Notes
Title: The logo for the Victor Talking Machine Company and (later) RCA Victor featured a white dog listening to a gramophone, based on an 1899 painting by Francis Barraud. Read the history of the logo here.
Dedication: Elizabeth Bishop, American poet (1911-1979) and friend of Merrill. Read a brief biography of Bishop from Addison Wesley Longman's literature site, visit the Elizabeth Bishop web site at Vassar, and take a look at a small selection of her poems.
1. Bix: Bix Biederbecke, jazz musician (1903-1931). Buxtehude: Dietrich Buxtehude, Baroque composer (1637-1707). Boulez: Pierre Boulez, composer and conductor (1925-).
6. earnestly to Bloch: Ernest Bloch, composer (1880-1959).
7. builds a church upon our acid rock: "And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18). Acid rock: "a style of rock music of the late 1960s having a prominent repetitive beat and lyrics that suggest psychedelic experiences" (American Heritage Dictionary). Read more at artistdirect.com.
8. Leiermann: "Der Leiermann" ("The Organ-Grinder" or "The Hurdy-Gurdy Man"), the final song in Franz Schubert's Winterreise cycle.
11-12. Ravel's "Les jets d'eau du palais de ceux que s'aiment": Maurice Ravel, composer (1875-1937). Translation: "the fountains of the palace of those who love each other."
13. Schumann: Robert Schumann, early Romantic composer (1810-1856).
15. Bach's eternal boxwood mazes: The J. S. Bach Home Page has abundant information on the life and works of Johann Sebastian Bach. Cf. also Merrill's poem "Trees Listening to Bach" (Selected Poems, 329-330). For an example of what a boxwood maze looks like, you can view an image of the one at the Haarlem Frans Hals Museum. Additionally, the University of Brighton's School of Design has a fascinating page on mazes in general (and garden mazes in particular).
17. calypso: "A West Indian ballad or song in African rhythm, usually improvised to comment on a topic of current interest" (Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed.). Learn more about calypso, including the etymology of the word, at starapple.com.
18. Wozzeck: 1925 opera by Alban Berg, based on the play Woyzeck by Georg Buchner.
23-24. Blanche . . . King Lear: See Shakespeare's King Lear, III.vi: "The little dogs and all, / Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me." Read the scene online courtesy of Dmax.com's Complete Works of Shakespeare or view a facsimile of the scene as it appears in the First Folio. (Caution: very large image.)
25. Jezebel: in 1 and 2 Kings, the pagan wife of Ahab, king of Israel; she was thrown from a window and her body was devoured by dogs (see 2 Kings 9:30-37). Read a summary of the story from Easton's Bible Dictionary, or read the chapter in the version of your choice.
30. His master's voice: Title of Francis Barraud's painting of Nipper, the Victor dog (see above). A large image of the painting may be seen here.
33-34. Handel . . . Il Cane Minore: Georg Friedrich Handel (1685-1759) composed over forty operas. "Il Cane Minore" ("The Smaller Dog"), however, is a fictional title.