Epiphany (Volume 10, Issue II)

TRINITY

JOURNAL OF

LITERARY

TRANSLATION

VOLUME 10, ISSUE II

И, взгляд подняв свой к небесам, ты вдруг почувствуешь, что сам — чистосердечный дар.

«1 января 1965 года» Иосиф Бродский

Volume 10, Issue II: Epiphany And should I then presume?

And how should I begin?

An ellipsis followed by an epiphany. If you should be so lucky.

With the theme of ‘epiphany,’ we invited expressions and translations of awakenings, crystallisations, discoveries, realisations, revelations and reveals. In receiving them, we hoped for a glimpse into the truth of things– for new perceptions and conceptions of the world around us. Such a request was met with a wealth of interpretations far outweighing our great hopes and expectations.

The word epiphany arrives to us from the ancient Greek ἐπῐφᾰ́νειᾰ (epipháneia), meaning a manifestation or appearance of a divine being. These manifestations were often invoked in moments of great strife or suffering, such as during wartime.

‘Epiphany’ also calls to mind the journey of the three Magi, culminating in the first manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles. In the western Christian tradition, this event is celebrated on the 6th January, with the feast of the Epiphany, while in Eastern Christianity, Epiphany celebrates the baptism of Jesus on the Jordan River as the first manifestation of his divinity. In a literary sense, ‘epiphany’ is most often associated with the literary Modernism of the twentieth century, and with the work of James Joyce in particular, who himself defined it as ‘a sudden spiritual manifestation, whether in the vulgarity of speech or of gesture or in a memorable phase of the mind itself.’ William Wordsworth’s ‘spots of time’ are retroactively viewed as proto-manifestations of the later twentieth century concept in a Romantic context.

Though these may be the three enduring definitions of ‘epiphany,’ Joyce’s later adoption of the word for his own purposes points to the looser interpretations it has come to be seen as capable of embodying. Maya Angelou, then, was astute in her more recent suggestion that ‘the word epiphany probably has a million definitions.’

Angelou’s own subsequent definition of the term is particularly enlightening: an epiphany being in her words, ‘the occurrence when the mind, the body, the heart, and the soul focus together and see an old thing in a new way.’ Such a definition of epiphany might well be applied to the act of literary translation itself. For the skill and the art of translation, in and of itself, signals an occurrence of coalescence in which the eventual outcome is one marked by a transformation. Günter Grass wrote that ‘translation is that which transforms everything so that nothing changes.’ In its transformation, that which is essential in the original text is both retained and rejuvenated anew through its transposition into the target language. And so, even if the approach is a literal one, a translation always involves a transformation of sorts; a good translation always involves a revelation of sorts.

It is with these mullings in mind that we arrived at the adorning cover art for this issue, depicting a scene from The Odyssey– ‘Athena appearing to Odysseus to reveal 2

the Island of Ithaca,’ painted by eighteenth century Italian artist Giuseppe Bottani.

Odysseus, unbeknownst to himself, has arrived home– his journey of twists and turns finally at an end. The goddess Athena appears to him– an epiphany in the original Greek sense of the word. Yet, in order to acclimatise the hero to the momentous moment of return, she has shrouded Ithaca in mist. Athena herself is also initially disguised, before eventually revealing her divine nature. With that, she disperses the fog, revealing Ithaca at last to the ‘long-suffering’ Odysseus, who kisses the soil of his homeland in jubilation. Homer’s scene then, and Bottani’s portrayal of it, depicts an epiphany, followed by a transformation and a reveal. Bottani’s vibrant greens point to the liturgical colour of the Epiphany season, while the figure of Odysseus prematurely references Joyce’s later appropriation of the term in a literary context, through his depiction of Leopold Bloom’s/the eponymous Ulysses’ miniaturised odyssey through Dublin on the 16th June, 1904.

It is our hope that the reader will embark on a comparably enriching journey in the subsequent pages that follow, and perhaps be jolted into some fresh realisations of their own. To open this second issue of this special tenth volume, we called forth the first founder and Editor of JoLT, Claudio Sansone, for a special contribution. His expectedly expert translation invokes Athena herself, and evokes new interpretations of an ancient, ambiguous telling. Encompassed in the translations which follow it are epiphanies instigated or catalysed by magic, narcotics, love–amidst other triggers– leading to reappraisals on concerns such as the art of translation, the purpose of poetry, and the cyclical nature of life itself. Nature proves often to be the backdrop for such moments of intuited realisation: ‘But heard, half-heard, in the stillness/Between two waves and the sea.’

Marking the second, spring issue of the journal this year, these instants of epiphany precipitate the instance of my own endpoint, with the passing on of these pages to my successor. My gratitude expressed last time out must therefore be repeated twofold.

With that, I thank my predecessor Martina, for her initial faith in me, and continuing faithful support in the continuance of her wonderful work. My greatest debt to her involves her assembling of the most wonderful editorial team for me this year. Thank you to Lily, Andrea, Felix, Anastasia, Rebecca, and Emer for your constant dedication and expertise. Thank you especially to my Deputy Editor and friend Oisín, for your unfailing patience, professionalism, and pursuit of perfection– as well as the techsavviness which has allowed for the beautiful visual layout of this issue. My final thank you goes to all the contributors to this second issue of this tenth volume– for answering the call so creatively. For many, I’m sure, it could signal a vocation. To those who will come together for the production of the next issue, I proudly pass on a great privilege.

With such newfound knowledge and faith, then, ‘I should be glad of another death.’

May we find comfort in the uncertainty… and be grateful for the clarity when it comes.

Cian Dunne

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Im. 10 Eagrán II: Eipeafáine Ar cheart dom talamh slán a dhéanamh de?

Agus conas ar cheart dom tosú?

Céard a thagann tar éis an chomhartha focalbhá? Eipeafáine, b’fhéidir.

Leis an téama ‘eipeafáíne,’ chuireamar fáilte roimh léirithe agus aistriúcháin de thuiscint, aimsithe agus oscailt súl. Bhíomar ag súil le spléachadh a fháil isteach san fhírinne– le braistint agus tuiscint nua faoin saol timpeall orainn. Sheol sibh isteach léirithe i bhfad ní ba ghéire ná sin a bhí á súil againn.

Tagann an focal ‘eipeafáine’ dúinn ón tSean-Ghréigise ἐπῐφᾰ́νειᾰ, leis an gciall taispeántaí na ndéithe. Agraíodh na taispeántaí seo go háirithe i rith amanna achrainn, mar shampla, in aimsir chogaidh. Spreagann ‘Eipeafáine’ turas na dTrí Ríthe inár n-intinn freisin, agus féile Nollaig na mBan. I gcomhthéacs litheartha, baineann ‘eipeafáine’ den chuid is mó le nua-aoiseachas an fichiú aois, agus le James Joyce go háirithe. Roimhe sin, bhí teicníc cosúil leis sin ag William Wordsworth.

Is léir mar sin, gur focal agus gur téama ilmhínithe atá i gceist le ‘eipeafáíne.’ D’fhéadfá an rud céanna a rá maidir leis an aistriúchán liteartha. Nuair a dhéanaimid aistriuchán ar théacs liteartha, is é próiseas claochlaithe an rud atá i gceist. Sa chlaochlú, coinnímid eisint an bhuntéacs; ag an am céanna, cuirimid beocht nua sna focail i dteanga dhifriúil. Mar sin, fiú dá mbeadh aistriuchán litriúil ann, bainfidh an t-aistriúcháín le claochlú; agus é déanta go sciliúil, beidh oscailt súl le feiceáil freisin.

Tá súil againn go mbeidh oscailt súl nó dhó agaibhse chomh maith, agus sibh ag léamh na leathanach seo a leanas. Chun tús a chur leis an eagrán seo, ghlaomar ar bhunaitheoir JoLT, Claudio Sansone, chun aistriúchán speisialta a thabhairt dúinn.

Chomh maith leis sin, léifidh sibh faoi heipeafáiní a bhí spreagtha ag draíocht, drugaí is ag an ngrá– ag tabhairt léargas nua ar an aistriúchán féin, ar an bhfilíocht, ar an mbás is ar an athbhreith, agus a bhfad níos mó. Go minic, is é an nádúr an rud a thugann an inspioráid chun na dearcthaí nua siúd a chur in iúl.

Leis an dara eagrán seo, tá an críochphointe sroichte agam, agus tiocfaidh duine éigin eile i m’áit go luath. Leis sin, tá roinnt focail le rá agam chun mo chuid bhuíochais a chur in iúl. Go raibh maith agat le mo réamhtheachtaí, Martina, as ucht an deis a thabhairt dom sa chéad áit, agus as an tacaíocht gan teip a thug sí dom le linn na bliana. A gníomh is flaithiúla– foireann eagarthóireachta chomh iontach sin a thabhairt dom. Do Lily, Andrea, Felix, Anastasia, Rebecca, agus Emer– míle buíochas as ucht bhur ndúthracht agus n-oilteacht. Buíochas speisialta do mo leas-eagarthóir foirfe Oisín, don fhoighe, don phroifisiúntacht, agus don tabhairt chun foirfeachta.

Chomh maith leis sin, táim fíorbhuíoch as an ngaisce teicneolaíochta agus as an leagan amach álainn san eagrán seo. Faoi dheireadh, gabhaim buíochas leis na daoine a chuir leis an dara eagrán seo den deichiú imleabhar, agus arís, leis an léitheoir as léamh.

Go rabhaimid compordach san éiginnteacht… agus buíoch as an tsoiléireacht nuair a thagann sí.

Cian Ó Duinn

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Editorial Staff 2021/22

Editor-in-Chief Cian Dunne

Deputy Editor & Layout Oisín Thomas Morrin Faculty Advisor Dr Peter Arnds

Assistant Editors Lily Brodie Hayes Andrea Bergantino Felix Vanden Borre Anastasia Fedosova Rebecca Deasy-Miller Emer O’Hanlon

Cover Art: 'Athena appearing to Odysseus to reveal the Island of Ithaca' by Giuseppe Bottani. Public domain, taken from Wikimedia Commons.

‘Comhlíon’, Alexander Fay

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Editorial

Contents 2

‘Comhlíon’ photograph by Alexander Fay

5

‘Untitled’ & ‘Epiphany’ artwork by Naemi Dehdes

8

‘Κάμινος ’ Ancient Greek-English translation and Introduction

by Claudio Sansone

9

‘Le Baiser, ou les effets secondaires de la littérature’ French-English translation

by Alexander Corey

12

‘Tagliatelle:Alex Sees The Light' artwork by Oona Kauppi

‘हमन है इश्क मस्ताना’ Hindi Urdu-English translation

by Khushi Jain ‘चाँ द नी रात’ Hindi Urdu-English translation

by Khushi Jain ‘Vänligen bygg inga berg’ Swedish-English translation

by Frank Caundle ‘Der Zauberlehrling’ German-Irish translation

by Eoin Mc Evoy

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28

‘Tar Amach’ photograph by Alexander Fay

28

‘Untitled 1’ artwork by Naemi Dehde

29

‘Childhood is the Kingdom Where Nobody Dies’ English-French translation

by Seán Staunton 30 Giacomo Joyce English-Macedonian translation

by Marija Girevska

34

‘Why the moon travels’ English-French translation

by Luna Ciarma

38

‘Galassie’ Italian-English translation

by Lucy McCabe

40

‘Solas Diaga’ photograph by Alexander Fay

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‘the body playlist’ artwork by Meghan Flood

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‘Solo de lune’ French-English translation

by Seoirse Swanton

42

‘A Zacinto’ Italian-English translation

by Martina Giambanco

46

‘floating lament, sinking acceptance’ artwork by Meghan Flood

47

Misérable miracle: la mescaline French-English translation

by Danielle Plunkett

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‘Poética’ Brazilian Portuguese-English translation

by Nayara Güércio 16 ვეფხისტყაოსანი Georgian-English translation

by Kotryna Garanasvili

‘My Shadow’ English-Irish translation by Árón Stiofán Ó Conaill

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24

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‘Gabriel is blue’ artwork by Penny Stuart

52

‘Gabriel Frog Princess’ artwork by Penny Stuart

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‘Je t’aime’ English-Spanish translation

by Eoghan Conway ‘Éirigh’ photograph by Alexander Fay

‘Ecce Puer’ English-Spanish translation

by Eoghan Conway

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‘Procreation’ artwork by Ellecia Vaughan

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‘James Joyce’ artwork by Elle Sloane

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‘epiphany reading’ artwork by Ellecia Vaughan

71

‘Rivelazione’ Italian-English translation

by Silvia Fini

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‘Desamor’ Spanish-English translation

by Eduardo Torres

72

‘Gabriel Dearg’ artwork by Penny Stuart

55

‘An epiphany at the end of the world’ artwork by Kanak Agrawal 72

56

The Waste Land English-Spanish translation by Octavio Pérez Sánchez

73

La patience des traces French-English translation by Anna Tomlinson

62

‘Meie jälgedest liivas’ Estonian-English translation

by Eduardo Torres

74

‘wait, look’ artwork by Meghan Flood

64

‘Faoi Láthair’ photograph by Alexander Fay

74

Il treno ha fischiato Italian-English translation by Martina Giambanco

‘With All the Love I Had, Which Was Not Enough’ English-Irish translation

by Cuán de Búrca 66 ‘Adhlacadh Mo Mháthar’ Irish-French translation by Álanna Hammel

68

‘Kui ma ei kõnele sellest’ Estonian-English translation

by Eduardo Torres

69

‘Epiphany_2’ artwork by Delphine De Luca

69

‘Epiphaneia’ Creole English-Cuban Spanish translation

by Yairen Jerez Columbié 75 ‘nightly sunrise’ artwork by Meghan Flood

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Notes on Contributors

76

‘Adoration of the Magi’ artwork by Patrick Balfe

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‘meshification’ artwork by Meghan Flood

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‘Untitled’, Naemi Dehde

‘Epiphany’, Naemi Dehde 8

Introduction to ‘The Kiln’ by Claudio Sansone

Across this piece gods, demons, and mythical figures are invoked to come and destroy the work of the potters, should they fail to pay a poet for his song. The verses have variously been attributed to Homer or Hesiod. They are likely the work of neither poet, not least because we cannot be sure such figures properly existed. But what better way to introduce a poem about frustrated poetic and manual labor than by speculating idly over its attribution? It is ironic that we do not know the identity of someone who set themselves to work on this piece of poetry, in part to deliberate over the subject of wages and patronage. Recent scholarship has identified the poem as something of a pastiche or “collection” of curses. The first set of curses (11-14) is more akin to typical kiln curses, while the second (15-21) shows a more learned and recherché literary reworking of the same genre (Faraone 2001). From one of the contexts in which it is preserved (the Pseudo-Herodotean “Life of Homer,” of which a small portion serves as an introduction below), we may suspect ancient readers appreciated it also for its humour. Nonetheless, it deserves a serious place in the history of labor. The manner in which gods and mythical figures are invoked to enforce the work of material production raises a set of questions about how transcendent and materialist views of political economy intersected—placing the labor of the poet, and of those who produce curses, at a curious crossroads.

My hope is that this translation may make it more popular and more widely available—so I have taken some small liberties in departing from a strict rendering of the Greek. I give the text as printed in West 2003, but accept the emendation πέρθε in verse eleven. In addition to West’s translation, interested readers may also want to compare my work to the one in Milne 1965. I am grateful to my student Charlotte Susser and her colleagues in my “Mythologies of Labor” course (University of Chicago, Winter 2022) for their perceptive comments and suggestions.

