htf translation
Reflections Concerning the Translation of Poetry Thinking about
various modes of translating poetry it occurs to me that a
translation that respects the rules of grammar must [inevitably]
be a false translation of the original [the matter of
originality will be discussed below] because a poem -- a true
poem -- is a poem [the repetitiousness is deliberate here] that
reflects on poetry as all true poems do while pretending to say
something important about life, love, nature, mankind, death,
religion, reality or whatever it pretends to be saying -- a true
poem -- regardless of whether it is ancient, classical,
romantic, symbolic, modern, contemporary, postmodern or whatever
it is or has been made to be -- a true poem cannot, must not,
will not respect the rules of grammar --
grammar is the police of poetry grammar is the IRS of poetry
grammar is the CIA of poetry grammar is the Gestapo of poetry
grammar is worse than a concentration camp grammar dictates and
to dictate is to be dictatorial grammar is the Hitler of poetry
grammar exterminates true poetry grammar forces the one who
translates into submission to the rules of grammar grammar
destroys true poetry the day grammar was invented poetry was
enslaved only those poets who revolted against this enslavement
wrote true poems -- [the readers of these reflections concerning
the translation of poetry can make their own list of poets who
have revolted -- mine is already made] and so to render the
grammarlessness [thank you sam] of a true poem one must not --
one cannot be faithful to the original because faithfulness
would by necessity [and by obligation] introduce grammar into
the new version in whatever language it has been translated --
but there lies the ambiguity, the inescapable ambiguity and the
paradox of translating a true poem because a translated poem
that rejects the rules of grammar can only be a falsification of
the original poem -- it has to be a false translation just as a
translation that respects the rules of grammar is a false
translation --
only the original can be a true poem but since poems always
borrow or steal from other poems then the act of poetry is
always an act of plagiarization and as such a true poem is in
fact a false poem --
this is why the act of translating poetry is a futile act just
as the act of writing poetry is a futile act since one can never
write a true poem -- only the first poem was true but it quickly
got lost, erased, forgotten into subsequent poems --
and so to write poetry is to lose ground [I stole this from my
Roumanian friend Emile Cioran] --
[when Cioran told me that I replied] then why kill oneself to
write poetry since one always kills oneself too late -- why
write to say exactly what one wanted to say in the first place
or what others have tried to say in vain --
[those who disagree with the above reflections can reflect on
the subject by themselves -- I merely wanted to share these
reflections with those who may not have reflected on the
question of translating poetry -- or cannot do so] -- these
reflections apply also to the translation of fiction -- I thank
you for your attention]
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