-------Original Message-------
From: Anny Ballardini <[log in to unmask]>
<<While for me it works the other way round, I like
the -impersonal distance- English takes from things. Well more than
impersonal distance, I would rather say, that an object is an object, and
as such it has to be "said", which under a distinct aspect qualifies the
human being. This relationship with gendered objects is anyhow (as you perfectly
say) impassioned, and in it I can also see some hypocrisy (I am
exaggerating but there is some); erotic, well yes, if you want to see it that way, but
anyhow distant, distant.>>
Hi Anny,
Thanks for your post. Yes, I think this is true, that English,
as the Germanic language
it is, has that quality of "thingness," that the "object is an
object," a res of materiality, that is distinct from human
qualities. Which is perhaps why English excels in technical
and scientific terminology, terms of exactitude of the thingness
of something, which originate in that impersonal distance that
can lend itself to exactitudes of differentiation and definition.
Still, I'm not sure what you mean by the 'hypocrisy' of gendered
nouns which exist in the other languages that you note, as well
as others. Is it some 'hypocrisy' in the language itself that makes
one thing feminine and another masculine, or as in Italian,
neutral? Or in the terms of this particular translation and
my viewing the poem as impassioned and erotic?
As I understand hypocrisy it means basically to advocate
or stand for one thing while actually practicing another, and
even though you note you are perhaps somewhat exagerrating,
I'm not sure how that pertains to this issue of language or
translating this particular work. So perhaps you could
unravel your sense of this? since I'm not clear what you mean.
>>But I am with you when you use this particular example about the
fountain-feminine and the choice given to the translator if s/he should
respect this -she- which gives the right interpretation to the poem (I can
remember for example some poems in which it is not made expicit but the
planets are perceived in between objects and/or deities, where the reader
can choose as s/he wishes). Yes, I think that as a translator you are
allowed to prefer the he or she pronoun, but, for the reader you should
add a note to explain your choice.
Well, my thoughts here were motivated by this particular example.
I don't as a general practice translate the gender of the thing
except as into the customary "it." But in this particular poem,
it is not so much that the "object is being said" as it is
being addressed as if it were a living being to which the
poet is speaking as a lover would, expressing many of the
feelings that a lover would, the seeing of the beloved
in everything, as the origins of everything, that sense
of knowing where the beloved sleeps or is or dwells in
some deep interior sense. Which is all why I said that it seems
erotic. It is basically a love poem to God, in which the
fountain or spring is that "living water" of which Christ
spoke somewhere, that he gave "living water" which was
inexhaustible and which would be the end of thirst. So the
the fountain or spring is not really a thing, an object,
but a living being. And so since English as you said
does have that sense of the thing, the object, perhaps
it becomes more problematic in translating this particular
poem, where what's addressed is not a distant, distant
thing or object separate from human qualities, not
a fountain in a square or a spring in a mountain.
Take care,
Rebecca
Rebecca Seiferle
www.thedrunkenboat.com
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