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ANCIENT GREEK

Κάμινος

τῆι δὲ ἐσαύριον ἀποπορευόμενον ἰδόντες κεραμέες τινές, κάμινον ἐγκαίοντες κεράμου λεπτοῦ, προσεκαλέσαντο αὐτόν, πεπυσμένοι ὅτι σοφὸς εἴη, καὶ ἐκέλευόν σφιν ἀεῖσαι, φάμενοι δώσειν αὐτῶι τοῦ κεράμου καὶ ὅ τι ἂν ἄλλο ἔχωσιν. ὁ δὲ Ὅμηρος ἀείδει αὐτοῖς τὰ ἔπεα τάδε, ἃ καλεῖται Κάμινος· εἰ μὲν δώσετε μισθὸν ἀοιδῆς, ὦ κεραμῆες, δεῦρ᾿ ἄγ᾿ Ἀθηναίη, καὶ ὑπέρσχεθε χεῖρα καμίνου, εὖ δὲ μελανθεῖεν κότυλοι καὶ πάντα κάναστρα, φρυχθῆναί τε καλῶς καὶ τιμῆς ὦνον ἀρέσθαι, πολλὰ μὲν εἰν ἀγορῆι πωλεύμενα, πολλὰ δ᾿ἀγυιαῖς, πολλὰ δὲ κερδῆναι, ἡμᾶς δὲ δὴ ὥς σφας ὀνῆσαι. ἢν δ᾿ ἐπ᾿ ἀναιδείην τρεφθέντες ψεύδε᾿ ἄρησθε, συγκαλέω δἤπειτα καμίνων δηλητῆρας, Σύντριβ᾿ ὁμῶς Σμάραγόν τε καὶ Ἄσβετον ἠδὲ Σαβάκτην Ὠμόδαμόν θ᾿, ὃς τῆιδε τέχνηι κακὰ πολλὰ πορίζει· πέρθε πυραίθουσαν καὶ δώματα, σὺν δὲκάμινος πᾶσα κυκηθείη, κεραμέων μέγα κωκυσάντων. ὡς γνάθος ἱππείη βρύκει, βρύκοι δὲ κάμινος, πάντ᾿ ἔντοσθ᾿ αὐτῆς κεραμήϊα λεπτὰ ποιοῦσα. δεῦρο καὶ Ἠελίου θύγατερ, πολυφάρμακε Κίρκη· ἄγρια φάρμακα βάλλε, κάκου δ᾿ αὐτούς τε καὶ ἔργα· δεῦρο δὲ καὶ Χείρων ἀγέτω πολέας Κενταύρους, οἵ θ᾿ Ἡρακλῆος χεῖρας φύγον, οἵ τ᾿ ἀπόλοντο· τύπτοιεν τάδε ἔργα κακῶς, πίπτοι δὲ κάμινος, αὐτοὶ δ᾿ οἰμώζοντες ὁρώιατο ἔργα πονηρά· γηθήσω δ᾿ ὁρόων αὐτῶν κακοδαίμονα τέχνην. ὃς δέ χ᾿ ὑπερκύψηι, περὶ τούτου πᾶν τὸ πρόσωπον φλεχθείη, ὡς πάντες ἐπίστωντ᾿ αἴσιμα ῥέζειν.

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ENGLISH

‘The Kiln’ translated by Claudio Sansone The next day, some potters who were busy firing a kiln filled with fine wares saw him [Homer] as he was leaving. They called him over, since they had heard that he was clever. They urged him to sing for them, saying they would give him a pot or whatever else they had. Homer sang the following words to them, which are entitled “The Kiln.”

If you pay me a wage for my song, potters, Then, Athena, may you come and set your hand over the kiln— May the pots and all the dishes blacken well And turn out finely baked, earning a worthy price When they are peddled in the marketplace and streets, 5 Reaping great profits, rewarding me as it does them.

But, should you turn to shamelessness and take to lying, Then I will summon together the destroyers of kilns instead— Smasher with Burster and Burner and Shaker, too, And also Cracker, who causes much harm to this craft.

10 Destroy the stoking channel and the chambers, and may the kiln Be all churned up as the potters wail loudly.

Just like a horse’s jaw gnashes, may the kiln gnash, Smashing to pieces all the pots inside of it.

And may you, the daughter of the Sun, Circe of the many potions, come here. 15 Mix together your wild drugs, harm them and their works.

Come, Chiron, too—may he lead here a band of Centaurs, Both those who escaped the hands of Heracles and those who were killed.

May they foully strike these works, may the kiln collapse.

And may the crying men watch the toilsome works.

20 I will enjoy watching their ill-fated craft.

And should someone peer inside, may his whole face Be scorched, so that they all learn to behave properly.

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FRENCH

‘Le Baiser, ou les effets secondaires de la littérature’ Manuela Dumay

This extract is from an autobiographical short story

by Manuela Dumay in which the narrator encounters the renowned author, Marguerite Yourcenar, the first woman to be

Portant un peignoir en soie gris et taupe à impression cachemire, les cheveux à peine coiffés, venant de se lever peut-être, Yourcenar arriva par la gauche avec son énergie à la fois forte et paisible, concentrée et déterminée. Sa présence emplit la pièce. Nos regards se rencontrèrent, le sien m’éclaira. Je me penchai pour prendre mes cannes, me lever et la saluer mais elle me pria de rester assise et prit place dans un fauteuil en face de moi, légèrement sur ma droite.

Je n’avais pas envie de parler, mais plus complètement de me laisser nourrir par son rayonnement, réconforter par sa chaleur, fût-elle un peu distante ; en termes qui m’étaient devenus familiers, je voulais Yourcenar en perfusion. Ça a quelque chose de tellement idiot cette visite au grand écrivain dont on espère sans se le dire qu’un peu de son talent déteindra sur nous à la manière dont l’arbre à santal parfume la lame qui le coupe. Je savais que c’étaient les circonstances dans lesquelles je me trouvais qui m’avaient permis d’obtenir ce rendez-vous. Je compris rapidement aussi que mes cannes et ce qui me restait de handicap étaient comme un masque que j’aurais voulu arracher.

J’avais simplement envie d’être là, en silence, de me laisser lentement imprégner de sa présence, à la manière dont on s’assoit dans une église ou face à un paysage grandiose. Peut-être étais-je fatiguée du voyage car ce que je voulais le plus, c’était de me reposer dans sa présence. Mais je fus incapable de lui dire cela qui restait une sensation, un souhait informe, informulé, dans ce territoire premier en amont de la pensée.

Alors, très rapidement, Yourcenar me bombarda de questions sur les conditions de mon hospitalisation. Je craignis un instant qu’elle me plaignît et refusai de toutes mes forces cette humiliation-là. Je l’assurai que j’étais parfaitement bien soignée, que les kinésithérapeutes, aides-soignants, médecins, infirmiers, animateurs étaient admirables de compétence et d’humanité. Puis je me suis entendue lui dire avec une fermeté un peu désespérée que je n’étais pas venue pour lui parler de mon hospitalisation. Je 12

ENGLISH elected at L’Académie Française.

This meeting, that reads as an epiphany itself, brings about other epiphanies for the narrator regarding life, self, and language.

‘The Embrace’ translated by Alexandra Corey

Wearing a grey and taupe silk robe with a cashmere print, her hair barely combed, perhaps having just woken up, Yourcenar arrived from the left with her energy at once strong, peaceful, and focused. Her presence filled the room.

Our eyes met, and hers brightened mine. I leaned down to pick up my crutches to stand up and greet her, but she asked me to remain seated and took the chair in front of me, slightly to my right.

I didn’t want to speak, only to let myself be nurtured by her radiance and comforted by her warmth, however distant. To put it in words that had become familiar to me, I wanted Yourcenar “on the drip.”

There is something so silly about a visit to a great writer where one hopes, without consciously admitting it, that some of her talent will rub off on us the way the sandalwood tree leaves its perfume on the blade that cuts it. I knew it was the circumstances in which I found myself that made it possible for me to arrange this meeting. I also quickly realized that my crutches and what was left of my handicap were like a costume that I wanted to tear off.

I just wanted to be there, in silence, to let myself slowly be imbued with her presence the way that one sits in a church, or in front of an awe-inspiring landscape. Maybe I was tired from the trip because what I wanted most was to rest in her presence. But I was unable to tell her what remained only a feeling, a shapeless, unformed wish, in the primal territory upstream from thought.

Suddenly, Yourcenar bombarded me with questions about the conditions of my medical care. I feared for a moment that she would feel sorry for me, and I rejected this humiliation. I assured her that I was perfectly well looked-after, that the physical therapists, orderlies, doctors, nurses, and care staff were fantastic in their competence and humanity. Then I heard myself tell her, with a mixture of desperation and firmness, that I had not come to tell her about my conditions of living.

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FRENCH

sentais Yourcenar très attentive à moi et en même temps j’eus l’impression qu’en me questionnant elle voulait combler un vide. Je repensai à ses entretiens avec Matthieu Galey où elle disait que beaucoup de gens n’ont rien à dire et qu’il y a si peu de choses qui passent entre deux personnes dans une conversation d’une demi-heure. Et je pris peur, il fallait de toute urgence que je lui propose un sujet de conversation. Je lui dis que j’étais venue pour que nous discutions des grands problèmes de la traduction. Ce n’était pas faux mais ce n’était pas vrai non plus, ce n’étaient bien sûr pas ces questions qui m’avaient donné l’énergie de venir jusqu’ici, à l’hôtel Pont Royal, pour la rencontrer. Nous avons néanmoins commencé à parler de traduction ; une connivence se dessina et notre conversation devint fluide lorsque je lui rappelai ce qu’elle m’avait écrit dans sa première lettre, « je crois que le métier d’écrivain et celui du traducteur ne diffèrent guère l’un de l’autre : on traduit toujours un langage intérieur, le sien, ou celui des autres. » Et je me trouvais précisément dans cet état où, par épuisement émotionnel et physique, je n’arrivais pas à traduire mon langage intérieur pour communiquer correctement avec Yourcenar. Tout d’un coup, j’eus l’idée de lui demander un conseil, un conseil de vie. Encore quelque chose que je n’avais pas anticipé car j’avais employé mes forces uniquement à rendre possible cette rencontre. En entendant ma question, elle me sourit avec une espèce de tendresse amusée et répondit « vivre en totale liberté à l’intérieur de nos modestes limites. » Elle développa ce qu’elle voulait dire mais je n’ai rien retenu. L’émotion de la situation gomma tout le reste.

*With thanks to Rémy Poignault, publisher of Bulletin and chairperson of Société Internationale des Études Yourcenariennes (SIEY), for his kind permission to reproduce part of this short story. (https://www.yourcenariana.org) 14

ENGLISH

While I felt that Yourcenar was very sympathetic to me, I also sensed that her questions were an attempt to fill a void. I thought back on her talks with Matthieu Galey where she said that a lot of people have nothing to say and that there is so little exchanged between two people in a half-hour conversation. I got scared, I urgently needed to suggest something else to talk about.

I told her that I had come to talk about the art of translation. This was not a lie, but it was not true, either. It was not these matters, of course, that had given me the energy to come here, to the Hôtel Pont Royal, to meet her. When we started to talk about translation, however, something opened up. Our conversation became fluid when I reminded her of what she had written to me in her first letter, “I think that being a translator is not much different from being a writer insofar as in both cases, we translate an inner language: one’s own, or that of another.” I found myself precisely in this state where, through emotional and physical exhaustion, I was unable to translate my inner language into words to communicate properly with Yourcenar. All of a sudden, it occurred to me to ask her for advice; some advice on life. This was something else that I had not anticipated, because whatever strength I had, it had gone into making this meeting possible.

Upon hearing my question, she smiled with a kind of tender amusement and replied, “to live in total freedom within our narrow boundaries.” She elaborated on what she meant. It didn’t register, however; wiped away by emotion.

‘Tagliatelle: Alex Sees The Light’, Oona Kauppi 15

BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE

‘Poética’ Manuel Bandeira

‘Poética’ was first recited to an audience 100 years ago, at the iconic 1922 Week of Modern Art, in the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil. In this poem, Bandeira manifests his

Estou farto do lirismo comedido Do lirismo bem comportado Do lirismo funcionário público com livro de ponto expediente proto [colo e manifestações de apreço ao sr. diretor Estou farto do lirismo que pára e vai averiguar no dicionário o cunho [vernáculo de um vocábulo Abaixo os puristas Todas as palavras sobretudo os barbarismos universais Todas as construções sobretudo as sintaxes de exceção Todos os ritmos sobretudo os inumeráveis Estou farto do lirismo namorador Político Raquítico Sifilítico De todo lirismo que capitula ao que quer que seja fora de si mesmo.

De resto não é lirismo Será contabilidade tabela de co-senos secretário do amante exemplar com

[cem modelos de cartas e as diferentes

[maneiras de agradar às mulheres, etc.

Quero antes o lirismo dos loucos O lirismo dos bêbedos O lirismo difícil e pungente dos bêbedos O lirismo dos clowns de Shakespeare - Não quero mais saber do lirismo que não é libertação.

16

ENGLISH realisation that poetry should not be bound to tradition. Rather it should be an act of creativity and subversion.

‘Poetics’ translated by Nayara Güércio

I am sick and tired of restrained lyricism Of well-behaved lyricism Of the lyricism of a public servant with a clock to punch shifts proto [col and manifestations of appreciation to Mister Director.

I am sick and tired of lyricism that stops and checks the vernacular nature [of a word in the dictionary Down with the purists.

All words, especially universal barbarisms All constructions, especially outlandish syntax All rhythms, especially the uncountable ones I have had enough of flirtatious lyricism Political Stunted Syphilitic Of all lyricism that capitulates whatever is foreign to itself.

What is left is not lyricism It will be accounting tables of cosines secretary to the exemplary lover

[with a hundred letter templates and the different

[ways of pleasing & aggravating women, etc.

I want rather the lyricism of the mad The lyricism of the drunk The hard and poignant lyricism of drunks The lyricism of Shakespeare's clowns.

- I no longer care about lyricism that isn’t emancipating.

17

GEORGIAN

ვეფხისტყაოსანი Shota Rustaveli

In this scene, taken from an epic piece of Georgian literature, Tariel tells the story of seeing NestanDarejan for the first time, and an incredible, devastating effect

ამბავი ტარიელის გამიჯნურებისა კვლა დაიწყო თქმა ამბისა მან, რა ხანი მოიტირა: “დღესა ერთსა მე და მეფე მოვიდოდით, გვენადირა; მიბრძანა, თუ: «ქალი ვნახოთ», ხელი ხელსა დამიჭირა. მის ჟამისა მხსენებელი მე სულ-დგმული არ გიკვირა?! “ბაღჩა ვნახე უტურფესი ყოვლისავე სალხინოსა: მფრინველთაგან ხმა ისმოდა უამესი სირინოსა; მრავლად იყო სარაჯები ვარდის წყლისა აბანოსა. კარსა ზედა მოჰფარვიდა ფარდაგები ოქსინოსა. “მეფემან ახმა დურაჯთა მითხრა მიტანად ქალისა, გამოვუხვენ და წავედით ჩემად სადებლად ალისა; მაშინ დავიწყე გარდახდა მე საწუთროსა ვალისა. ალმასისა ხამს ლახვარი ლახვრად გულისა სალისა! “ვიცოდი, სწადდა არვისგან ნახვა მის მზისა დარისა, მე გარე ვდეგ და მეფემან შევლო ფარდაგი კარისა; ვერას ვხედევდი, ოდენ ხმა მესმოდა საუბარისა. ასმათს უბრძანა გამოხმა დურაჯთა ამირბარისა. “ასმათ ფარდაგსა აზიდნა, გარე ვდეგ მოფარდაგულსა; ქალსა შევხედენ, ლახვარი მეცა ცნობასა და გულსა. მოვიდა, მივსცნე დურაჯნი, მთხოვა ცეცხლითა დაგულსა. ვამე, მას აქათ სახმილსა დავუწვავ ნიადაგულსა! “აწ წარხდეს იგი ნათელნი, მზისაცა მოწუნარენი!” მისი ვერ გაძლო ხსენება, დაბნდა და სულთქნა მწარენი; ყმა და ასმათი ტიროდეს, ხმას სცემდეს იგი არენი, ჭმუნვით თქვეს: “მკლავნი ცუდ ქმნილან, ვა, გმირთა მემუქარენი!” ასმათმან წყალი დაასხა, ცნობად მოვიდა ტარია, დიდხან ვერა თქვა, სევდამან გული შეუპყრა, დარია; დაჯდა და მწარედ სულთ-ითქვნა, ცრემლი მიწასა გარია, თქვა: “ჩემგან მისი ხსენება, ვამე, რა დიდი ზარია!

