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seven The Future of O? Stay wisely in between Keep near the standard bearer. The first ones always die The last ones are also hit Those in the centre come home. —Bertolt Brecht, The Caucasian Chalk Circle In the ubiquity of the O, how does one move forward (again)? This is the question that repeats itself upon the horizon of our present world. For if, as I have been contending, the O, in its elliptical trajectory through the twentieth century, a trajectory that is, as we have now seen, a circuit, has reached a certain meridian point, a zenith that is, we have argued, also a nadir, how does one (or even One) find the bearings to proceed along the axis that our contemporary situation has determined for us? If O is now everywhere, not just in the religious and philosophical spheres that once gave rise to the supremacy of One, but throughout the universe that is our cultural imagination, so that its coming to light has obscured its own positioning, and we can only speak of a prevailing that is everywhere and nowhere at once, how do we move forward? To approach this question, with a view to any kind of answer, if any there be, let us return to a play, and even, again, a play within a play, and now, also, a play within a play within a play (the continuing mise‑en‑abîme of the mise‑en‑scène of this book). A play about sovereignty, to be sure, and a playing about sovereignty—who has the right to play at sovereignty, to play with sovereignty?—but also a quite different kind of play and playing than we have thus far seen. Here we turn to Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and in particular the English version for which Auden wrote 253 254 AUDEN’S O the verse translations. Why this play? We ask this in two directions: Why did Auden choose this play, and why do we choose it now? And we can answer: it is not simply Auden’s association that makes our choice relevant; but it is also precisely Auden’s association, in his appropriation of the nega‑ tive centrality that is the O, which of course has never been his O per se, that opens up to us the force of that relevance. Auden’s Brecht There is certainly an early political affinity with Auden and Brecht, as Frederick Buell has long since pointed out: both, as part of an interwar generation, were seeking an “artistic voice for a left‑wing polemic,” and felt literature can be, and should be, socially and politically engaged.1 Yet we know that by the time both found themselves in America, Auden had long since abandoned this vision, even if he continued to admire Brecht’s work. The “prolific” as artist and the “devourer” as politician, he had writ‑ ten, must be considered, in any practical sense, “enemies.”2 So was Auden, in fact, drawn to Brecht and this play? The biographies paint differing pictures. Auden worked on several translations of Brecht, even with Brecht himself during the latter’s exile in America, though he regarded the German writer, in the end, “a most unpleasant man.”3 His work on The Caucasian Chalk Circle was in tandem with James and Tania Stern, his close friends in New York; Auden translated the song lyrics. Was this just a personal favor, then, or professional maneuvering, or, as one biographer suggests, unimportant “interludes”?4 Or was there something about the play that drew Auden in, even despite his unease with the author’s manner? Let us bear in mind that Auden was invited by Brecht, who had only just finished drafting the play in German, to translate the songs in August 1944, just as Auden was finishing up his own The Sea and the Mirror. The origins of both works, then, are contemporaneous, as was Auden’s eventual involvement. Did Auden thus feel a direct correlation between his “com‑ mentary” on Shakespeare and his “translation” of Brecht? Or was it the fact that Brecht’s play stood as yet “unfinished,” perhaps even in constant need of transformation? This was not because the play‑ wright lacked finish—Auden never questioned Brecht’s immense talent. But the nature of the play’s own genesis, and hence its title, seemed to demand a continual reworking of itself in manifold forms, much like the O Auden had envisioned in Shakespeare...

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