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Dugong

Item date(s): c 1973-1974

Walter Whall Battiss (1906-1982)

Size: 64 x 45 cm
Technique: Pen & ink on card
Inscription: Signed with the initials

Category: Found
Type: Drawing

ART 1099

Additional notes:
A single card folded inwards on the left and right with a green pencil stripe (from upper left to lower right) on the verso and text on the recto: Blank left section, Fook script in black ink on the central portion and a pencil translation of the poem on the right section.

Illustrated on p120 of "Walter Battiss" edited by Karin Skawran & Michael Macnamara, published by Ad Donker, 1985.

Illustrated, without a translation, on p15 of Izwe 16, 1974.

See proof-reading with the item showing mistakes by Battiss (some of which have been cancelled with a X by Battiss and others which he missed).

DUGONG

The old Dugong died last night

Her children are playing on other beaches.

I knew her well

and eased her dying.

She made a great noise like a dragon

when the mood took her

Sometimes she just muttered in the water

I could never make out whether she ever wanted to be human

being genetically flawed

She will now be taken to the deep

fathoms beyond the coral reef

and in the everlasting darkness

of us all

go home.

W. B.

Illustrated in "Printing the Seventies: Battiss, Burwitz, Skotnes and More. The Stephen Gray Collection"

Illustration on page 15 of Izwi 16 shows a reduced reproduction of Dugong which is this item.

Referenced on p48 of ADA #6: Article: Casper Schmidt by Tys Botha. "The third publication is still in the project stage, it is to be a portfolio on Walter Battiss' poem 'Dugong'. The poem, as yet not published in its translated form, was written in Battiss' legendary Fook Island Script. Schmidt intends the portfolio to consist of the original poem, its direct translation, plus a final version of the poem followed by an essay on Fook script in the context of censorship, written by Schmidt himself."

Ref: GB/50028