18

ENGLISH it had on him. This epiphanic moment has the power to transform the course of his life, faith and identity. In its effect, it is equal to an ethereal experience.

The Man in the Tiger Skin translated by Kotryna Garanasvili

Tariel Tells the Story of Falling in Love He was quiet for a minute, tears rolling down his face. Then he went on to tell his story.

“That day, the king and I were hunting in the woods. Afterwards, he placed his hand amiably on my shoulder and asked me to come with him. He wanted me to meet his daughter. It still pains me to death to even recall what happened.

I was taken to the gardens I had never seen before. The birds were singing, their voices sounding sweeter than the siren songs. There were beautiful fountains filled with rose water, and every entrance was covered in drapes of velvet adorned with gold.

I was bringing a pair of partridges as a gift to the princess. I walked through the garden by the king’s side, and I felt like I was walking towards an open fire. Somehow I knew that from then on, I would start paying off my debt for everything I had been blessed with in this world. It takes a diamond arrow to pierce a heart of stone!

I knew that the king was very protective of his daughter and kept her away from everyone. She was his sun and his whole world revolved around her.

When we approached, he disappeared behind heavy velvet drapes where she was sitting. I couldn’t see her yet, only heard the king’s voice ordering Asmat to bring the partridges to her. The drapes opened, and I caught a glimpse, for the first time, of Nestan-Darejan. Her gaze lanced through me, and my heart and mind were struck.

Unthinkingly, I gave the birds to Asmat. The earth was shaking underneath my feet. At that moment, I was doomed, thrown into raging flames. Nestan’s eyes shone brighter to me than the sun.”

A shadow ran through Tariel’s face. He went pale and collapsed again, unable 19

“მიმნდონი საწუთროსანი მისთა ნივთთაგან რჩებიან, იშვებენ, მაგრა უმუხთლოდ ბოლოდ ვერ მოურჩებიან; ვაქებ ჭკუასა ბრძენთასა, რომელნი ეურჩებიან. ისმენდი ჩემთა ამბავთა, თუ სულნი შე-ღამრჩებიან. “დურაჯნი მივსცენ, გავიღე სხვა ვერა გზაღა თავისა, დავეცი, დავბნდი, წამიხდა ძალი მხართა და მკლავისა, რა სუდად მოვე, შემესმა ხმა ტირილისა და ვისა: გარე მომრტყმოდეს ჯალაბნი, ვითა ჩამსხდომნი ნავისა. “შიგან ვწევ დიდთა დარბაზთა ტურფითა საგებელითა, ზედ დამტიროდეს მეფენი ცრემლითა უშრობელითა, პირსა იხოკდეს ხელითა, ღაწვისა გამპობელითა. მუყრნი მოასხნეს, სენითა მთქვეს გამაბელზებელითა. “მე რა მნახა თვალ-ახმული, მეფე ყელსა მომეხვია, ცრემლით მითხრა: «შვილო, შვილო, ცოცხალ ხარ-ღა? სიტყვა თქვია!» მე პასუხი ვერა გავეც, ვითა შმაგი, შევკრთი დია, კვლა დავეცი დაბნედილი, გულსა სისხლი გარდმეთხია. “სრულნი მუყრნი და მულიმნი მე გარე შემომცვიდიან; მათ ხელთა ჰქონდა მუსაფი, ყოველნი იკითხვიდიან; მტერ-დაცემული ვეგონე, არ ვიცი, რას ჩმახვიდიან. სამ დღემდის ვიყავ უსულოდ, ცეცხლნი უშრეტნი მწვიდიან. “აქიმნიცა იკვირვებდეს: «ესე სენი რაგვარია? სამკურნალო არა სჭირს რა, სევდა რამე შემოჰყრია». ზოგჯერ შმაგად წამოვიჭრი, სიტყვა მცთარი წამერია. დედოფალი ზღვასა შეიქმს, მას რომ ცრემლი დაუღვრია. “სამსა დღესა დარბაზს ვიყავ, არ ცოცხალი, არცა მკვდარი; მერმე ცნობა მომივიდა, მივჰხვდი რასმე მიუმხვდარი; ვთქვი, თუ: «ჰაი, რაშიგან ვარ მე სიცოცხლე-გარდამხდარი!» თმობა ვსთხოვე შემოქმედსა, ვჰკადრე სიტყვა სამუდარი. “ვთქვი, თუ: «ღმერთო, ნუ გამწირავ, აჯა ჩემი შეისმინე, მომეც ძალი დათმობისა, ცოტად ვითმე აღმადგინე, აქა ყოფა გამამჟღავნებს, სახლსა ჩემსა მიმაწვინე!» მანვე ქმნა და მო-რე-ვჯობდი, გული წყლული გავარკინე.

20

to go on. Avtandil and Asmat couldn’t help but cry, echoing his great sorrow.

These arms that used to threaten the most powerful of enemies, they wondered, seemed helpless now like broken wings. Asmat splashed Tariel’s face with some cool water, and soon, he regained his consciousness. Yet he couldn’t get a grip. The grief and despair left him speechless, only tears were silently falling on the ground beneath his feet.

“The mere memory of this is more than I can stand,” he said at last. “Some people rejoice in short-lived favours of this world, only to find they have been lured into a trap where only disappointment awaits. I admire the wisdom of those who manage to see through this deceit. But hear me out. Let me tell you what happened next, if my heart can bear it.

I handed over the birds, and at that moment, I was blinded to everything around me. I was shaken to the core. Suddenly, all strength seemed to have left me. I stumbled and fell. When I opened my eyes again, I saw the whole royal household gathered around me like a crowd seeing off a ship, observing me with great concern. I found myself lying on a large bed, soft like feathers, in one of the rooms of the palace. At once, I met the worried gazes of the king and the queen. They were genuinely distressed at the wretched state I was in. They had summoned mullahs who said it must have been the workings of the devil.

Seeing my eyes open, the king embraced me. “Say something, my son. Tell me you’re alive,” he begged. But all I managed was a dull cry of grief and pain.

Trembling like a madman, I dropped in a dead faint again. The mullahs and muqris were going through the pages of Koran. They tried to find a way to treat me. They were convinced I was possessed. For three days, I was torn, engulfed in burning flames.

The nature of my state remained a mystery to my patrons. I was tormented by terrible visions of cruel battles and talking wildly in my sleep. “It is an illness but of spirit, not of flesh and bones,” they said. Dismayed, the queen shed a sea of tears.

I spent the three days completely lifeless, unable to make a slightest movement.

When I stirred back to life, I knew at once what had happened to me. If I stay for here for any longer, I thought, it will be the death of me. I prayed to receive mercy and peace. My prayer was heard, for slowly, I started to regain my strength. Yet I was not the same.”

21

HINDI-URDU

‘हमन है इश्क मस्ताना’ Kabir

ENGLISH

‘I am intoxicated by love’ translated by Khushi Jain

This ghazal* is about the spiritual realisation of falling in love with the divine (ishq). Transcending the mundane human experiences of worldliness, dualities etc., Kabir, intoxicated, asks why he should be involved with the ordinary when he has just found the extraordinary.

22

हमन है इश्क मस्ताना, हमन को होशियारी क्या? रहें आज़ाद या जग में, हमन दनु िया से यारी क्या?

I am intoxicated by love, why should my heart be straight anymore?

Freedom from life or not, why should the world be fate anymore?

जो बिछु ड़े हैं पियारे से, भटकते दर-ब-दर फिरते, हमारा यार है हम में, हमन को इं तजारी क्या?

Separated from their beloved, they drift aimless and lost, My beloved dwells within me, why should I wilt and wait anymore?

न पल बिछु ड़े पिया हमसे, न हम बिछड़े पियारे से, उन्हीं से नेह लागा है, हमन को बेकरारी क्या?

Not for a moment is my love away from me, nor I from them, My heart is all theirs now, why should I agitate anymore?

कबीरा इश्क का माता, दईु को दू र कर दिल से, जो चलना राह नाज़ुक है, हमन सर बोझ भारी क्या?

Drunk in adoring devotion, purge all duality Kabir, This road of mine is delicate, why should I hold this crate anymore?

HINDI-URDU

ENGLISH

‘चाँ द नी रात’

‘This Moonlit Night’

Saifuddin Saif, Ali Sethi and Shakeel Sohail

translated by Khushi Jain

This ghazal describes a meeting with the beloved that the poet has been yearning for. The longing and praying have finally been actualized, but in a simple dream. Despite this epiphany, the poet is not discouraged; a chance to see his beloved even with closed eyes is bliss.

चाँदनी रात बड़ी देर के बाद आई है लब पे इक बात बड़ी देर के बाद आई है

This moonlit night has come after a long time This that I write has come after a long time

ना खुले आँख अगर ख्वाब है तो ख्वाब सही ये मुलाक़ात बड़ी देर के बाद आई है

If this be a dream with closed eyes let it be This pious plight has come after a long time

मांग रखी थी बड़ी देर से जो वस्ल की शाम वो मेरे हाथ बड़ी देर के बाद आई है

A long time I prayed for this meeting with you This rare delight has come after a long time

चाँदनी रात बड़ी देर के बाद आई है लब पे इक बात बड़ी देर के बाद आई है

This moonlit night has come after a long time This that I write has come after a long time

*The Ghazal is an amatory poem originating in the Arabic tradition, which became popular in Persia and then the Indian subcontinent. Comprising couplets, it follows an intricate rhyme scheme known as qaafiya - AA BA CA DA EA and so on. It also has a radif, a phrase or refrain that must appear at the end of every couplet’s second line (and both lines of the first couplet). Originally, ghazals were meant to be sung and vocally transmitted.

23

SWEDISH

‘Vänligen bygg inga berg’ Lina Arvidsson

ENGLISH

‘Tender accepted, please take your items’ translated by Frank Caundle

Lina Arvidsson’s supermarket colleague will die of an unspoken illness. In this poem, from an autobiographical collection, she remembers the first sign of illness, the first symptom. Which is more the epiphany: when we learned of the symptom, or when we realised the cause?

På jobbet pratar vi om dig efteråt pratar vi inte om dig efteråt det blev en svart dag

At work we speak of you later on we don't speak of you later on it became a black day

frågar kunder har kunder någonsin frågat efter dig? kommer de att fråga efter mig?

do they ask have customers ever asked about you? will they ask about me?

låg i en vecka hur länge hade jag

lain low for a week how long had i

jag vill skriva fina saker mitt tydligaste minne: hur du vände dig om i stolen när jag kom från rast vinkade mig till dig

i want to write fine things my clearest memory: how you turned around behind the till when i came from break waved me to you

Lina? ja? kan du snälla hoppa in en minut bara jag tror att jag kanske måste kräkas

Lina? yeah? can you take over for just a sec i think that maybe i need to hurl

haha hård natt? ja

24

haha long night? yes

GERMAN

‘Der Zauberlehrling’ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

IRISH

‘Dalta an Draoi’ aistrithe ag Eoin McEvoy

Tá eipeafáine i gceist sa méid is go dtaibhsítear don dalta laghad a chumhachta féin de gheit nuair a théann rudaí ó smacht air. Chomh maith leis sin tá taisí draíochta á nglaoch chuige ag an dalta agus iad á nochtadh féin dó, ciall bhunaidh ἐπιφάνεια sa tSean-Ghréigis.

Hat der alte Hexenmeister Sich doch einmal wegbegeben!

Und nun sollen seine Geister Auch nach meinem Willen leben.

Seine Wort und Werke Merkt ich und den Brauch, Und mit Geistesstärke Thu' ich Wunder auch.

Walle! walle Manche Strecke, Daß, zum Zwecke, Wasser fließe Und mit reichem, vollem Schwalle Zu dem Bade sich ergieße.

Und nun komm, du alter Besen!

Nimm die schlechten Lumpenhüllen; Bist schon lange Knecht gewesen: Nun erfülle meinen Willen!

Auf zwei Beinen stehe, Oben sei ein Kopf, Eile nun und gehe Mit dem Wassertopf!

Walle! walle Manche Strecke, Daß, zum Zwecke, Wasser fließe

Seo mo sheans: tá an seandraoi críonna bailithe leis ar shiúl sa deireadh!

Mithid dá chuid taisí draíochta gníomhú dom ’s mo thoilse a dhéanamh.

Gach aon chleas is briathar thug mé liom uaidh iad; tá le m’aigne faobhar ’s déanfaidh mise draíocht.

Aistrigh! aistrigh Déan do bhealach le go meallfar uisce ón sruthán is go snífidh sé go caiseach dá dheoin féin isteach sa tobán. Éirigh, a sheanscuab, suas go beoga!

Déan duit féin ó ghiobail léine; fada thú id ghiolla dósan – déan anois de réir mo mhéinse!

Bíodh péire cos fút ’s cloigeann ar do bharr; brostaigh ort is buail romhat, beir leat an corcán!

Aistrigh! aistrigh Déan do bhealach 25

GERMAN

Und mit reichem, vollem Schwalle Zu dem Bade sich ergieße.

Seht, er läuft zum Ufer nieder, Wahrlich! ist schon an dem Flusse, Und mit Blitzesschnelle wieder Ist er hier mit raschem Gusse.

Schon zum zweiten Male!

Wie das Becken schwillt!

Wie sich jede Schale Voll mit Wasser füllt!

Stehe! stehe!

Denn wir haben Seiner Gaben Vollgemessen! – Ach, ich merk es! Wehe! wehe!

Hab ich doch das Wort vergessen!

Ach, das Wort, worauf am Ende Er das wird, was er gewesen.

Ach, er läuft und bringt behende!

Wärst du doch der alte Besen!

Immer neue Güsse Bringt er schnell herein, Ach! und hundert Flüsse Stürzen auf mich ein.

Nein, nicht länger Kann ichs lassen; Will ihn fassen.

Das ist Tücke!

Ach! nun wird mir immer bänger!

Welche Miene! welche Blicke!

O du Ausgeburt der Hölle!

Soll das ganze Haus ersaufen?

Seh ich über jede Schwelle Doch schon Wasserströme laufen.

Ein verruchter Besen, Der nicht hören will!

Stock, der du gewesen, Steh doch wieder still!

26

IRISH

le go meallfar uisce ón sruthán is go snífidh sé go caiseach dá dheoin féin isteach sa tobán.

Féach, sin é ag rith go habhainn, tá sé ag an mbruach thíos cheana, is ar ais ar ball go deabhach, é ag doirteadh leis go dána.

Seo é arís ag filleadh!

Is an dabhach boglán!

Tá gach babhla ag sileadh ’s iad ar fad lomlán!

Seasaigh, seasaigh, mar tá romhainn lán ár ndóthain de do shaothar!

Och mo léan is ó mo dhearmad – níl an briathar fós im chuimhne!

Briathar é arbh é a thoradh tú a iompú ar ais mar ’ sheas tú.

Och! Seo chugam é fós ag iompar!

B’fhearr i bhfad thú arís id sheanscuab!

