Read at the first public by
Dada soiree, Zurich, July 14, 1916.
Dada is a new tendency in
art. One can tell this from the fact that until now nobody knew anything about
it, and tomorrow everyone in Zurich will be talking about it. Dada comes from
the dictionary. It is terribly simple. In French it means "hobby horse".
In German it means "good-bye", "Get off my back", "Be
seeing you sometime". In Romanian: "Yes, indeed, you are right,
that's it. But of course, yes, definitely, right". And so forth.
An International word.
Just a word, and the word a movement. Very easy to understand. Quite terribly
simple. To make of it an artistic tendency must mean that one is anticipating
complications. Dada psychology, dada Germany cum indigestion and fog paroxysm,
dada literature, dada bourgeoisie, and yourselves, honoured poets, who are
always writing with words but never writing the word itself, who are always
writing around the actual point. Dada world war without end, dada revolution
without beginning, dada, you friends and also-poets, esteemed sirs,
manufacturers, and evangelists. Dada Tzara, dada Huelsenbeck, dada m'dada, dada
m'dada dada mhm, dada dera dada, dada Hue, dada Tza.
How does one achieve
eternal bliss? By saying dada. How does one become famous? By saying dada. With
a noble gesture and delicate propriety. Till one goes crazy. Till one loses
consciousness. How can one get rid of everything that smacks of journalism,
worms, everything nice and right, blinkered, moralistic, europeanised,
enervated? By saying dada. Dada is the world soul, dada is the pawnshop. Dada
is the world's best lily-milk soap. Dada Mr Rubiner, dada Mr Korrodi. Dada Mr
Anastasius Lilienstein. In plain language: the hospitality of the Swiss is
something to be profoundly appreciated. And in questions of aesthetics the key
is quality.
I shall be reading poems
that are meant to dispense with conventional language, no less, and to have
done with it. Dada Johann Fuchsgang Goethe. Dada Stendhal. Dada Dalai Lama,
Buddha, Bible, and Nietzsche. Dada m'dada. Dada mhm dada da. It's a question of
connections, and of loosening them up a bit to start with. I don't want words
that other people have invented. All the words are other people's inventions. I
want my own stuff, my own rhythm, and vowels and consonants too, matching the
rhythm and all my own. If this pulsation is seven yards long, I want words for
it that are seven yards long. Mr Schulz's words are only two and a half
centimetres long.
It will serve to show how
articulated language comes into being. I let the vowels fool around. I let the
vowels quite simply occur, as a cat meows . . . Words emerge, shoulders of
words, legs, arms, hands of words. Au, oi, uh. One shouldn't let too many words
out. A line of poetry is a chance to get rid of all the filth that clings to
this accursed language, as if put there by stockbrokers' hands, hands worn
smooth by coins. I want the word where it ends and begins. Dada is the heart of
words.
Each thing has its word,
but the word has become a thing by itself. Why shouldn't I find it? Why can't a
tree be called Pluplusch, and Pluplubasch when it has been raining? The word,
the word, the word outside your domain, your stuffiness, this laughable
impotence, your stupendous smugness, outside all the parrotry of your
self-evident limitedness. The word, gentlemen, is a public concern of the first
importance.
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