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Poem translation

od richardhall, 15 kwietnia 2008

Wpisy: 5

Język: English

richardhall (Pokaż profil) 15 kwietnia 2008, 19:28:42

I've done a translation of one of my favourite poems by RS Thomas for my blog. I'd love to know if it makes sense...

Preĝoj kiel gruzo
Ĵetiĝis al la fenestro
de la ĉielo,
Esperanta allogi
l'atento de la amato.
Sed sen videblaj plektaĵoj mallevi
Per kiuj la kredanto povus grimpi,
Al kio celo malfermiĝas tio fora fenestro?
Mi min detenus
antaŭ longatempe
sed foje strabinta
tra miaj ŝlosaj fingroj
Mi pensis, ke mi vidis ekmovan kurtenon.

Miland (Pokaż profil) 15 kwietnia 2008, 20:16:28

Here's the original text:
Folk Tale

Prayers like gravel
Flung at the sky's
window, hoping to attract
the loved one's
attention. But without
visible plaits to let
down for the believer
to climb up,
to what purpose open
that far casement?
I would
have refrained long since
but that peering once
through my locked fingers
I thought that I detected
the movement of a curtain.

(R.S. Thomas)

In the light of the above, I suggest omitting Esperanta (or substituting Esperante), malfermiĝu instead of malfermiĝi, opiniis for pensis.

Anyhow, I was impressed by your translation. Good stuff!

richardhall (Pokaż profil) 15 kwietnia 2008, 21:20:31

Dankon!

trojo (Pokaż profil) 15 kwietnia 2008, 22:42:04

I'll give it a shot and make some comments also.

Of course there are many ways to translate any given text, and I'm not saying my opinion is necessarily any better than anyone else's.

Preĝoj, kvazaŭ ŝtonetoj
ĵetataj al la fenestro
de la ĉielo
por espere allogi
la atenton de la amato.


It's a sentence fragment, but the original is too, so that's ok. Also, I prefer "kvazaŭ ŝtonetoj" over "kiel gruzo" here... seems to make a bit more sense to me, but "kiel gruzo" is probably fine too.

Note that "atenton" needs to be accusative.

I put a "por" in there because unlike in English where an infinitive by itself implicitly carries the meaning "in order to", in Esperanto you usually have to use "por".

Sed sen videblaj harplektaĵoj malleveblaj,
per kiuj la kredanto grimpus,
kial oni malfermus
tiun foran fenestron?


"Harplektaĵoj": the oblique Rapunsel reference may not be obvious so a slight clarification was appropriate here, I feel.

"To what purpose" is just a fancy way of saying "why".

"Oni" is in there because it's implied in the original, but in Esperanto it's not very common to see a finite verb with a direct object but no subject.

And of course that far window is accusative.

Mi min detenus
antaŭ longe,
sed foje, rigardante
tra miaj interplektitaj fingroj,
mi pensis, ke mi ekvidis
la moviĝon de kurteno.


"Interplektitaj": this seems to be the usual word to describe hands folded for prayer. Also it kinda ties back in with the earlier use of "plektajxoj" which is kind of neat, even though the original didn't do this.

richardhall (Pokaż profil) 16 kwietnia 2008, 08:59:56

Those comments are really helpful Trojo -- thanks.

I suppose that any translation is going to be an interpretation, and that must be all the more true for poetry. For example, I liked Thomas' image of "peering through locked fingers", but the parallelism you suggest between 'harplektaĵoj' and 'interplektitaj fingroj' is an attractive one.

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