Doirteann sé gan staonadh uisce isteach sa rúm sruthanna ’na gcéadta ina ndíle chugam.

Stop! Is leor sin!

Ormsa an fhreagracht É a cheangal.

Sleamhain an té é!

Tá m’fhaitíos ag fás i dtólamh: féach an dreach air, féach a éadan!

Och! A áibhirseoir, a dheamhain!

Báifear orm an teach trí chéile!

Feicim uaim an díle ag sreabhadh is gach tairseach di ag géilleadh.

Gealt atá sa scuab seo,

GERMAN Willst's am Ende Gar nicht lassen?

Will dich fassen, Will dich halten Und das alte Holz behende Mit dem scharfen Beile spalten.

Seht da kommt er schleppend wieder!

Wie ich mich nur auf dich werfe, Gleich, o Kobold, liegst du nieder; Krachend trifft die glatte Schärfe.

Wahrlich, brav getroffen!

Seht, er ist entzwei!

Und nun kann ich hoffen, Und ich atme frei!

Wehe! wehe!

Beide Teile Stehn in Eile Schon als Knechte Völlig fertig in die Höhe!

Helft mir, ach! ihr hohen Mächte!

Und sie laufen! Naß und nässer Wirds im Saal und auf den Stufen.

Welch entsetzliches Gewässer!

Herr und Meister! hör mich rufen! – Ach, da kommt der Meister!

Herr, die Not ist groß!

Die ich rief, die Geister werd ich nun nicht los. »In die Ecke, Besen, Besen!

Seids gewesen.

Denn als Geister Ruft euch nur zu seinem Zwecke, Erst hervor der alte Meister.«

tá sé bodhar, dúr!

Bí id mhaide athuair dom, bí id sheasamh ciúin!

IRISH

Cad ab áil leat – maos gan deireadh?

Tá uaim breith ort, tú a choisceadh is faoi dheireadh do sheanadhmad le lann ghéar na biaile a scoilteadh.

Féach! Seo chugainn ag doirteadh arís é; seo mé anois im léim anuas ort.

Géill, a phúca, géill dom mhianta, luascaim thar mo cheann an tua ort!

Bhuail mé an sprioc go díreach!

Tá sé in dhá leath!

Ligim osna faoisimh ’s dóchas fillte ar ais!

Och! Mo léan géar!

Tá an dá leath sin ina seasamh mar bheirt ghiollaí!

Cosnaíg mé ón olc seo, ’ dhéithe, tá siad ard, iomlán is ullmhaithe!

Níl aon stop leo! Fliuch, níos fliche ’tá an seomra is barr na céime.

Uafás é an líon seo uisce! Éist, a Mháistir! Caithfear éisteacht! Á! Seo chugam an seandraoi. ’ Mháistir, táim i bponc!

Ghlaoigh mé ar do thaisí – ach ní éistfear liom!

“Sin a dheireadh ’ scuaba! ’scuaba! ’steach sa chúinne!

Is, a thaisí, ná héistíg’ riamh le neach eile ach le gairm is toil an tseandraoi.”

27

ENGLISH

‘My Shadow’ Robert Louis Stevenson

I mo leagansa, nuair a thugann an reacaire faoi deara nach bhfuil a scáil leis níos mó sa dorchadas, cuireann sé seo eagla air.

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me, And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.

He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head; And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow— Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow; For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball, And he sometimes gets so little that there's none of him at all.

He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play, And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.

He stays so close beside me, he's a coward you can see; I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

One morning, very early, before the sun was up, I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup; But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head, Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.

‘Tar Amach’, Alexander Fay 28

IRISH Tuigeann sé gurb eisean an duine meata. Tá seisean ag brath ar an scáil, ní an bealach eile thart.

‘Mo Scáilín’ aistrithe ag Árón Stiofán Ó Conaill

Bíonn scáilín do mo leanúint, agus leanann sé gan stad.

Cibé áit a bhím, leanann sé an lá ar fad.

Bíonn seisean cosúil liomsa, óna bhoinn go dtí a cheann, 'Is nuair a bhím sa leaba fiú, aidhe bíonn seisean ann.

An rud is aistí faoisean, ná go n-éiríonn sé níos lú.

In amanna eile, áfach, fásann sé ar nós bambú.

Ní thuigeann seisean páistí, ní thuigeann sé a spórt, Ní thuigeann sé a lúcháir, nó rud ar bith den sórt.

Is bogán é mo scáilín. Ní fhágann sé mo thaobh, Dá mbeinnse i mo chrann, bheadh seisean ina chraobh. Ós ag caint ar phlandaí muid, le drúcht a bhí siad fliuch, Uair amháin ar maidin, nuair a d’éirigh mé go moch. Ó bhí sé iontach dorcha. Ní raibh an ghrian sa spéir.

Agus bhí spiorad uaigneach le brath ansin san aer.

Go tobann, chas mé timpeall, ach ní raibh seisean ann.

“Cá bhfuil sé?” arsa mise, “Cá bhfuil mo mheatachán?”

Rith mé ar ais chomh gasta agus gurbh fhéidir liom, ‘Is bhí teacht ar mo scáilín, ag codladh ann go trom.

“Seans nach bhfuil sé meata”, dúirt mise liomsa féin, “Bheadh sé níos éirimiúla fanacht leis an ghréin”.

Go díreach ag an phointe sin, athraíodh mo shaol go deo, Mhalartaigh muid ár ról. Ní leanfadh sé níos mó.

‘Untitled 1’, Naemi Dehde 29

ENGLISH

‘Childhood is the Kingdom Where Nobody Dies’

The premise of this poem is the speaker ascertaining the true meaning of ‘childhood’.

Childhood is not set within a particular time frame, nor is it a

Edna St. Vincent Millay Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age The child is grown, and puts away childish things.

Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies.

Nobody that matters, that is. Distant relatives of course Die, whom one never has seen or has seen for an hour, And they gave one candy in a pink-and-green stripéd bag, or a jack-knife, And went away, and cannot really be said to have lived at all.

And cats die. They lie on the floor and lash their tails, And their reticent fur is suddenly all in motion With fleas that one never knew were there, Polished and brown, knowing all there is to know, Trekking off into the living world.

You fetch a shoe-box, but it's much too small, because she won't curl up now: So you find a bigger box, and bury her in the yard, and weep.

But you do not wake up a month from then, two months A year from then, two years, in the middle of the night And weep, with your knuckles in your mouth, and say Oh, God! Oh, God! Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies that matters, —mothers and fathers don't die.

And if you have said, "For heaven's sake, must you always be kissing a person?"

Or, "I do wish to gracious you'd stop tapping on the window with your thimble!"

Tomorrow, or even the day after tomorrow if you're busy having fun, Is plenty of time to say, "I'm sorry, mother."

To be grown up is to sit at the table with people who have died, who neither listen nor speak; Who do not drink their tea, though they always said Tea was such a comfort.

30

FRENCH psychologically developmental stage in one’s life, but rather the space where anything is possible.

As long as we live in this space, we are removed from mortality.

‘L’enfance est le royaume où personne ne meurt’ translated by Seán Staunton

L’enfance ne se limite pas à la naissance jusqu’à un âge particulier et à cet âge L’enfant est grand, et se débarrasse des choses enfantines.

L’enfance est le royaume où personne ne meurt.

Personne qui compte, autant dire. Des parents éloignés, bien sûr Meurent, que l’on n’a jamais vus ou que l’on a vus pendant une heure, Et ils ont donné un bonbon dans un sac rayé rose et vert, ou un canif, Et ils s’en sont allés, et n’ont jamais vraiment vécu du tout.

Et les chats meurent. Ils s’allongent sur le sol et remuent leurs queues, Et leur pelage réticent est tout à coup en mouvement Avec des puces dont personne n’a jamais remarqué, Polis et bruns, en savant tout ce qu’il faut savoir, S’aventurant dans le monde vivant.

Tu vas chercher une boîte à chaussures, mais elle est bien trop petite, parce qu’elle ne se roule pas en boule maintenant : Alors tu trouves une boîte plus grande, et tu l'enterres dans le jardin, et tu pleures.

Mais tu ne te réveilles pas un mois après, deux mois après Un an après, deux ans, au beau milieu de la nuit En pleurant, avec les poings dans la bouche, et en disant « Oh mon Dieu ! Oh mon Dieu ! ».

L’enfance est le royaume où personne ne meurt, personne qui importe, - les mères et les pères ne meurent pas.

Et si tu as dit : « Pour l’amour du ciel ! Tu dois toujours embrasser quelqu’un ? » Ou : « Je te supplie d’arrêter de taper sur la fenêtre avec votre dé à coudre ! » Demain, ou même l’après-demain si tu es occupé à t’amuser, Et assez de temps pour dire : « Désolé, maman ». Être adulte, c’est s’asseoir à la table avec des gens qui sont morts, qui n’écoutent ni ne parlent ; 31

ENGLISH

Run down into the cellar and bring up the last jar of raspberries; they are not tempted.

Flatter them, ask them what was it they said exactly That time, to the bishop, or to the overseer, or to Mrs. Mason; They are not taken in.

Shout at them, get red in the face, rise, Drag them up out of their chairs by their stiff shoulders and shake them and yell at them; They are not startled, they are not even embarrassed; they slide back into their chairs.

Your tea is cold now.

You drink it standing up, And leave the house.

32

Qui ne boivent pas leur thé, bien qu'ils aient toujours dit que Le thé était un tel réconfort.

FRENCH

Descends à la cave et rapporte le dernier bocal de framboises ; Ils ne sont pas tentés.

Flatte-les, demande-leur ce qu’ils ont dit exactement A ce moment-là, à l’évêque, ou au responsable, ou à Mme Mason ; Ils ne se sont pas dupes.

Crie sur eux, explose de colère, lève, Les tirer de leurs chaises par leurs épaules raides et secoue-les et crie-leur dessus ; Ils ne sont pas effarouchés, ils ne sont même pas gênés ; ils se rassoient sur leurs chaises.

Maintenant, le thé est froid.

Tu le bois debout, et tu quittes la maison.

33

ENGLISH

Giacomo Joyce James Joyce

Joyce wrote Giacomo Joyce ‘in his best calligraphic hand’ in a notebook while living in Trieste and between completing his two

[7] She raises her arms in an effort to hook at the nape of her neck a gown of black veiling.

She cannot: no, she cannot. She moves backwards towards me mutely. I raise my arms to help her: her arms fall. I hold the websoft edges of her gown and drawing them out to hook them I see through the opening of the black veil her lithe body sheathed in an orange shift. It slips its ribbons of moorings at her shoulders and falls slowly: a lithe smooth naked body shimmering with silvery scales. It slips slowly over the slender buttocks of smooth polished silver and over their furrow, a tarnished silver shadow....

Fingers, cold and calm and moving.... A touch, a touch.

Small witless helpless and thin breath. But bend and hear: a voice. A sparrow under the wheels of juggernaut, shaking shaker of the earth. Please, mister God, big mister God! Goodbye, big world!....... Aber das ist eine Schweinerei!

[8] Great bows of her slim silver shoes: spurs of a pampered fowl.

The lady goes apace, apace, apace .....Pure air on the upland road. Trieste is waking rawly: raw sunlight over its huddled browntiled roofs, testudoform; a multitude of prostrate bugs await a national deliverance. Bellumo rises from the bed of his wife’s lover’s wife: the busy housewife is astir, sloe-eyed, a saucer of acetic acid in her hand.....

Pure air and silence on the upland road: and hoofs. A girl on horseback. Hedda! Hedda Gabler!

The sellers offer on their altars the first fruits: green-flecked lemons, jewelled cherries, shameful peaches with torn leaves. The carriage passes through the lane of canvas stalls, its wheel spokes spinning in the glare. Make way! Her father and his son sit in the carriage. They have owls’ eyes and owls’ wisdom. Owlish wisdom stares from their eyes brooding upon the lore of their Summa contra Gentiles.

[9] She thinks the Italian gentlemen were right to haul Ettore Albini, the critic of the Secolo, from the stalls because he did not stand up when the band played the Royal March.

She heard that at supper. Ay. They love their country when they are quite sure which country it is.

She listens: virgin most prudent.

A skirt caught by her sudden moving knee; a white lace edging of an underskirt lifted unduly; a leg-stretched web of stocking. Si pol?

I play lightly, softly singing, John Dowland’s languid song. Loth to depart: I too am loth to go. That age is here and now. Here, opening from the darkness of desire, are eyes that dim the breaking East, their shimmer the shimmer of the scum that mantles the cesspool of the court of slobbering James. Here are wines all ambered, dying fallings of sweet airs, the proud pavan, kind gentlewomen wooing from their balconies with 34

MACEDONIAN

novels A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses.

Epiphanies of mood, celebrating a moment of romantic grace.

Џакомо Џојс translated by Marija Girevska

[7] Таа ги крева своите раце во обид да ја закачи на тилот од својот врат наметката со црн превез. Не ѝ успева: не, не ѝ успева. Се придвижува назадечки кон мене немо. Ги кревам рацете за да ѝ помогнам: рацете ѝ паѓаат. Ги држам пајажливомеките рабови на нејзината наметка и извлекувајќи ги за да ги закачам го гледам низ отворот на црниот превез нејзиното свитливо тело обвиено во портокалова ноќница. Ноќницата ги лизга своите врзалки во сидриштата на нејзините раменици и полека паѓа: свитливо глатко голо тело трепери со сребрени крлушки. Полека се лизга по виткиот задник од меко изгланцано сребро и по неговата бразда, избледена сребрена сенка.... Прсти, студени и спокојни и подвижни.... Допир, допир. Мал безумен беспомошен и тенок здив. Но, наведни се и чуј: глас. Врапче под тркалата на џагернотот, тресе тресачот од земјата. Те молам, господине Господи, голем господин Господи! Збогум, голем свету! Aber das ist eine Schweinerei!

[8] Големи панделки на нејзините тенки бронзени чевли: изданоци на разгалена птица. Дамата се упати нога пред нога..... Чист воздух угоре земјениот пат. Трст се буди свежо: свежа сончевина врз скупчените кафенопоплочени кровови, желковидни; мноштво од распростени бактерии чека национално ослободување. Belluomo станува од постелата на жената на љубовникот на својата жена: зафатената домаќинка е будна, црнокосоока, чинија со оцетна киселина во нејзината рака. ..... Чист воздух и тишина угоре земјениот пат: и копита. Девојка на коњ. Хеда! Хеда Габлер! На своите олтари продавачите ги нудат своите први плодови: зеленодамкосани лимони, накитени цреши, срамни праски со поткинати ливчиња. Кочијата поминува низ уличката со платнени тезги, спиците од тркалото ѝ се вртат во блесокот. Направете пат! Нејзиниот татко и неговиот син седат во кочијата. Имаат очи и мудрост на був. Буволика мудрост им зјапа од очите замислени за преданието на нивната Summa contra Gentiles.

[9] Таа мисли дека италијанските господа имале право да го извлечат Еторе Албини, критичарот на Секоло, од тезгите бидејќи тој не станал кога бендот го свирел Кралскиот марш. Таа го чула тоа на вечера. Да. Тие си ја љубат својата земја кога се сосема сигурни за која земја се работи. Таа слуша: дева најпромислена. Здолниште фатено од нејзиното ненадејно движење на коленото; бела тантела што се порабува на подздолништето што нескромно се подигнало; испружена нога во мрежа од долг чорап. Si pol? Свирам нежно, тивко пеам, мрзоволна песна од Џон Доуленд. Безволен да заминам: и јас сум безволен да си одам. Таа возраст пристигна овде и сега. Овде се очите, што се отвораат од темнината на копнежот, што го затемнуваат зазорениот 35

ENGLISH

sucking mouths, the pow-fouled wenches and young wives that, gaily yielding to their ravishers, clip and clip again.

