Both 'nanny' and 'billy' goats chew away in English, Erminia.
I'll post the Montale poem later on - it's not on disk so I've got to type
it up. I'll certainly look round for an English translation of 'A mia
moglie' too.
Best
Dave
David Bircumshaw
Leicester, England
Home Page
A Chide's Alphabet
Painting Without Numbers
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/index.htm
----- Original Message -----
From: "Erminia Passannanti" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, February 23, 2002 9:26 AM
Subject: Re: Saba's female animals
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002 23:04:42 -0000, david.bircumshaw
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>Erminia
>
>but, as far as this goes, I was very taken by the distinction you drew
>between Montale's and Saba's visions of the feminine, so sensitively
right I
>thought, and I liked the way you drew out the un-metaphysically-adorned
>humanitas of Saba.
Isn't called 'goat' in England the 'nanny', who breast-feeds the new born
child in the place of his mother?
The goat is a particularly beautiful creature, you are right.
Well, please, so send your other poem after Montale. I will read it with
pleasure.(I was born in fact in a small town up the mountains where both
my parents were teachers - we stayed there until I was 3 and half years
old, before going to Salerno, a sea-town. But I still remember vividly the
strong impression in seeing those peasants walking by our terrace holding
a donkey or a goat by a rope: the goat with breast heavy with milk, a mild
being glancing peacefully around and living behind a trace of smelly black
little balls of excrement, the body covered with gold-blond fur.
Well, it is sad that in popular idioms there are always offensive
expressions relating human stupidity or stubbornness to the goat.
In fact, I do not know if you heard of the news that the hen's
intelligence was recently proved scientifically. Apparently, they have the
ability to move in relation to geometrical spacesa nd understand its
logic, a thing that the pigeons are incapable of doing (they say).
But please, try to find a translation in English of 'A mia moglie', by
Saba: it is the most tender and powerful poem beyond the silly ' amor
cortese' conventions seeing us as medium for spiritual salvation and so
on, which is all together a very male dominating attitude towards the
opposite sex.
Erminia
>As for goats, I had a sudden vision of la capra as a Jewish mother, a
>wonderful thought, male they usually are thought of, unlike their near
>biological cognates, sheep. In Chinese astrology I'm a Sheep-Goat, which
>might be part of my interest.
>
>I once did one other 'after' of an Italian poem - a Montale in this case -
>but much more removed from the original than the Saba. Should I post it?
>
>Best
>
>Dave
>
>
>David Bircumshaw
>
>Leicester, England
>
>Home Page
>
>A Chide's Alphabet
>
>Painting Without Numbers
>
>http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/index.htm
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Erminia Passannanti" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2002 11:16 PM
>Subject: Re: Saba's female animals
>
>
>Saba in 'To my wife', (Il Canzoniere) compares his wife (moglie) to
>various animals of feminine sex: hen, heifer, bitch, rabbit, swallow, ant,
>and finally to a bee .
>
>(final stanza that I am translating for you because I have not found on
>the Internet any translation of this poem)
>
>
> 'And therefore in the bee
>I recognize you, and in all
> the females of the serene animals
>that stand next to God; and in
>no other woman.... '
>
>
>Please, so note how in this closing stanza
>Saba's tone evokes Saint Francis 'Cantico delle Creature'.
>
>His wife as one of the many females natural creatures - the bee, the
>bitch, the hen - does not have a 'salvific' connotation nor function,
>unlike in Montale' s poetics, but she is the tender and sure companion to
>console and be consoled by from the anguish of living.
>
>Through the similes with the animals Saba exalted the females' vitality' ,
>intelligence, and also strength of natural instincts.
>
>On the contraruy, the oneness of one's wife among all the human females
>alludes to the oneness of the mother. In the poem 'A mia moglie', Saba
>treats also the topics of " lamentation " and " suffering " (in the birth
>giving labors, for instance) that joins together the first four animals
>as a meaningful continuity between the figure of the wife and that of
>one's mother.
>
>One major reflection: I was shocked when I first started teaching in an
>English mixed comprehensive, to find out that when a boy wants to offend a
>girl, he calls her 'bitch'. In Saba's meaning, it is the most beautiful
>comparison one could make between the woman and a really caring and
>intelligent and giving a female of all the existing species.
>
>The same, then, is to be read in 'The goat',
>"In una capra dal viso semita
>sentiva querelarsi ogni altro male,
>ogni altra vita." (La capra)
>
>'A goat with a Jewish face,
>reciting the toneless torah
>of all other ills, all other
>lives' laments.'(Translated by Dave)
>
>'In a Semite featured goat
>I heard questioned every other pain
>every other life.'
>
>(translated by Erminia)
>------------------------------------
>
>Erminia
|