1) of course, poetry is untranslatable. and that's exactly why we
have to translate it.
2) anything put into language is already a translation, language is
already a translation, so there is no pre-translation, no original
untranslated text. and if all is always-already translation, why worry?
3) belief is useless when translating or writing.
Pierre
On May 8, 2006, at 3:45 PM, MJ Walker wrote:
> I'm curious, Stephen - how do they translate the "found" bits where
> the poetic effect depends on your understanding French words in a
> different context, like place-names? If you translate Vierge in a
> place-name, fr'instance, it comes out unFrench as Virgin (oh, that
> railway company), if you don't, you don't understand why it chimes
> with Marie, etc etc.(That's in a poem called something something
> *naturel*, in my sagging memory) There's a lot of that Oulipian
> sort of thing going on in that book. (OUvroir de LIttérature
> POtentielle). I no longer believe in poetry translation -
> imitation, yes (Nachdichtung), crib, yes, but not traduttore=
> traditore. But even novels come out of the machine bleached or
> discoloured, and they're something else again ("He's something,
> Else", as Frieda von Richthofen said to her sister.)
> mjay
>
> Stephen Vincent wrote:
>
>> By the way, speaking of Ouilipo, particularly for its wonderfully
>> diverse
>> and exhaustive embrace of Paris, I suggest folks keep their eyes
>> for Jacques
>> Roubaud's "The Form of a city changes faster, alas, than the human
>> heart."
>> It's coming out from Dalkey Archive Press in July and is
>> translated by Keith
>> and Rosemarie Waldrop. I got an advance review copy and I can't
>> put it
>> down, well, I did for this!
>>
>> Stephen
>> http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
>> Currently home of the "Tenderly" series,
>> A serial work in progress.
>>
>>
>
>
> --
>
> The self that shines in the greying sunshine
> of the immediate is actual, though it is
> not all that is there. - Douglas Oliver
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