Hi Joanna
I must get off this computer!
But before I do: this from a small bit on pantuns in the Penguin Book of
Oral Poetry.
"The most famous Malay form is the pantun, the brief quatrain so often
devoted to the theme of love. Its apparent simplicity involves a four-line
verse, in which the first line rhymes with the third, the second with the
fourth. ... There is a close and carefully constructed connection in
imagery and sound association between the two balanced halves of the
quatrain. As one of the leading translators puts it, 'the first line of the
quatrain does not simply "rhyme" with the third; the sound of the whole of
the first line must suggest the sound of the whole of the third. ...
The sound-suggestion involved is indicated in the following rendering of a
Malay pantun:
The fate of a dove is to fly
It flies to its nest on the knoll
The gate of true love is the eye
The prize of its quest is the soul
There's more, about the metaphorical connections between the two couplets,
which are apparently also very difficult to render across languages.
Clearly practically impossible to translate to form in English, and
practically impossible to write.
Best
A
PS Unless - of course - pantoums are different from pantuns??? I've been
assuming they're differing renderings of the same words.
Alison Croggon
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
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