It was pointed out to me that the name 'Martha' has connotations to do with domesticity and running a home - not really suitable for a camera begging to be taken into the wilds.
A camera has nothing to do with household management. A camera is something else - an extension of the photographer's creative mind, a device to make an imagined composition real. In other words, an essential partner in the process of capturing a scene, or a subject, to perfection. Which is what Leica (as a brand, and as a force in photography) stands for.
A photographer is nothing without a camera to use, whatever its form. And not unnaturally, the better the match or meld between camera and photographer, the closer the symbiosis.
It's entirely possible to care deeply about a camera that works properly, and does things well, and shares one's adventures. Just as you would care about a car, or a bike, or a boat, or anything else that supported the creative or adventurous side of one's life. And just like that regard for the said car, bike or boat, a camera can make a claim on your emotions. So much so, that - as with anything cherished - you totally forgive whatever quirks and idiosyncrasies it may have.
A camera can certainly play the part of an old and trusted friend. So bestowing the right name is important. It matters.
In my last post, I mentioned the 'secret names' that my possessions undoubtedly have. In my new camera's case, she had a German name, which I conjectured might be Isolde, Gertrud or Birgitta. Others could be added, such as Elke, Erika, Ursula and Uta, the last two perhaps referencing the 'U' in 'X-U'. None of these felt quite right, but nevertheless I certainly thought that a German name must be best. After all, one of the big facts about my new camera was that she was made in Germany!
So which name now?
I was beginning to incline after all towards Isolde or Gertrud. They seemed as German as Leica itself. But an exchange of texts with a friend prompted me to think of Lili, as in the song Lili Marlen (or Marlene) - 'the Girl under the Lantern' - a forces' favourite on both sides in World War II, but especially popular with the German Afrika Korps, against whom Dad, in the British Eighth Army, was pitted.
The nice thing about this song was that the leading Nazis disapproved of it, probably because it told the story of a soldier's tender love for a pretty girl, and consequently wasn't 'martial' enough. A song that might sap a soldier's resolve to face death for the Fatherland, and in any case harked back to happier, freer, pre-Nazi days. One in the eye for Joseph Goebbels, then, who fumed at its immense popularity. But he had to relent. On the Allied side, the song's sentimentality and evocation of normal, very human, concerns appealed just as much. War-weary soldiers tend to share the same wistful notions.
So Lili it is.
Lili the Leica.
Lili and Lucy: sounds like a great team.
