis fell out with the feminists of Reiner Leven and the Flinken), though whereas in ‘Droom’ she is an imaginary lover, in ‘Legende’ the beautiful young lady whose music enchants the children of the village resembles a magical figure from mythology, though I have no idea whether the writer was drawing on an actual folktale. The whole late-Romantic atmosphere of this long prose poem, with its sensuous visual imagery, makes one think of a melancholy Pre-Raphaelite painting, such as John William Waterhouse’s ‘The Lady of Shalott’, or the mystical fantasies of Aubrey Beardsley, about whom Ceunis wrote admiringly in his artistic manifesto of 1907.
Cover of the issue of ‘De Vlaamsche Gids’ in which Ceunis’ prose poem appears
Legend. Poem of the evening on the Lys.
I.
Who was the woman? Where had she come from? Nobody knew.
When the red evening sun had drifted over yonder, in the bloody opulence of a crimson glow; when the soft-fading evening mist blew tenderly over the fields and drove weary people and weary things to take their rest; when all the sounds of work were silenced and satisfied cows had returned to their stables; when all the field and meadow flowers had closed their pale cups, and in the air there rose from the earth a sweet fragrance, which was the blessed evening scent of the fields; then, beautiful and holy as the night itself, she came up softly, the woman with such pale hands, and with them moved the oars so quietly in the water that no rumour rose along the bank, while only the lonely irises held their silent assembly.
Thus she came at twilight every day, silent and mysterious …
And when the Lys no longer laughed in the mild glare of the sun, but grew lonely and melancholic, a pale figure slid over her still waters … it was she, the mysterious one, who like a floating water lily left a mark on the dark Lys in the twilight.
Then she rose up on to the river bank and moved slowly towards the orchard.
That orchard was not far from the village, and was deserted, belonging to everyone and no one; – the trees were old and broken, though every spring they were heavily weighed down with silver-white and pink flowers, and in the month of May the tall wild grass was dotted with sweet pale leaves falling from the trees. The villagers held that orchard in high esteem, and it was the source of all kinds of legends that were heard from the mouths of both parents and children.
This young lady came here every day at dusk, playing and singing with the peasant girls and boys, who looked upon her as a saint and followed her in unending worship.
Her hair, dark as night, fell long down her back, creating a great dark stain against the pallor of her slender robe. Her eyes were deep and large, heavy with love and sorrow. And her movements sang with grace and sobriety, while pale hands, with their gentle gestures, emerged from the wide sleeves of her white robe.
In that orchard there was a harmonium; – where did that harmonium come from? They did not know that either; but she, the lady with the pale hands, played it, and then soft long tones wept over the Lys region, and then all the children were silent …
The boldest and bawdiest cowman listened piously and reverently, feeling tenderly happy; and so did all the boys, and so did all the girls, and then there shone something in their glistening child eyes that came from their souls and that they did not understand.
And meanwhile the slender hands slid over the keys, so soft and so light, as if those pale hands were carved from marble, from pure white marble; … and yet they were so white-shining, so diaphanous … And the long fine fingers, like those of the Madonna of the mystics, slid over the keyboard, sometimes so slowly, and sometimes so swiftly and quickly, as if silver-winged dragonflies flew over the white-legged keys …
And the fruit trees, in that half-twilight, seemed as reverent as the children, and all the while they slowly dropped the pale leaves of their flowers that fell on the grass, tender and sad, like the blue lamentations of the harmonium itself.
Then all the orchard was one silent place of holiness, where everything seemed to pray in silent listening. And when a gentle evening breeze caressed the trees, and the young leaves rustled softly, then this yellow sound of nature mingled with the organ-soft tones, and then that glory was carried on the wind, so weeping-sweet, over the resting fields along the quiet Lys to the village, where the pious inhabitants, sitting on the borders of their town, sat peacefully listening to those melancholic songs, which drifted along with the evening breeze …
And when those simple, well-behaved children of nature had listened carefully to that beautiful music, as to something grand and sacred to which they were devoted but which they did not understand, – they too played happy songs, old folk songs to which they sang along and to which they danced joyfully.
The young lady had taught them all, tapping their blushing cheeks with her pale marble hands, if all was well.
There was one song that sounded sad and melancholic, and that the stranger had sung so divinely; – and that all the children, although they didn’t understand it, preferred to sing.
With this song the twilight-delicate ceremony ended; the strange singer lifted herself up, and her pale hands softly closed the harmonium. By then there was already a dark shroud around the trees, and dream-like threads of mist flecked more densely and sweetly around the things of the orchard.
The young lady moved in it like a shining angel, and every gesture of her white hands was a caress, whose golden music made more beautiful and more sacred the breath of the sad evening. The stars also shone in the sky, at first faint, rising and disappearing, then brazenly, heather-sparkling pearls and diamonds.
Then she stepped slowly from the orchard, and for each of the great crowd around her she had a tender word and a holy smile; with her long soft fingers she stroked every girl along the cheeks, with every boy she placed a comforting hand on the hair of their head … The girls always thought of that soft friction with childlike devotion, the boys always felt that holy hand on their head like a rich blessing whose value they could scarcely imagine.