[10] In the raw veiled spring morning faint odours float of morning Paris: aniseed, damp sawdust, hot dough of bread: and as I cross the Pont Saint Michel the steel-blue waking waters chill my heart. They creep and lap about the island whereon men have lived since the stone age ..... Tawny gloom in the vast gargoyled church. It is cold as on that morning: quia frigus erat. Upon the steps of the far high altar, naked as the body of the Lord, the ministers lie prostrate in weak prayer. The voice of an unseen reader rises, intoning the lesson from Hosea. Haec dicit Dominus: in tribulatione sua mane consurgent ad me. Venite et revertamur ad Dominum .... She stands beside me, pale and chill, clothed with the shadows of the sindark nave, her thin elbow at my arm. Her flesh recalls the thrill of that raw mist-veiled morning, hurrying torches, cruel eyes. Her soul is sorrowful, trembles and would weep. Weep not for me, O daughter of Jerusalem!

I expound Shakespeare to docile Trieste: Hamlet, quoth I, who is most courteous to gentle and simple is rude only to Polonius. Perhaps, an embittered idealist, he can see in the parents of his beloved only grotesque attempts on the part of nature to produce her image........... Marked you that?

[11] She walks before me along the corridor and as she walks a dark coil of her hair slowly uncoils and falls. Slowly uncoiling, falling hair. She does not know and walks before me, simple and proud. So did she walk by Dante in simple pride and so, stainless of blood and violation, the daughter of Cenci, Beatrice, to her death: ........ Tie My girdle for me and bind up this hair In any simple knot.

The housemaid tells me that they had to take her away at once to the hospital, poveretta, that she suffered so much, so much, poveretta, that it is very grave...... I walk away from her empty house. I feel that I am about to cry. Ah, no! It will not be like that, in a moment, without a word, without a look. No, no! Surely hell’s luck will not fail me!

Operated. The surgeon’s knife has probed in her entrails and withdrawn, leaving the raw jagged gash of its passage on her belly. I see her full dark suffering eyes, beautiful as the eyes of an antelope. O cruel wound! Libidinous God! Once more in her chair by the window, happy words on her tongue, happy laughter. A bird twittering after storm, happy that its little foolish life has fluttered out of reach of the clutching fingers of an epileptic lord and giver of life, twittering happily, twittering and chirping happily.

36

MACEDONIAN

Исток, нивниот трепет трепетот на баграта што ја покрива отпадната јама на дворјето на разлигавениот Џејмс. Овде се вината сети килибарни, паѓањата на слатките напеви што изумираат, гордиот паван, љубезни нежнигоспоѓи што се додворуваат од своите балкони со шмукави усти, на френгичните роспиички и млади сопруги кои, радосно подавајќи им се на своите обљубители, се впиваат и впиваат одново.

[10] Во свежото прекриено пролетно утро слаби мириси лебдат од утринскиот Париз: анасон, влажна дрвесина, врело тесто леб: и додека го преминувам мостот Сен Мишел, челично-сините води што се будат ми го разладуваат срцето. Лазат и заплискуваат околу островот на кој луѓето живеат уште од каменото доба..... Мрк мрак во пространата гаргојлната црква. Студено е како она утро: quia frigus erat. На скалите од оддалечениот висок олтар, соголени како телото Господово, свештениците лежат ничкум во одвај чујна молитва. Гласот на еден незабележан чтец се крева, воспевајќи ја поуката од Осија. Haec dicit Dominus: in tribulationе sua mane consurgent ad me. Venite et revertamur ad Dominum…. Таа стои покрај мене, бледа и студена, нагрната во сенките на гревотемниот кораб, нејзиниот тенок лакот до мојата рака. Нејзината плот ја памети возбудата од она свежо магловелно утро, заитани факели, сурови очи. Душата ѝ е тагополна, трепери и ќе заплаче. Не плачи за мене, О ќерко ерусалимска! Му го појаснувам Шекспир на подучливиот Трст: Хамлет, велам, кој е најучтив до нежен и едноставен, груб е само кон Полоние. Можеби, огорчен идеалист, тој умее да види во родителите на својата сакана само гротескни обиди од страна на природата да се изведе нејзиниот лик........... Јасно ли ти е?

[11] Таа оди пред мене по ходникот и како што оди една темна намотка од нејзината коса полека се одмотува и паѓа. Полека се одмотува коса што паѓа. Таа не знае и оди пред мене, природна и горда. Така одеше и таа покрај Данте во природна гордост, беспрекорна во крвта и престапот, ќерката на Ченчи, Беатриче, кон својата смрт:

........ Врзи Ми го коланот и подврзи ми ја косата Во проста врзалка. Куќната помошничка ми вели дека морале да ја одведат веднаш во болница, poveretta, дека се измачила толку многу, толку многу, poveretta, дека е многу сериозно...... Ѝ ја одминувам празната куќа. Насетувам дека ќе заплачам. Ах, не! Нема да биде така, за миг, без збор, без поглед. Не, не! Сигурно касметот на пеколот нема да ме изневери! Оперирана. Ножот на хирургот ѝ се пробил во утробата и се повлекол, оставајќи ровок назабен засек при својот премин врз нејзиниот стомак. Ѝ ги гледам наполно темните страдални очи, убави како очите на антилопата. О сурова рано! Соблазнив Богу! Еве ја пак во својата столица покрај прозорецот, радосни зборови на нејзиниот јазик, радосна смеа. Птица што црцори по бура, радосна дека нејзиниот малечок будалест живот одлетал од дофатот на грабливите прсти на епилептичниот господар и дарител на животот, радосно црцори, црцори и чрчори радосно.

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ENGLISH

‘Why the moon travels’

In this excerpt from the short story ‘Why the moon travels’, DeBhairduin tells the story of

Oein DeBhairduin In a time long ago when the earth was young, the moon was a disc set in the sky, silent and still. Sometimes, in whispered rumours, it was said the moon would visit. When it did, it took the form of a beautiful lady. Charming and alluring, stern and strong, she was a light unto herself and was kind to those of the earth. She guided many at night with light she borrowed from the day, making sure that none would ever lose their way as they travelled near or far from home. It is told that during her time on earth she met and fell in love with a Mincéir.

He was short of stature, slender and wispy, without a single distinguishing physical feature that would stay in the minds of those who met him. Nevertheless, people's eyes still fell in warmth on him. While he was neither sun nor star, he had a secret glow, expressed in unspoken words and graceful motions.

One night, on his way back from town where he had spent the day sweeping chimneys, he decided to cut through a field to get home more quickly. Although his steps were hurried, he found his sight captured by the moon. She held his lingering gaze, and sensing the want between them, she descended from the sky, slowly changing from a sphere of light to the glowing outline of a figure. He was terrified and turned to flee, but she started singing a low melody, the words of which he didn’t understand but sensed to be kind and welcoming.

He turned back to her and saw her for who she was, not just the moon but a beautiful woman.

She was lovely and fair, with skin like fresh snowflakes and hair like the softest silk, light mixed with grey, like clouds passing through the twilight sky. Her eyes were pale blue, soft as falling snow. She was draped in cloths, dark twilight blue with glints of speckled starlight and backlit in soft copper tones.

38

ITALIAN the moon making a magical appearance on Earth and falling with a Mincéir, an Irish Traveller.

‘Perchè la luna viaggia’ translated by Luna Ciarma

In un tempo molto lontano, quando la terra era ancora giovane, la luna non era che un disco nel cielo, silenziosa e immobile. La gente diceva, sussurando, che la luna sarebbe venuta in visita. Quando lo fece, prese la forma di una bellissima donna. Affascinante e attraente, austera e forte, era una luce per sé stessa, ed era gentile con gli abitanti della terra. Di notte, guidava molte persone con la luce che prendeva in prestito dal giorno, assicurandosi che nessuno perdesse il proprio sentiero mentre viaggiava vicino o lontano da casa. Si narra che durante i suoi periodi trascorsi sulla terra, abbia conosciuto e si sia innamorata di un Mincéir.

Lui era basso e magro, senza un’unica caratteristica che lo distinguesse o che facesse sì che restasse nelle menti di chi lo incontrava. Nonostante ciò, gli occhi delle persone si addolcivano vedendolo. Non era né il sole né una stella, ma possedeva un bagliore segreto, espresso tra parole non dette e movimenti graziosi.

Una notte, mentre tornava a casa dalla città dove aveva passato la giornata a pulire camini, decise di tagliare attraverso un campo per arrivare a casa più velocemente. Nonostante i suoi passi fossero veloci, il suo sguardo fu catturato dalla luna. Lei mantenne lo sguardo e, sentendo il desiderio tra di loro, discese dal cielo, trasformandosi lentamente da una sfera di luce in una figura brillante.

Lui era terrorizzato e si voltò per scappare, ma lei iniziò a cantare una dolce melodia di cui non capiva le parole, che però sembravano gentili e accoglienti.

Si girò e la vide per ciò che era, non solo la luna, ma una bellissima donna.

Era incantevole e dalla carnagione chiara, la pelle simile a fiocchi di neve, i capelli di seta morbida con tinte di grigio, come delle nuvole che attraversano il cielo del crepuscolo. I suoi occhi erano di un blu pallido, morbidi come la neve cadente. Era avvolta da un tessuto blu scuro, maculato di frammenti di stelle e illuminato da soffici toni ramati.

39

ITALIAN

‘Galassie’ Antonella Anedda

ENGLISH All epiphanies in Anedda’s Historiae– whether in the kitchen, a private journal, through the sliver of a curtain, or on the world stage – take place in a sidereal light.

‘Galaxies’ translated by Lucy McCabe

(perché mi vinse il lume d’esta stella Dante, Paradiso, IX, 33) Sognavo di osservare la terra da lontano, vedevo i prati, la luna, la risacca e come ogni marea scalzasse terra dall’acqua.

Volevo raggiungere Saturno, il mio pianeta di fuoco e piombo, dunque nutrivo la malinconia.

Ruotavo nella nebbia per cercarti ed eri giú tra i vivi. Amavi chi non ero o non sarei mai stata ma là nel vuoto, in quella luce siderale vedevo l’autunno che filava foglie di verde-rame, sentivo il tonfo del vento su un lenzuolo mentre una voce chiamava un’altra voce e questa rispondeva qualcosa nella sera che avanzava con l’ombra sulle sedie.

Ero lassú già in gloria, già vinta dai lumi tra i pianeti eppure mi struggevo ancora viva d’invidia per la vita (‘because overcome by the radiance of that star’ Dante, Paradise, IX, 33) In dreams I observed the earth from afar, I saw fields, the moon, the surf and how every tide sapped up earth into water.

I wanted to reach Saturn, my planet of fire and lead, so I nurtured melancholy.

I spun circles in the fog in search of you and there you were among the living. You loved who I was not and would never become but there in the void, in that sidereal light I saw the autumn sweep up brass-green leaves, I heard the wind crash against a sheet while a voice called out for another voice and was answered by something in the evening which charged with the shadows onto chairs.

I was up there in glory, already overcome by the lights between planets and still I pined away, alight with envy for life.

40

‘Solas Diaga’, Alexander Fay

‘the body playlist’, Meghan Flood

41

FRENCH

‘Solo de lune’ Jules Laforgue Je fume, étalé face au ciel, Sur l'impériale de la diligence, Ma carcasse est cahotée, mon âme danse Comme un Ariel ; Sans miel, sans fiel, ma belle âme danse, Ô routes, coteaux, ô fumées, ô vallons, Ma belle âme, ah ! récapitulons.

Nous nous aimions comme deux fous, On s'est quitté sans en parler, Un spleen me tenait exilé, Et ce spleen me venait de tout. Bon. Ses yeux disaient : " Comprenez-vous ? " Pourquoi ne comprenez-vous pas ? " Mais nul n'a voulu faire le premier pas, Voulant trop tomber ensemble à genoux.

(Comprenez-vous ?)

Où est-elle à cette heure ?

Peut-être qu'elle pleure....

Où est-elle à cette heure ?

Oh ! du moins, soigne-toi, je t'en conjure !

42

Jules Laforgue prefigured Modernism with his literaryimpressionist psychological portraits. Here he delineates the unfurling of thoughts and sable Des mers où d'autres ont vu se baigner son corps ; Tout n'en va pas moins à la Mort, Y a pas de port.

Des ans vont passer là-dessus, On s'endurcira chacun pour soi, Et bien souvent et déjà je m'y vois, On se dira : " Si j'avais su.... " Mais mariés de même, ne se fût-on pas dit : " Si j'avais su, si j'avais su ! ... "?

Ah ! rendez-vous maudit !

Ah ! mon cœur sans issue ! ...

Je me suis mal conduit.

Maniaques de bonheur, Donc, que ferons-nous ? Moi de mon âme, Elle de sa faillible jeunesse ? Ô vieillissante pécheresse, Oh ! que de soirs je vais me rendre infâme En ton honneur !

Ô fraîcheur des bois le long de la route, Ô châle de mélancolie, toute âme est un peu aux écoutes, Que ma vie Fait envie !

Cette impériale de diligence tient de la magie.

Ses yeux clignaient : " Comprenez-vous ? " Pourquoi ne comprenez-vous pas ? " Mais nul n'a fait le premier pas Pour tomber ensemble à genoux. Ah !...

Accumulons l'irréparable !

Renchérissons sur notre sort !

Les étoiles sont plus nombreuses que le

On a dépassé les filatures, les scieries, Plus que les bornes kilométriques, De petits nuages d'un rose de confiserie,

La Lune se lève, Ô route en grand rêve !...

ENGLISH replaying of dialogue while riding the night coach, building to an epiphany about a man’s failed love in the terrible and paralytic clarity of hindsight.

‘Solo by the Light of the Moon’

Smoking, face craned to the sky, Tightly nestled on the upper deck of the coach, I am jostled, and my soul makes its approach To a dance of Ariel.

Neither honeyed nor bilious, its choreographies…

Roads and hills. Smokes and valleys.

Ah, my soul, my soul, let us recollect, and ponder at our ease…

Ah… The woods’ crisp breeze runs along the road, The melancholy shawl falls ’round me, And every soul seems to listen out.

Ah… How life’s fire spurs desire!

This coach seat holds a magic most discrete.

We loved one another like two taken thralls, We left one another without a word spoken.

Spleen holds me, exiled, its grip unbroken, And it is from each and all that this spleen falls…

And her eyes said: “Do you not understand?”

“Why don’t you understand?”

But we could neither of us stand to make a stand, Wishing so to fall together to our knees, unplanned.

(Do you understand?)

And where is she at this hour?

Perhaps her tears fall to the floor…

Oh! Where is she at this hour?

Take care of yourself, at least, That I do implore.

translated by Seoirse Swanton

Let us gather then, what can never be made right, Probe deeper still into our sorry plight.

The stars are, indeed, more numerous than the sands Of seas of other lands, Where the bathing of her body has greeted others’ sight.

In any case life cannot but set into its night, And death, ever ready, asserts only his right.

The years’ procession will pass us overhead We’ll steel ourselves, grown, each, a little dead, And already I see us saying each to each, “If I had only known…”

But married, all the same, would we not have said: “If I had only known, If I had only known…”?

Damned rendez-vous!

Ah, with my cul-de-sac of a heart.

43

FRENCH

Cependant qu'un fin croissant de lune se lève, Ô route de rêve, ô nulle musique....

Dans ces bois de pins où depuis Le commencement du monde Il fait toujours nuit, Que de chambres propres et profondes !

Oh ! pour un soir d'enlèvement !

Et je les peuple et je m'y vois, Et c'est un beau couple d'amants, Qui gesticulent hors la loi.

Et je passe et les abandonne, Et me recouche face au ciel, La route tourne, je suis Ariel, Nul ne m'attend, je ne vais chez personne, je n'ai que l'amitié des chambres d'hôtel.

