 by Dr. Jeffrey Lant. Author's program note. I was eighteen or so when I became aware of Jacques Brel.... and, quite simply, I adored him and the language he wielded with exquisite sensitivity and dangerous power. Then, years later, I saw him on video, face drenched in sweat, the ears two sizes too large, imperfect teeth painted by cigarettes, lips sensual, ready to tell inconvenient truths and break hearts even when he didn't mean to, the unrepressed, perilous sensuality that made love far too potent and alluring... The honesty! The integrity! The terrible pain we all come to know...wrenching, haunting remembrance in every word... ... and I was glad he was alive and well and living in Paris. It was the one city on Earth where this man of consummate mastery and precise renderings should be. But Brel was not Parisian, not even French; nor was French his first language. Dutch was, for he was Fleming. You see, he was from the artificial kingdom of Belgium, a made-up country Europe's chess-playing statesmen cobbled together in 1830, the better to keep its crucial strategic position out of the hands of any stronger continental nation with designs on England and England's wealth. What war-weary post-Napoleonic Europe wanted there was a nation of neutralists, lucky people shielded from mayhem, turmoil and havoc of any kind, except the unceasing mayhem, turmoil and havoc they were so adept at bringing on themselves; thus proving that bellicose humans are incapable of knowing a good thing when they see it, much less protecting it; requiring instead the benefits derived from mutually demonizing, destroying, and demolishing each other to be happy. However on this basis the Belgians must be ecstatic for they have grasped the essence of what it takes to torment each other, though in approved and time-honored fashion they would die rather than admit this fact, much less admit you to their high mysteries and sacred rites of strife and bitter contention.. Enter the Coburgs, the stud-farm of Europe. Imagine if you can a favored kingdom where the dynasty had one and only one product to offer, one and only one duty to perform, to conceive and breed princes renowned for the beauty of their manly features, the graceful proportions of their well-turned limbs, their unmatched ability to make females of better pedigree and far greater fortune gaze, desire, and submit. This is the concise definition of the mission of the princes of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, whose descendants in time came to rule the world simply by being breathtaking with perfect manners and the promise of unexampled marital bliss and concupiscence. And I ask you: what is the point of being even the greatest of queens, the richest of princesses, ruler of the fairest of provinces, if you cannot have this? Thus did the stunning princes of once impecunious, insignificant and contemptible Coburg thrive, their every feature discretely discussed behind fluttering fans, with breathless interest and complete attention, for the stakes were universal and enormous; the need for such princely paragons acute and absolutely necessary to maintain the intricate system with all its privileges and perquisites that was monarchical Europe. In 1830, the aristocratic Solons of Europe adamantly concurred that such a prince was urgently required for the ancient provinces of Brabant and Flanders, to be massaged into a newly minted kingdom called Belgium, after a local tribe conquered by Julius Caesar and written up in resonant prose once known by every school boy. "Je frai un domaine." (I will give you a kingdom.) Needless to say all those concerned did not always agree; His Majesty of the Netherlands, for example, demurred when statesmen needing a chunk of his royal patrimony to secure the desired result asked him to cooperate with their schemes. He refused. Went to war. And lost. Thus was royal Belgium born by robbing royal Holland. And so beautiful Coburg Prince Leopold, once married to besotted Charlotte hoyden Princess of Wales, heiress of England, who died in childbirth (1817), become a king; the first of seven of his line to do so, the latest just the other day, July 21, 2013. His mission was to keep his kingdom out of war and his subjects, wealthy Protestant Dutch-speaking Flemings, less well off Roman Catholic French-speaking Francophones (called Walloons), enemies for centuries, from exasperating, irritating, and even killing each other. Moi fois, it was no easy task in 1830. It is no easy task today. In a nutshell. Now imagine this situation, a country of just 11,760 square miles, the size of South Carolina, populated today by 10.5 million people; 6 million Flemings, 4.5 million Walloons. (By comparison South Carolina has just 4.7 million inhabitants); the two factious factions different in religion, language, mores, and in how the economic pie was unevenly divided. Thus you have the problem that is and has always been Belgium, since the moment of its inception. This acute division is the fundamental reason why the prince of pulchritude, Leopold I, was offered the rickety throne, his orders unmistakable: "Keep the peace. Quell your restive peoples. Make your tumultuous kingdom work." This man, in turn, reviewed his options, which included the throne of Greece. He decided on Belgium. It was the right decision... for himself, for his royal house, for Belgium... and for Jacques Brel, born into a Flemish family in 1929, his first language Dutch; thereafter master of la belle langue, the toast of Paris, then the great goodwill ambassador from his sharply divided nation to the world; his a message of empathy, humanity, and always of love. It is now time for you to hear this master of songs, this man of protean talents. Go then to any search engine and start with his lyric plea recorded in 1959, "Ne me quitte pas." Listen first to renditions by Nina Simone, Sting, Melina Mercuri. Then listen to Brel himself, and perhaps for the first time, you will know the power of love and why it moves us so, despite its often squalid, distressing, humbling and profoundly unsettling aspects, confounding, perplexing, unnerving, demeaning, disturbing, but always glorious, which no one has ever rendered quite as well as Brel, dead young, just 49, in 1978; his mission over of transforming vulnerability into empathy, pain into redemption, diversity into strength, and the whole into the searing reality that is art. "Forget the times/ of the misunderstandings/ the lost times." Brel may be gone, but the essence of Brel remains in his lyrics, his music, in his great vision and sensitivity... as such he is a great Belgian, not merely a great musician. This is precisely what his still too unhappily yoked countrymen need and must have as was so amply demonstrated as the new king, Philippe I, son of the abdicating sovereign Albert II (reigned 1993-2013), swore allegiance to the nation and its 183 year old constitution. The ceremony was brief, moving, solemn... and rudely marred by the boycott of the Flemish Interest Party, while the N-VA New Flemish Alliance sent only a token delegation. What made this churlish behavior of any note is the fact that the N-VA New Flemish Alliance is now the main opposition group and seeks Flemish independence through democratic transition. Its platform is short, sweet and entirely negative; that the sovereign, the living symbol of Belgium and its strictly constitutional dynasty and parliamentary government, be stripped of any role in coalition negotiations to form a new government, removed as head of the armed forces and not sign any laws. In other words, it's monarchical emasculation, eradication and the death of a thousand cuts, the king and his unified nation to die together, so the self-serving, sanctimonious and supercilious Flemings may flourish. "Il faut oublier." Fortunately his (very new) majesty has a renowned weapon at the ready... Jacques Brel, that great Belgian and loyal subject to his sovereign. Brel's plea from beyond the grave is poignant, telling and to any sensible soul persuasive. But such souls are not always available in Belgium and particularly in the N-VA New Flemish Alliance. But Brel, who never hesitated to lay his soul bare in life, the better to touch hearts will not hesitate now. His case is short, sweet, and entirely positive. "Oublier le temps/ Des malendendus/ et le temps perdu" (Forget the times/ of the misunderstandings/ the lost time.) Forgive! Forget! And love... for there must be love between the warring elements, love or unending civil strife. No one knew this better than Brel, which is patently apparent in his most celebrated song... "Quand on n'a que l'amour" (If we only have love), recorded in 1956. "If we only have love/ Then tomorrow will dawn." Thus begins the necessary process of reconciliation, necessary to save Belgium; necessary to save the world. Long live Philippe I the king of Flemings, the king of Walloons, the king of all the Belgians, ...and Jacques Brel who reminds us what is really important... love. |