Alone she moved further between the prayer trees, and her pale figure floated serenely through the evening …
The children never ran noisily when they returned to the village, but they went quietly and happily – peace and compassion hung over the crowd of children, and that evening each parent received a soft and tender child into their home…
John William Waterhouse, ‘The Lady of Shalott’, 1888 (Tate Britain)
II.
It was Sunday. All day the Lys had put on her shimmering sun-robe, and the poplars on the banks had been constantly reflected in it, proud and content, looking so freshly green and sunny. There was also a feast in the meadow, and all the flowers vied for the purest and most beautiful colours.
In that smiling sunshine everything was beautiful and silvery, and numerous happy boats sailed on the happy water, with generous talk and laughter everywhere.
If then that lady with the pale hands had come, gliding softly and stately along the Lys in her little boat that was always crowned with white lilies and seemed covered with silver ornaments, she would have been mildly illuminated with golden sunlight around her white robe, like a knight of the Grail, solemnly in his swan boat with silver-like armour.
But now, at dusk, when peaceful rest had descended and all the rumours of laughter had died away; now the poplars again stood dreaming and seemed so serious and sad; now that a shade was caressing across the Lys, a sultry summer air that caressed the leaves and sang its evening song; now that instead of a silver and gold shimmer there were only pale spots in the twilight, and all things were spun over with mist threads and melted together in the tender mood of the evening, … now that young lady came as always without a sound, and again her white robe was one white spot of holiness … No swan knight she seemed, but she seemed like the evening itself, a hazy image of tenderness and love.
It was as if there a great silent sad love accompanied her boat over the region of the Lys valley, full of infinity and goodness … The water lapped so strangely soft against the dreaming banks…
The girls and boys had been waiting for her, and when she appeared they all walked together to the orchard. She took the two smallest ones by the hand and this was a wonderful joy for the little ones. She was the unknown holy lady and they were allowed to go along with her. But they did not simply go along, the little ones, they ran on yelping and pulling her forward almost without reverence; they were still so young. Only then did the stranger’s face glow with a smile … a smile as fragile and tender as that of the Gioconda.
It was a special day today, there was no playing in the orchard.
Three cowmen had already loaded the harmonium on a wheelbarrow, and they now continued on along the Lys to the village …, followed by the lady and all the gang of children. But no happy sounds reverberated from their youthful throats today, now there would be no singing of:
In Bruges there is a house
with spiders, rommom,
In Bruges there is a house
with flowers all around.
There was something soft and delicious in their child eyes, and their cherry-red mouths remained innocently closed. Dreamily and with a somewhat roguish look, they continued hand in hand. Those were truly lovely, sweet children’s faces.
The procession reached the courtyard of a farm. Everything was silent here, such a sad oppressive silence. The guard dog had been taken away, there was no industrious business as usual on the farm by evening.
Inside was a sick girl, Meelke, who would otherwise usually come to the orchard and play with them. Now she was sick, very sick …
The stranger with her pale hands would play wonderfully for the sick child …
Inside, Meelke lay on her bed with pale cheeks, blonde curls of hair played around her head, and blue, dream-blue eyes gazed at the beautiful stranger who sat and played the harmonium. Around her the pious family stood humbly; the mother wept, wept softly, and held her blue apron in front of her.
And Meelke looked so happy now that she was there. Now her child’s eyes had regained some of their former shine. She should now be allowed to listen to that beautiful music again, as it used to be in the orchard.
Outside, all the girls and boys stood dumbly at the door and window; they did not move a muscle and listened sweetly as if in church.
And the harmonium played softly, so evening-soft, so delicate, so embalming …
Low, low sank the evening down, with blessing and with peace, spinning soft gloom over the farmhouse. Inside, where yellow-singing lamps were already burning, sifting light fell on the courtyard in oblique beams from the door and window. Blond strands of light were caught in the hair of the listening crowd of children …
The stables were already so gloomy now, it seemed as if they were already asleep under the warm mantle of the night.
And the tones wept around the farm like yellow-gleaming garments of light, along the fields to the Lys that flowed yonder, where the high poplars made their narrow crowns sway mysteriously, and there were dark ghostly spots on the after-glowing blue-dark sky.
That evening, all the children would be anxious to return to their homes through that darkness … They would go into deep darkness close together, in the tender emotion of joyful embarrassment …
Inside, in the little house, where the lamp light shone so dimly, little Meelke was dreaming of the sweet tones, and knew no darkness …
Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, ‘Le Recueillement’, 1866, Musée d’Orsay
III.
Meelke had died, her eyes had been full of sweetness and grace, like a flower that closes its cup at night, she was dozing for eternity, and no suffering had shrunk her beautiful girl’s face; she had even smiled at her parents and brothers for a while, and perhaps in that subtle ray of sunshine there was something for the stranger … something for her music.
Like a processional virgin she lay on her snow-white bed, her blond shining curls along her porcelain cheeks.