La lune se lève, Ô route en grand rêve ! Ô route sans terme, Voici le relais, Où l'on allume les lanternes, Où l'on boit un verre de lait, Et fouette postillon, Dans le chant des grillons, Sous les étoiles de juillet. … Ô Solo de lune, Vous défiez ma plume, Oh ! cette nuit sur la route ; Ô Etoiles, vous êtes à faire peur, Vous y êtes toutes ! toutes ! Ô fugacité de cette heure...

Oh ! qu'il y eût moyen De m'en garder l'âme pour l'automne qui vient !...

Voici qu'il fait très très-frais, Oh ! si à la même heure, Elle va de même le long des forêts, 44

Noyer son infortune Dans les noces du clair de lune !...

(Elle aime tant errer tard !)

Elle aura oublié son foulard, Elle va prendre mal, vu la beauté de l'heure !

Oh ! soigne-toi je t'en conjure !

Oh ! je ne veux plus entendre cette toux !

Ah ! que ne suis-je tombé à tes genoux !

Ah ! que n'as-tu défailli à mes genoux !

J'eusse été le modèle des époux !

Comme le frou-frou de ta robe est le modèle des frou-frou.

I have followed the wrong way, from the very start.

Drunk with joy, What measures would we, then, deploy?

Me with my soul, Her with her fallible youth?

Oh, aging sinner, I will render myself infamous, so many evenings over, And all in your honour.

Her eyes blinked: “Do you not understand?”

“Why don’t you understand?”

But we could neither of us stand to make a stand, Wishing so to fall together to our knees, unplanned.

The moon rises; the road is in full dreaming.

The sawmills and the spinning mills have been passed, Beyond the milestones left along the road, Little clouds of confectionary pink-rose, While the fine-edged crescent of the moon rises, O road of reverie, without music’s sound…

In these pinewoods, night has held, Since the beginning of the world, As in rooms proper and profound!

Oh, if I could but recapture a night of full rapture!

Populating such rooms, I see myself there as if through some aperture, And they are a pretty pair of lovers there, Forming gestures outside the law, without a care…

I pass on, and they are gone.

I lie, face looking to the sky,

ENGLISH

The road turns; I am Ariel by and by.

No one awaits me. I will make no visits.

A series of hotel rooms is all I have for amity.

The moon rises; the road is in full dreaming.

The road without end, See here the stops, Where the lanterns are lit, Where a glass of milk is had, And the postilion whips, Amid the cricket-song, Under stars of July’s sky. …

O solo of the moon, Still you defy my quill!

Oh, this night, on the road; Stars… you inspire fear, You are all in your sphere.

This hour will soon be gone…

If I had but some way to save my soul For this coming autumn…

It has grown cold.

What if she, just the same, tonight, Forayed along the wooded way, to drown her sorrows In weddings of moonlight?

(She does so like to wander late.)

She will have forgotten her scarf, She will have taken ill, having seen such beauty as the hour had in store, Take care of yourself, please, that I do implore.

I do not wish to hear that cough anymore…

Ah! Why did I not fall at your knees!

And why did you not fall at mine!

I would have been the model spouse in everything, As the rustling of your dress is the model of rustling!

45

ITALIAN

‘A Zacinto’ Ugo Foscolo

ENGLISH

‘To Zakynthos’ translated by Martina Giambanco

Epiphany intertwines with the theme of exile in this Pre-Romantic sonnet.

The poet’s existential experience of displacement brings him to remember his motherland, whose recollection suddenly awakens him to the truth of his fate. Unlike Ulysses’ Ithaca, the memory of beloved Zakynthos tragically manifests to Foscolo the reality of his death away from home.

Né più mai toccherò le sacre sponde Ove il mio corpo fanciulletto giacque, Zacinto mia, che te specchi nell’onde Del greco mar da cui vergine nacque Venere, e fea quelle isole feconde Col suo primo sorriso, onde non tacque Le tue limpide nubi e le tue fronde L’inclito verso di colui che l’acque Cantò fatali, ed il diverso esiglio Per cui bello di fama e di sventura Baciò la sua petrosa Itaca Ulisse.

Tu non altro che il canto avrai del figlio, O materna mia terra; a noi prescrisse Il fato illacrimata sepoltura.

46

Nor will I ever touch the sacred shores again Where my childlike body laid, My Zakynthos, reflecting yourself in the waves of the Greek sea whence virgin was born Venus, and made those islands fecund With her first smile, and your clear clouds and fronds did not omit the illustrious verse of the one who of the fatal Waters sang, and the different exile for which, made known by fame and misfortune Ulysses kissed his rocky Ithaca.

You will have nothing but the song of the son, O my maternal land; to us fate prescribed unwept burial.

‘floating lament, sinking acceptance’, Meghan Flood 47

FRENCH

Misérable miracle: la mescaline Henri Michaux

In Miserable Miracle, Michaux poetically documents his experimentation with the mindaltering drug mescaline. This excerpt recounts the time he mistakenly took six times the

On m’avait parlé de visions dans le cristal. (Mais là aussi j’avais dû mal comprendre, imaginant que je pourrais transférer les visions de ma tête au cristal.) Je pris donc la boule préparée, à côté de moi, la tournai et la retournai dans ma main, je me souviens, avec embarras, comme fait un enfant avec un objet nouveau, ne sachant s’en servir et si ça en vaut la peine, et prêt à le reposer. Ainsi j’allais faire, lui ayant déjà fait prendre inutilement trois ou quatre positions où j’avais vu tout juste mes doigts agrandis par la réfraction, quand...JE COULAI. {La plongée} Ce fut une plongée instantanée. Je fermai les yeux pour retrouver les visions, mais c’était inutile, je le savais, c’était fini. J’étais coupé de ce circuit. Perdu dans une profondeur surprenante, je ne bougeais plus. Quelques secondes s’écoulèrent dans cette stupeur.

Et soudain les vagues innombrables de l’océan mescalinien qui débouchaient sur moi me renversaient. Me renversaient, me renversaient, me renversaient, me renversaient, me renversaient. Ça n'allait plus finir, plus jamais. {Dans la vibration du ravage} J’étais seul dans la vibration du ravage, sans périphérie, sans annexe, homme-cible qui n’arrive plus à rentrer dans ses bureaux.

Qu’avais-je fait? Plongeant, je m’étais rejoint, je crois (footnote) en mon fond, et coïncidais avec moi, non plus observateur-voyeur, mais moi revenu à moi et, là-dessus en plein sur nous, le typhon.

La boule de cristal ne fit peut-être que hâter ma perte. De toute façon j’allais être renversé. Ou non? Je ne saurai jamais.

Cependant les objets du dehors avaient sensiblement repris leurs couleurs naturelles.

L’excitation optique c’est comme si elle avait disparu. Tout rentrait dans l’ordre, sauf moi.

Ce que ça peut être atroce, atroce en essence, je ne trouve aucun moyen de le dire et me sense comme un faussaire de l’essayer.

Là où l’on n’est rien d’autre, que son être propre, c’était là. Là, follement vite, des centaines de lignes de force peignaient mon être, qui jamais assez vite n’arrivait à se reconstituer, qui au moment de se reconstituer, par un nouveau rang de lignes en râteau était 48

ENGLISH normal dose and experienced an epiphany in which he ‘became’ a line in suspended space, for him a painful and highly revelatory experience.

Miserable Miracle translated by Danielle Plunkett

I​​ had been told about visions in crystal balls. (But I must have misunderstood this concept too, imagining that I could transfer the visions in my head to the crystal.) So I picked up the ball, turned it over a few times in my hands, I remember, with confusion, like a child with a newfound thing, not knowing its purpose or if it was worth bothering with, ready to put it back down. That is exactly what I was about to do, having found it useless after looking at it in three or four different positions and having seen only my fingers enlarged by the refraction, when...I WENT UNDER. The plunge was immediate. I closed my eyes to recall the visions, but it was useless, I knew, they were gone. I had been cut from that circuit. Lost in a surprising depth, I no longer moved. A few seconds went by in this stupor. And suddenly the innumerable waves of the mescalinian ocean crashed over me, and knocked me down. Knocked me down, over and over and over and over and over. It was never going to end, not ever. I was alone in the vibration of the ravaging, without periphery, without annex, a manturned-target with no hope of return.

What had I done? Plunging in my own depths, I had, I believe, joined myself, and coincided with myself, no longer voyeur-observer, but my self returned to me--and, with that, the typhoon was directly upon us.

All the crystal ball did, perhaps, was hasten my downfall. I was going to be knocked over no matter what. Or maybe not--I will never know.

However, the objects outside had noticeably regained their natural colors.

As for the optical excitement, it was as if it had disappeared. Everything returned to order, except me.

How atrocious, how fundamentally atrocious it can be, I haven’t the means to describe it, and even trying to make me feel like a liar.

There, where one is nothing else, nothing but themself, it was there. Insanely fast, hundreds of lines of force combed my being, which was never able to reconstitute itself quickly enough for, right when it would begin to reintegrate, a new rake of new lines would rake it over, and then again, and then again. (Will this last all my life, now that it 49

FRENCH

ratissé, et puis encore, et puis encore. {Ce qui ratisse l’âme.} (Est-ce que ça va durer toute la vie, maintenant que c’est amorcé, maintenant que je me trouve dans le chemin par où ça passe?)

En un flash je me rappelais cette si remarquable allure des démentes échevelées, que non pas le vent seul rend ainsi ou les mains divagantes, ou l’incurie, mais l’impérative nécessité intérieure de traduire, au moins comme cela, le rapide, l’infernal peignage-dépeignage de leur être indéfiniment martyrisé, traversé, tréfilé.

Ainsi, et toujours à cette incessante, inhumaine vitesse, j’étais assailli, percé par la taupe électrique forant son chemin dans le plus personnel de l’essence de ma personne.

----------Pris, non dans de l’humain, mais dans une sorte de frénétique agitateur mécanique, dans un malaxeur-broyeur-émieteur, traité comme métal dans une usine, comme eau dans une turbine, comme vent dans une soufflerie, comme racine dans un défibreuse automatique, comme le fer sous le mouvement infatigable de fraises d’acier à tailler des engrenages. Mais je devais veiller, moi!

Comme une fauvette dans le sillage tourbillonnant des hélices d’un quadrimoteur, comme une fourmi plaquée sous les eaux écrasantes d’une vanne d’écoulement, comme je ne sais quoi, comme personne.

Intense au-delà de l’intense, ce combat, moi actif, comme jamais, me dépassant miraculeusement, mais dépassé hors de toute proportion par le phénomène disloquant.

L’horreur était surtout en ce que je n’étais qu’une ligne. Dans la vie normale, on est une sphère, une sphère qui découvre des panoramas. On passe en château d’une minute à l’autre, on passe sans cesse d’un château à un nouveau château, telle est la vie de l’homme, même le plus pauvre, la vie de l’homme au mental sain. {Quand on n’est plus qu’une ligne} Ici seulement une ligne. Une ligne qui se brise en mille aberrations. La lanière du fouet d’un charretier en fureur, c’eût été pour moi du repos. Pas d’apitoiement non plus. L’accéléré linéaire, que j’étais devenu, ne reculait pas, faisait front à chaque déchiquetage, était pour se reformer, allait presque se reformer, quand la force sur lui plus rapide qu’un bolide...C’était atroce, parce que je résistais.

De l’émotion? Je ne pouvais même pas reculer dans l’émotion. La diffusion naturelle des émotions qui vont au coeur lequel vient à battre plus précipitamment ou plus gravement, ainsi qu’aux poumons dont la respiration se met à changer, ne se faisait pas.

50

has begun, now that I find myself in its path?)

ENGLISH

In a flash I remembered that disheveled look specific to mad women, that the wind alone does not make so, or rambling hands, or carelessness, but the imperative interior need to translate, at least in this way, the rapid and infernal combing-uncombing of their entire being, indefinitely martyred, crossed, drawn like a wire through a die.

Thus, and always at this incessant, inhuman speed, I was besieged, pierced by the electric tunneller drilling its way into the most personal, essential part of my being.

----------Caught, not in anything human, but in a sort of wildly intense mechanical agitator, in a kneader-grinder-crusher, treated like metal in a factory, like water in a turbine, like air in a wind tunnel, like roots in an automatic shredder, like iron under the indefatigable movement of steel reamers cutting gear teeth. But as for me, I had to take care!

Like a warbler in the whirling wake of the propeller of a four-engine aircraft, like an ant flattened under the crushing waters of a drain valve, like I don’t know what, like nobody.

Intense beyond intense, this fight--me active as ever, surpassing myself miraculously, but surpassed out of all proportion by the dislocating phenomenon.

More than anything, the horror was that I was nothing more than a line. In normal life, one is a sphere, a sphere that encounters different views. We go in luxury from one minute to another, ceaselessly going from one castle to a new castle, such is the life of man, even the poorest one, the life of the mentally sound man. {When one is no more than a line} Now only a line. A line that breaks into a thousand deviations.

A lash from the whip of an angry cart driver would have been a moment’s respite for me. No pity either. The accelerated line which I had become did not withdraw, facing up to each shredding; it was going to re-form, was on the precipice of re-forming when the force upon it, quicker than a meteor, crashed down at supersonic speed...it was agony, because I resisted.

And as for emotion? I could not even retreat into emotion. The natural diffusion of the emotions that go to the heart, which comes to beat more rapidly or more severely, as well as to the lungs whose breathing starts to change, was not happening. I would notice it ten days later when, while at the cinema seeing a drama otherwise ordinary 51

FRENCH

Je le remarquai dix jours plus tard quand, assistant au cinéma à un drame pourtant ordinaire en ces lieux, j’eus une émotion “qui pénétra ma poitrine”. Dans mes jours d’horreur, j’avais oublié ce chemin, ce confort.

---D'être devenu une ligne était catastrophique, mais c'était , si c’est possible encore plus inattendu, prodigieux. Tout moi devait passer par cette ligne. Et par ses secousses épouvantables.

La métaphysique, saisie par la mécanique.

‘Gabriel is blue’, Penny Stuart 52

ENGLISH

in such a place, I had an emotion “that pierced my chest”. In my days of horror, I had forgotten this pathway, this comfort.

Becoming a line was catastrophic, but it was (if it’s possible) even more of a shock, sensational. All of me had to pass through this line and its appalling tremors.

The metaphysical, seized by the mechanical.

‘Gabriel Frog Prince’, Penny Stuart

53

ENGLISH

‘Je t’aime’ Michael Hartnett

SPANISH

‘Je t’aime’ translated by Eoghan Conway

Hartnett comments on the nature of the love yet comes to the realisation that many do not possess the same intensity of a relationship he has. His realisation is seen in the unhappy faces of the girls in this poem and in the looming deception. His moment of revelation comes at the expense of others.

My darling, love ends abruptly, like a country road.

There is no time to cry, lilies open, white and broad, in the parks; like delicate footsteps of spring they quiver.

And our sad walk will bring us to the river and a hundred unsophisticated girls will cry at coffee tables; and our sad walk will bring us to museums And a hundred unsophisticated girls will wilt there, like Greek fables in marble.

Look at the trees and smile, my darling: there is always another deceiver.

Mi cariño, el amor termina repentinamente, como un camino rural.

No hay tiempo para llorar, los lirios abren, blancos y anchos, en los parques; como los paseos delicados de la primavera tiemblan.

Y nuestros paseos tristes van a llevarnos al río y cien niñas poco sofisticadas van a llorar en las mesas de los cafés; y nuestros paseos tristes van a llevarnos a los museos y cien niñas poco sofisticadas van a marchitarse ahí, como fábulas griegas en mármol.

Mira a los arboles Y sonríe, mi cariño: siempre hay otros engañabobos.

