Ruth Weiss: The Beat Goddess Using Association
Ruth weiss was a Beat poet, performer, playwright and artist. She was born into a Jewish family in Berlin, 1928, though leaving with her family in 1933 to Vienna to escape the religious genocide of Jews in Nazi Germany. From there, weiss and her family boarded the last train leaving the Austrian border to Holland and boarding a ship to the United States. Her immediate family was able to escape the persecution, but her relatives perished in the concentration camps.
Weiss includes her memories and emotions of her past within her poetry to have as a reminder and to validate the things that have happened to her. She uses association within her poem about escaping from Nazi Germany, “Single Out,” to convey her past knowledge and create spontaneous rhythmic lines.
“one woman slips in the mud…
shots singing above our heads
not really meant to hit us (the swiss sharpshooters) —
the warning real enough —
go back we can’t take anymore.
we couldn't either” (Weiss 251).
Weiss avoids capitalizing any nouns in her poem, as she does in her name, as a rebellion against Germanic linguistics, in which the majority of nouns are capitalized. She also uses association by including that “sharpshooters” were warning them to turn around by firing over their heads. This indicates that they had no intention of harming anyone.
She uses the object (The shots that were fired) and her memory of knowing that they had no other choice but to avoid the warnings and keep going forward. Weiss also associates these memories by not capitalizing and using spontaneous forms.
“a young man with unslept eyes was sipping coffee
where are you headed?
vienna.
The man nodded, kissed the woman and left.
her hands put money and tickets in ours
she directed us to the station-” (Weiss 252).
This interaction with the young man and his wife is crucial to the poem, showing that even in times of cruelty and genocide, there was still kindness in some people willing to help them escape. The tickets and money represent freedom.
Weiss uses association in these lines by breaking traditional constraints of literature. She does not capitalize nouns, does not use quotation marks when a person speaks, and does not use full sentences, just ideas and fast rhythm. Thus in the following lines :
“at the station an official gleaming a huge swastika near us.
what now?
then we saw his face.
it was the young man who hadn’t slept” (Weiss 252).
At the station, as they prepared to escape, she saw the young man at the house who was kind enough to have them stay the night. He works for the Nazis. Including these images shows that things might not be what they appear to be: some people are forced to do horrible things, in spite of their desire to do the right thing.
Weiss uses short sentences and fast rhythm to sustain emotions that she was feeling at that moment, while using certain images and objects to connect them. By using association, Ruth Weiss is able to evoke her past and convey different thoughts and emotions.
weiss, ruth. “Single Out.” Women of the Beat Generation. Edited by Brenda Knight, Conari Press, 1996, pp. 241-255.