She lay on display for two days. All the inhabitants of the village and all the children made the sad journey and stared at the dead Meelke for a while. They all had a word of comfort for the mother:
‘She’s in heaven, young … She’s in heaven, young …‘
But she also came; towards evening she came to her with her white robe full of love and holiness. They were respectful and withdrew a little. The son of the house, a rude fellow, who had always spoken viciously and harshly about the lady and said that she was a witch, now stood back humbly.
She kissed little Meelke. The eerie room was full of mysterious silence, the people held their breath, and the settling evening surrounded everything with greyness and vagueness. Next to the bed were two candles burning, spinning around them a trembling yellow-red light that lay so strangely on the twilight …
Then she left again, shuffling slowly in her pale robe… Her feet were not seen, she floated like the dead over the ground.
Now Meelke had been buried for three days.
The villagers had talked a lot about the girl’s death, and now there were still all kinds of whispers, for a wind had blown into the simple lives of the peasants, and it had awakened suspicion. They talked about Meelke’s dying and some mentioned that lady. But people did not dare to believe it yet; yet it was whispered from neighbour to neighbour, though in a growing voice; for had she not such a beautiful, young and sad face?
Was it possible that she was a …?
Soon people spoke of the witch, they no longer said: the lady. And what had been whispered before, was now heard loudly.
Only when evening had fallen and darkness lay over the black fields in front of their houses, those people grew a little more frightened, and then they thought of those sayings, and that – lady, and they began…
And when the lady came to the shore with pale hands, not a single child met her, and she was alone in the quiet orchard.
The leaves blew so mysteriously among themselves, and the tall grass swayed, so deserted in the evening wind …
But she continued to play, soft and sweet-floating as ever, and the tones drifted sadly with the evening breeze along the Lys, towards the village, where the shutters were closed in fear and the lamps were lit …
Aubrey Beardsley, ‘La Beale Isoud at Joyous Gard’, 1884
IV.
The children of the village did not speak about the ‘witch’, rather they spoke of her with reverence and love. The first days, when the parents had forbidden them to return to the orchard, they cried a good deal; their parents had also spoken of her with disgust as they admonished them. The gentlest of the girls, who could still feel that pale marble hand glide down their cheeks, were therefore very sad and wept every time when she was insulted.
And now, full of homesickness for the orchard, they would sit together every day at dusk under the linden trees of the church square and talk about Her … Sometimes they quietly sang the songs they had learned…
But there were also other rumours circulating in the village. Cows had died of unknown diseases, and this was associated with Meelke’s death.
People began to look with vengeance toward the deserted orchard.
The son of Meelke’s house was the firestarter, fanning the kindled flames that quickly spread and were fostered in the inns where the roughest people gathered. All kinds of plans were being made there.
One day, when the sun was already low and already of warm gold, a sombre group of men came together outside the village. The children who sat under the limes of the square and knew nothing of what was going to happen, nevertheless had a fearful premonition.
That evening they remained under the trees for a long time and sat very close together and spoke soft whispering words to each other.
No harmonium sounds came over the village … Was there not a shadow she could cast?
Then the sombre group returned, all swanky and with wild songs, and all the children scattered in terror and ran to their houses.
They were so frightened of their dark rooms and hid themselves face down under the covers, where they sobbed and cried without knowing why …
While terrible work was being done in the orchard, the evening had crept in invisibly. First it laid down to rest in the grass and stared at the setting sun, which glowed so strangely and was so fiery red. And all the trees looked with melancholy at that beautiful cruel blood sun, and it seemed as if their leaves also had deep wounds and were bleeding …..
Then the sun sank behind the fields and there lay its dirty work to rest …
A free breeze cooled across the Lys, and came to the orchard, where it began to sigh in the leaves of the trees, which rustled quietly and had whispering voices …it was like a sigh of relief…
Then the evening rose, and with his fingers, which were softer and more tender than a prayer, he first and foremost closed the flowers in the grass, then moved around a few times with his beautiful misty cloak around his shoulders, and climbed slowly up the trees over which he gently let his breath pass, which, as if in a delicate veil, hung around the leaves, bringing rest, peace and evening beauty to them. Then he went on and did his same work of love everywhere; and when the whole region was enveloped in his soft peace garment, he went to the Lys, satisfied, and slept there.
Even paler than the whiteness of her robe, now bearing dark stains of blood, She strode slowly toward the mournful lapping water. The gloomy evening had sunk around her, in a misty beauty full of sorrow and melancholy. Her hair hung loose against the garment, and was like a deep night’s darkness because of the diaphanous pallor of her face.
She peered in the direction of the village, and her suffering eyes shone with the soft glow of a great love … an infinite love of goodness and feminine tenderness …
On the Lys the poplars sang their silent, sad evening song; and the lonely one who still goes to receive the kiss of the evening in that region, hears that song … that strange beautiful evening song of the Lys.
Gerard Ceunis, untitled drawing (Cathcart collection)
The Quest for Ceunis 