‘Éirigh’, Alexander Fay 54

ITALIAN

‘Rivelazione’ Giorgio Caproni

ENGLISH

‘Revelation’ translated by Silvia Fini

Giorgio Caproni was an Italian poet, writer, translator, literary critic and teacher. His poetry tries to embed the fleeting essence of reality into simple but striking fragmented verses. In ‘Rivelazione’ Caproni suddenly realises he is the only one responsible for all his decisions and mistakes, a painful but necessary epiphany.

Mi sono risolto.

Mi sono voltato indietro.

Ho scorto uno per uno negli occhi i miei assassini.

Hanno – tutti quanti – il mio volto.

I have decided.

I’ve turned back around.

I have descried the face of each one of my assassins.

They – all of them – have my eyes.

‘Gabriel Dearg’, Penny Stuart 55

ITALIAN

Il treno ha fischiato Luigi Pirandello

The 20th-century literary phenomenon of epiphany finds expression in Italian Modernism in this novella by Luigi Pirandello.

The whistle of a train suddenly leads Belluca, a model employee,

Farneticava. Principio di febbre cerebrale, avevano detto i medici; e lo ripetevano tutti i compagni d’ufficio, che ritornavano a due, a tre, dall’ospizio, ov’erano stati a visitarlo.

Pareva provassero un gusto particolare a darne l’annunzio coi termini scientifici, appresi or ora dai medici, a qualche collega ritardatario che incontravano per via: [...]

Morrà? Impazzirà?

Mah! Morire, pare di no…

Ma che dice? che dice?

Sempre la stessa cosa. Farnetica…

Povero Belluca!

E a nessuno passava per il capo che, date le specialissime condizioni in cui quell’infelice viveva da tant’anni, il suo caso poteva anche essere naturalissimo; e che tutto ciò che Belluca diceva e che pareva a tutti delirio, sintomo della frenesia, poteva anche essere la spiegazione più semplice di quel suo naturalissimo caso.

Veramente, il fatto che Belluca, la sera avanti, s’era fieramente ribellato al suo capo-ufficio, e che poi, all’aspra riprensione di questo, per poco non gli s’era scagliato addosso, dava un serio argomento alla supposizione che si trattasse d’una vera e propria alienazione mentale.

Perché uomo più mansueto e sottomesso, più metodico e paziente di Belluca non si sarebbe potuto immaginare [...] Già s’era presentato, la mattina, con un’aria insolita, nuova; e - cosa veramente enorme, paragonabile, che so? al crollo d’una montagna - era venuto con più di mezz’ora di ritardo [...]

Così ilare, d’una ilarità vaga e piena di stordimento, s’era presentato all’ufficio. E, tutto il giorno, non aveva combinato niente.

La sera, il capo-ufficio, entrando nella stanza di lui, esaminati i registri, le carte: E come mai? Che hai combinato tutt’oggi?

Belluca lo aveva guardato sorridente, quasi con un’aria d’impudenza, aprendo le mani.

Che significa? - aveva allora esclamato il capo-ufficio, accostandoglisi e prendendolo per una spalla e scrollandolo. - Ohé, Belluca!

Niente, - aveva risposto Belluca, sempre con quel sorriso tra d’impudenza e d’imbecillità su le labbra. - Il treno, signor Cavaliere.

Il treno? Che treno?

Ha fischiato.

Ma che diavolo dici?

Stanotte, signor Cavaliere. Ha fischiato. L’ho sentito fischiare…

56

ENGLISH to unexplainably rebel against his boss and work duties…has he gone mad? Only one of his colleagues seems to understand the truth…

The train has whistled translated by Martina Giambanco

He was raving. The principle of a cerebral fever, the doctors had said; and all the office mates were repeating it, returning in two and three from the hospice, where they had been to visit him. It looked like they felt a particular relish in announcing it with the scientific terms, just learned from the doctors, to some latecomer colleague they met on the way: [...]

Will he die? Will he go mad?

Mah! Dying, apparently not…

But what is he saying? What is he saying?

Always the same thing. He raves…

Poor Belluca!

It did not enter anyone’s head that, given the most special conditions in which that unhappy man had been living for many years, his case could have as well been the most natural; and that every single thing Belluca said and that seemed delirious to everyone else, a symptom of frenzy, could as well have been the most simple explanation of that most natural case of his.

In reality, the fact that Belluca, the night before, had proudly rebelled against his boss, and that after, in response to the bitter reprehension of this one, he had nearly gotten at his throat, gave a serious point to the supposition that it was a case of genuine and actual mental alienation.

For a man meeker and more submissive, more methodical and patient than Belluca, one could have never been able to imagine [...] He had even showed up to the office, in the morning, with an unusual air, new; and - truly a huge deal, comparable to, I don’t know? the collapse of a mountain - he had arrived more than half an hour late [...]

This cheerful, of a cheer vague and full of dizziness, he had shown up to the office.

And, all day, he had not done anything.

In the evening, the office boss, coming into his room, examined the registers, the papers: How come? What have you done all day today?

Belluca had looked at him all smiley, almost with an air of impudence, opening his hands.

What does this mean? - had then exclaimed the boss, approaching him and grabbing him by his shoulder and shaking him. - Ohé, Belluca!

Nothing, - had responded Belluca, always with that smile between impudence and imbecility on his lips. -The train, Sir Cavaliere!

57

ITALIAN

Il treno?

Sissignore. E se sapesse dove sono arrivato! In Siberia… oppure oppure… nelle foreste del Congo… Si fa in un attimo, signor Cavaliere!

Gli altri impiegati, alle grida del capo-ufficio imbestialito, erano entrati nella stanza e, sentendo parlare così Belluca, giù risate da pazzi.

Allora il capo-ufficio - che quella sera doveva essere il malumore - urtato da quelle risate, era montato su tutte le furie e aveva malmenato la mansueta vittima di tanti suoi scherzi crudeli.

Se non che, questa volta, la vittima, con stupore e quasi con terrore di tutti, s’era ribellata, aveva inveito, gridando sempre quella stramberia del treno che aveva fischiato, e che, perdio, ora non più, ora ch’egli aveva sentito fischiare il treno, non poteva più, non voleva più esser trattato a quel modo.

Lo avevano a viva forza preso, imbracato e trascinato all’ospizio dei matti.

Seguitava ancora, qua, a parlare di quel treno. Ne imitava il fischio. Oh, un fischio assai lamentoso, come lontano, nella notte; accorato. E, subito dopo, soggiungeva: Si parte, si parte… Signori, per dove? per dove?

E guardava tutti con occhi che non erano più i suoi. Quegli occhi, di solito cupi, senza lustro, aggrottati, ora gli ridevano lucidissimi, come quelli d’un bambino o d’un uomo felice; e frasi senza costrutto gli uscivano dalle labbra. Cose inaudite; espressioni poetiche, immaginose, bislacche, che tanto più stupivano, in quanto non si poteva in alcun modo spiegare come, per qual prodigio, fiorissero in bocca a lui, cioè a uno che finora non s’era mai occupato d’altro che di cifre e registri e cataloghi, rimanendo come cieco e sordo alla vita: macchinetta di computisteria. [...]

Cammin facendo verso l’ospizio ove il poverino era stato ricoverato, seguitai a riflettere per conto mio: « A un uomo che viva come Belluca finora ha vissuto, cioè una vita “impossibile”, la cosa più ovvia, l’incidente più comune, un qualunque lievissimo inciampo impreveduto, che so io, d’un ciottolo per via, possono produrre effetti straordinari, di cui nessuno si può dar la spiegazione, se non pensa appunto che la vita di quell’uomo è “impossibile”. Bisogna condurre la spiegazione là, riattaccandola a quelle condizioni di vita impossibili, ed essa apparirà allora semplice e chiara [...] » Ebbene, signori: a Belluca, in queste condizioni, era accaduto un fatto naturalissimo.

Quando andai a trovarlo all’ospizio, me lo raccontò lui stesso, per filo e per segno. Era, sì, ancora esaltato un po’, ma naturalissimamente, per ciò che gli era accaduto. Rideva dei medici e degli infermieri e di tutti i suoi colleghi, che lo credevano impazzito.

Magari! - diceva. - Magari!

Signori, Belluca, s’era dimenticato da tanti e tanti anni - ma proprio dimenticato - che il mondo esisteva.

Assorto nel continuo tormento di quella sua sciagurata esistenza, assorto tutto il giorno nei conti del suo ufficio, senza mai un momento di respiro, come una bestia bendata, aggiogata alla stanga d’una nòria o d’un molino, sissignori, s’era dimenticato da anni e anni - ma proprio dimenticato - che il mondo esisteva.

Due sere avanti, buttandosi a dormire stremato su quel divanaccio, forse per l’eccessiva 58

ENGLISH

The train? What train?

It whistled.

What the hell are you talking about?

Tonight, Sir. It whistled. I heard it whistle…

The train?

Yessir. And if only you knew where I arrived! In Siberia…. or…or…in the forests of Congo…it takes a second, Sir! The other employees, to the screams of the furious boss, had entered the room and, hearing Belluca speaking this way, fell down in manic laughter.

Thus the boss - who that night must have been in a bad mood - offended by those laughs, had flown off the handle and had beaten the tame victim of many of his cruel jokes.

If not that, this time, the victim, with wonder and almost terror of everyone else, had rebelled, had railed against him, always screaming that weirdness of the train that had whistled and that, for God’s sake, now not anymore, now that he had heard the train whistle, he could not, he did not want to be treated that way anymore.

They had taken him by live force, harnessed him and dragged him to the psychiatric hospital.

He continued to talk, there, about that train. He imitated its whistle. Oh, a whistle much mournful, as if far away, in the night; heartfelt. And, immediately after, he added: Time to leave, time to leave…Gentlemen, for where? for where?

And he looked at everyone with eyes that were no longer his own. Those eyes, usually gloomy, without lustre, furrowing, now were lit up with laughter, shining, like those of a child or a happy man; and sentences without structure came out of his lips. Things inconceivable; poetic expressions, imaginative, bizarre, that were all the more surprising, for it could not be explained in any way how, in virtue of what prodigy, they bloomed in his mouth, that is, in someone who until now had never taken care of anything else but numbers and registers and catalogues, remaining like blind and deaf towards life: an accounting machine.

Walking towards the hospice where the poor man had been admitted, I kept reflecting on my own: ‘To a man who lives the way Belluca has lived until now, that is, an “impossible” life, the most obvious thing, the most common incident, any slightest, unforeseen, obstacle whatsoever, I don’t know, a pebble on the way, can produce extraordinary effects, of which nobody can give himself an explanation, if one does not think indeed that the life of that man is “impossible”. One must trace the explanation there, tying it back to those impossible conditions of life, and it will become then clear and simple [...]’

Well, gentlemen: to Belluca, in those conditions, a most natural event had happened.

When I went to visit him at the hospice, he narrated it to me himself, word for word.

He was, yes, a bit exalted still, but in the most natural way, for what had happened to him. He laughed at the doctors and the nurses and at all his colleagues, who believed he had gone mad.

I wish! - he said. - I wish! [...]

59

ITALIAN

stanchezza, insolitamente, non gli era riuscito d’addormentarsi subito. E, d’improvviso, nel silenzio profondo della notte, aveva sentito, da lontano, fischiare un treno.

Gli era parso che gli orecchi, dopo tant’anni, chi sa come, d’improvviso gli si fossero sturati.

Il fischio di quel treno gli aveva squarciato e portato via d’un tratto la miseria di tutte quelle sue orribili angustie, e quasi da un sepolcro scoperchiato s’era ritrovato a spaziare anelante nel vuoto arioso del mondo che gli si spalancava enorme tutt’intorno.

S’era tenuto istintivamente alle coperte che ogni sera si buttava addosso, ed era corso col pensiero dietro a quel treno che s’allontanava nella notte.

C’era, ah! c’era, fuori di quella casa orrenda, fuori di tutti i suoi tormenti, c’era il mondo, tanto, tanto mondo lontano, a cui quel treno s’avviava…Firenze, Bologna, Torino, Venezia… tante città, in cui egli da giovine era stato e che ancora, certo, in quella notte sfavillavano di luci sulla terra. Sì, sapeva la vita che vi si viveva! La vita che un tempo vi aveva vissuto anche lui! E seguitava, quella vita; aveva sempre seguitato, mentr’egli qua, come una bestia bendata, girava la stanga del molino. Non ci aveva pensato più! Il mondo s’era chiuso per lui, nel tormento della sua casa, nell’arida, ispida angustia della sua computisteria… Ma ora, ecco, gli rientrava, come per travaso violento, nello spirito. L’attimo, che scoccava per lui, qua, in questa sua prigione, scorreva come un brivido elettrico per tutto il mondo, e lui con l’immaginazione d’improvviso risvegliata poteva, ecco, poteva seguirlo per città note e ignote, lande, montagne, foreste, mari… Questo stesso brivido, questo stesso palpito del tempo. [...]

E, dunque, lui ora che il mondo gli era rientrato nello spirito poteva in qualche modo consolarsi! Sì, levandosi ogni tanto dal suo tormento, per prendere con l’immaginazione una boccata d’aria nel mondo. [...]

Ora che il treno ha fischiato…

60

ENGLISH

Engrossed in the continuous torment of that wretched existence of his, engrossed all day in the accounts of his office, without ever having a moment to breathe, like a blindfolded beast, yoked to the pole of a well or a mill, yes gentlemen, he had forgotten from years and years - actually forgotten - that the world existed.

Two nights before, throwing himself, exhausted, to sleep on his awful couch, perhaps due to the excessive tiredness, unusually, he had not been able to fall asleep straight away. And, all of a sudden, in the profound silence of the night, he had heard, from far away, a train whistle.

It had seemed to him that his ears, after many years, who knows how, had unclogged all at once.

The whistle of that train had torn apart and taken away all of a sudden the misery of all his horrible anguish, and almost from an uncovered sepulchre he had found himself moving around, yearning, in the airy void of the world that was opening wide, enormous, all around him.

He instinctively grabbed at the blankets that every night he would throw above himself, and he had run with his thoughts after that train that was moving away in the night.

There was, ah! there was, beyond that horrible house, beyond all his torments, there was the world, much, much world far away, towards which that train was going…

Florence, Bologna, Turin, Venice…many cities, in which he had been as a young man and that were still, certainly, during that night, shining with their lights on the earth.

Yes, he knew the kind of life that was lived there! The life that some time ago he had lived himself, too! And it continued, that life; it had always continued, while he was there, like a blindfolded beast, going in circles around the pole of the mill. He had not thought about it anymore! The world had closed for him, in the torment of his home, in the arid, prickly anguish of his accounting office…But now, here is, it re-entered, as if violently poured back, his spirit. The moment, that shot out for him, here, in this prison of his, was flowing like an electric shiver across the whole world, and he could, with his imagination abruptly re-awakened, here, he could follow it across cities known and unknown, moors, mountains, forests, seas…This same shiver, this same throb of time.

And, therefore, now that the world had re-entered his spirit, he could in some way console himself! Yes, getting away every now and then from his torment, to take a breath of fresh air in the world with the imagination. [...]

Now that the train has whistled…

61

FRENCH

La patience des traces Jeanne Benameur

This extract describes the rupture, a broken bowl, in the protagonist's daily routine which prompts him to confront his inner self after dedicating his life to listening

Simon est assis dans sa cuisine, seul. Il vient de ramasser les deux parties d’un vieux bol bleu. Une dans chaque main.

Le bol est tombé sans qu’il s’en rende compte. Il lui a échappé des mains.

Maintenant il regarde par la fenêtre. Les deux moitiés ne pèsent pas le même poids.

On peut jouer toute une vie sur quelque chose de brisé. Il en sait quelque chose.

Il abaisse son regard sur la faïence bleue. Le bol a gardé en empreinte des traces plus sombres malgré les lavages. Depuis si longtemps c’est son bol du matin. Celui du premier café. Quand tout dort encore dans la ville et que lui, déjà, veille.

Le bol des pensées qui se cherchent, pas encore arrimées à la journée. La pensée qui flotte, entre sommeil et éveil. La concentration dont il aura besoin qui prend naissance là. Dans cet entre-deux. Aucun nom encore dans la tête. Aucun cas précis. La couleur du ciel qui apparaît peu à peu, la sensation du froid ou du chaud sous la plante de ses pieds. C’est toujours le même bol entre ses mains, quelle que soit la saison.

Et lui qui songe. Sa liberté du matin.

Après les heures s’enchaînent et les rendez-vous. Drôle de mot quand on y pense. Qui se rend ? et à quoi ? sur ce divan chacun prend le chemin qu’il peut. Et lui, dans son fauteuil, yeux mi-clos ou scrutateurs soudain, il écoute.

Il va partir. Quitter la ville qu’il aime depuis l’enfance.

Son doigt effleure le bord râpeux à l’endroit où la céramique a cédé, comme on caresse le sillon où le collier de l’animal domestique a comprimé le pelage. Il est grand temps. Il pense aux pieds bandés des Chinoises. C’est douloureux quand on laisse le sang circuler à nouveau paraît-il.

Pour la délivrance il faut toujours payer le prix.

Il remet les deux faces l’une contre l’autre. Voilà. C’est parfait. Le bol réapparaît. En 62

ENGLISH to others as a psychoanalyst.

This single moment provokes an epiphanic and sudden desire for freedom.

Echoes from Within translated by Anna Tomlinson

Simon is sitting in the kitchen, alone. He has just picked up the two halves of the old blue bowl. One in each hand.

The bowl fell without him realising it. It slipped out of his hands.

Now he looks out of the window. The two halves do not weigh the same.

You can build your whole life on something broken. He knows something about that.

He lowers his gaze to the blue ceramic. The bowl still has dark marks on it despite all the times he’s washed it. It has been his morning bowl for so long. The first coffee.

When the city is still asleep but he is awake.

The bowl of thoughts which only interact with each other, not yet tied up in the day.

The thoughts that float, between sleeping and waking. The concentration he will need for the day is birthed in this in-between time. No name in mind yet. No specific thought. The colour of the sky appears little by little, the hot or cold sensation on the soles of his feet. It is always the same bowl in his hands, whatever the season.

And he contemplates. His morning freedom.

Later, the hours and appointments come one after the other. A strange word when you think of it. Who is appointing? And to what? On this sofa, everyone takes whatever path they can. And in his armchair, he listens, with half-closed or suddenly searching eyes.

He is going to leave. Leave the city he’s always loved.

His finger brushes the rough edge where the ceramic has eroded, like caressing the groove where a pet’s collar has flattened the fur. It’s about time. He thinks about the bound feet of Chinese women. It seems to be painful when you let the blood flow again.

You always have a price to pay for freedom.

63

apparence, rien ne manque. Mais lui, il connaît la cassure. Il suit des yeux la ligne qui prive désormais l’objet de son utilité. Ce n’est plus un bol. Rien que de la faïence brisée.

Retournés à la matière, même les objets peuvent perdre leur sens.

Simon pose les deux morceaux sur la table de la cuisine puis il fait le geste de les tenir encore entre ses mains. Dans le vide. Le bout de ses doigts se rejoint autour d’une forme qui n’existe plus. Il pense aux mains qui se joignent pour prier. Il n’a jamais pu.

Il revoit alors une fleur délicate de bougainvillier, rose tendre, balayée par le vent sur une terrasse. C’était il y a des années et le souvenir est pourtant si vif. Il l’avait suivie du regard longtemps avant de la ramasser. Elle doit toujours être dans un de ses livres.

Mais la couleur... Déjà sur la terrasse, sans le bleu cru du ciel en arrière-plan, elle perdait son éclat.

Il a tout mis en place pour partir. Depuis des mois il ne prend plus de nouveaux patients. Poursuivre la route avec quelques-uns, jusqu’au terme, les rendez-vous bloqués sur trois jours. Pour deux ou trois autres, indiquer des confrères. Maintenant ça touche à sa fin.

Il est libre. Presque. C’est dans le “presque” que tout se joue. Toujours.

Il suffit parfois d’un bol qui échappe. Ça va s’accélérer.

‘wait, look’, Meghan Flood 64

He puts the two halves together again. That’s it. It’s perfect. The bowl reappears. It looks like nothing is missing. But he knows it is broken. His eyes follow the line that now strips the object of its usefulness. It is no longer a bowl. Nothing but broken crockery.

When returned to matter, even objects can lose their meaning.

Simon puts the two pieces on the kitchen table then gestures as if he is holding them in his hands again. In the emptiness. The tips of his fingers meet around a shape that no longer exists. He thinks of hands that join to pray. He could never do it.

He saw a delicate, soft pink bougainvillaea flower, swept up by the wind on a terrace. It was years ago and yet the memory is still so vivid in his mind. He followed it with his eyes for a long time before he picked it up. It must still be in one of his books. But the colour… on the ground, without the bright blue sky as background, lost its sparkle so quickly.

He has put everything in place to leave. He hasn’t taken on any new patients for months so that he could see it through with the ones he had left. He blocked out three days for meetings. He referred two or three others to colleagues. He can almost see the light.

He is free. Almost. It all comes down to the “almost”. It always does.

Sometimes all it takes is a bowl to slip out of your hands.

65

ENGLISH

‘With All the Love I Had, Which Was Not Enough’

Scríobh Bukowski an dán seo i ndiaidh bás a mhná céile.

Meandar tochtmhar atá ann ina dtuigeann an file gur chuma faoina chroí briste, faoina

Charles Bukowski I pick up the skirt, I pick up the sparkling beads in black, this thing that moved once around flesh, and I call God a liar, I say anything that moved like that or knew my name could never die in the common verity of dying, and I pick up her lovely dress, all her loveliness gone, and I speak to all the gods, Jewish gods, Christ-gods, chips of blinking things, idols, pills, bread, fathoms, risks, knowledgeable surrender, rats in the gravy of two gone quite mad without a chance, hummingbird knowledge, hummingbird chance, I lean upon this, I lean on all of this and I know: her dress upon my arm: but they will not give her back to me.

66

IRISH chuthach, faoina ngrá. Ní fhillfidh a bhean ón mbás. Splanc léargais lom, ionraic agus coscrach is ea ‘For Jane…’ - ba mhór an pléisiúr é a aistriú go Gaeilge.

‘Le Grá mo Chroí, Nárbh Leor É’ aistrithe ag Cuán de Búrca

Tógaim an sciorta den urlár tógaim na cóirníní daoldubha an ruidín seo a bhog timpeall ar fheoil tráth Bréagadóir thú, a Dhia an rud a bhog mar sin, a bhí fios m’ainmne aige, ní fhéadfadh sé dul ar shlí na fírinne an ghnáthfhírinne sin.

Agus tógaim a gúna álainn, a hálainne ar lár, agus cuirim caint ar na déithe ar fad déithe giúdacha, críost-déithe, sliseanna ag spréachaíl, déithe bréige, piollaí, arán, tuiscintí is rioscaí, géilleadh an fhir fheasaigh francaigh i súlach beirte imithe le craobhacha seans ar bith fios luaineach, seans luaineach bainim taca as seo as é seo ar fad agus tuigim: a gúna leagtha ar mo lámh: ach ní thabharfaidh siad ar ais dom í.

67

IRISH

‘Adhlacadh Mo Mháthar’ Séan Ó Ríordáin

FRENCH

‘L'enterrement de Ma Mère’ translated by Álanna Hammel

Similar to James Joyce who popularised the term ‘epiphany’, Ó Ríordáin used what we like to call ‘chomhfhocal’ throughout his work. The speaker of the poem has his own epiphany upon the realisation of his mother’s death.

Grian an Mheithimh in úllghort, Is siosarnach i síoda an tráthnóna, Beach mhallaithe ag portaireacht Mar screadstracadh ar an nóinbhrat.

Seanalitir shalaithe á léamh agam, Le gach focaldeoch dár ólas Pian bhinibeach ag dealgadh mo chléibhse, Do bhrúigh amach gach focal díobh a dheoir féin.

Do chuimhníos ar an láimh a dhein an scríbhinn, Lámh a bhí inaitheanta mar aghaidh, Lámh a thál riamh cneastacht seana-Bhíobla, Lámh a bhí mar bhalsam is tú tinn.

Agus thit an Meitheamh siar isteach sa gheimhreadh, Den úllghort deineadh reilig bhán cois abhann, Is i lár na balbh-bháine i mo thimpeall Do liúigh os ard sa tsneachta an dúpholl, Gile gearrchaile lá a céad chomaoine, Gile abhlainne Dé Domhnaigh ar altóir, Gile bainne ag sreangtheitheadh as na cíocaibh, Nuair a chuireadar mo mháthair, gile an fhóid.

68

Soleil de juin dans le verger, Soie bruissante de l’après-midi, Une méchante abeille que j'entends bourdonner Une larme sur la couverture de midi.

Je lisais une lettre écornée Chaque mot larmoyant que j’ai consommé Une douleur fulgurante poignardant mon côté, Chaque mot, sa propre larme a pleuré.

Se souvenir de la main qui a écrit ces mots, Familiers comme un visage reconnaissable, Comme une bible, elle a éparpillé ces bons rameaux, Une main comme un baume pour les fous.

Et juin bascula à l’envers dans l’hiver, Le verger devient un cimetière blanc au long de la rivière, Au milieu de la blancheur tout autour Un mugissement dans la neige froide et obscure Une fille à sa première communion, sa blancheur La blancheur de l’eau bénite sur l’autel du dimanche Le blanc du liquide sortant des seins Quand ma mère a été enterrée comme la terre si blanche.

ESTONIAN

ENGLISH

‘Kui ma ei kõnele sellest’

‘If I don’t speak about it’

Doris Kareva

translated by Eduardo Torres

This poem expresses a dark epiphany, an obscure revelation that leads to paradox, thus showing that not all realisations are bright and light; some are no more than death ends, the recognition that there is no escape.

“Kui ma ei kõnele sellest, ma suren.

If I don't speak about it, I will die.

Kui tunnistan seda, see tapab mu.

If I confess it, It will kill me.

Taevas, mida ma teen?”

Heaven, what shall I do?

‘Epiphany_2’, Delphine De Luca 69

ENGLISH

SPANISH

‘Ecce Puer’

‘Ecce Puer’

James Joyce

translated by Eoghan Conway

Written at the time during the mourning of his father's death and birth of his grandson, Joyce contrasts the cyclical nature of life. His acknowledgment of personal grief and his guilty plea for forgiveness depicts a man faced with the admission of his own personal inaction.

Of the dark past A child is born; With joy and grief My heart is torn.

Del oscuro pasado Un niño es nacido; Con alegría y pena Mi corazón está desgarrado.

Calm in his cradle The living lies.

May love and mercy Unclose his eyes!

Tranquilo en su cuna Los vivos están acostados. ¡Que el amor y la clemencia Abran sus ojos!

Young life is breathed On the glass; The world that was not Comes to pass.

La vida juvenil es respirado En el cristal; El mundo que no era Viene a pasar.

A child is sleeping: An old man gone.

O, father forsaken, Forgive your son!

Un niño está durmiendo: Un viejo se ha ido.

Ay, padre abandonado, ¡ Perdona a tu hijo!

‘Procreation’, Ellecia Vaughan 70

‘James Joyce’, Ella Sloane

‘epiphany reading’, Ellecia Vaughan 71

SPANISH

‘Desamor’ Rosario Castellanos

ENGLISH

‘Lovelessness’ translated by Eduardo Torres

An epiphany of sorrow and despair, the bleak recognition of worthlessness that echoes deeply and atavistically in these times of plague and war. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

“Me vio como se mira al través de un cristal o del aire o de nada.

[He looked at me as if looking through a crystal or through air or through nothing.

Y entonces supe: yo no estaba allí ni en ninguna otra parte ni había estado nunca ni estaría.

And then I knew: I was not there nor anywhere else nor was I ever there nor would I be.

Y fui como el que muere en la epidemia, sin identificar, y es arrojado a la fosa común.”

And I was like the one who dies in the epidemic, unidentified, and is thrown to the common grave.]

‘An epiphany at the end of the world’, Kanak Agrawal 72

ENGLISH

The Waste Land T. S. Eliot

SPANISH

La Tierra Baldía translated by Octavio Pérez Sánchez

Before the Waste Land can begin to heal, we come to the perilous chapel: the darkest trial, right at the end of the quest. After the cry from a rooster, an echo to the Crucifixion, the long awaited rain finally comes. And so the thunder speaks and reorders the world.

In this decayed hole among the mountains In the faint moonlight, the grass is singing Over the tumbled graves, about the chapel There is the empty chapel, only the wind’s home.

It has no windows, and the door swings, Dry bones can harm no one.

Only a cock stood on the rooftree Co co rico co co rico In a flash of lightning. Then a damp gust Bringing rain Ganga was sunken, and the limp leaves Waited for rain, while the black clouds Gathered far distant, over Himavant.

The jungle crouched, humped in silence.

Then spoke the thunder DA [...]

Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata Shantih shantih shantih

En esta brecha vil en las montañas a la débil luz lunar, la hierba canta sobre hundidas tumbas, junto a la capilla Está la capilla desierta, hogar sólo del viento.

No tiene ventanas, y su puerta oscila, los huesos secos ya a nadie dañan.

Sólo un gallo se irguió en el tejado Ki ki riki ki ki riki ante el relámpago. Después un viento húmedo cargando lluvia Ganga estaba hundido, y las hojas mustias esperaban lluvia, y las nubes negras se reunieron lejos, sobre Himavant.

La selva se encogió, encorvada en silencio.

Entonces habló el trueno DA [...]

Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata Shantih shantih shantih

73

ESTONIAN

‘Meie jälgedest liivas’ Doris Kareva

ENGLISH

‘From our footprints in the sand’ translated by Eduardo Torres

This poem showcases the image of an epiphany, a recognition, a revelation: the world itself as filled with meaning; and the revelation is a pretty simple yet very powerful idea expressed by means of the subtle connotations of the Estonian verb “hoidma”: I am not here to keep you, but to hold you.

"Meie jälgedest liivas sai alguse tsivilisatsioon, sellest keel, valgusekeel, filosoofia, luule.

Taevas, kuidas se tulitas tähendusi!

Ilm sai ilmsiks, lõpuni põles.

Ma ei hoia Sind kinni; ma hoian."

[From our footprints in the sand, civilisation had its origin, from them language, the language of light, philosophy, poetry.

Heaven, how it ignited meanings!

The world became apparent, burning till the end.

I don't keep You; I hold You.]

‘Faoi Láthair’, Alexander Fay 74

CREOLE-ENGLISH

CUBAN-SPANISH

‘Epiphaneia’

‘Epifaneia’

Richard Georges

translated by Yairen Jerez Columbié

How else do we know that we are alive?

Channel a way for yourself through this world; warm your bones; make life amidst the strife.

What are poems but prayers? An unfurling of hope, wonder — the words come like a gale about my head. And then the waves of tributes.

Another gone.

Now Shabine, make your books our gaol.

See the streaking swift, hollow your canoe.

Out there on the blue, good poet, dance.

I’ll stand here, my hand shielding my eyes from the reddening sun, until the old man’s salted head slips under the horizon.

What am I to do with all that you give, except to fight, to work, to love, to live?

Epiphaneia was the name of the several times destroyed city of Hama, Syria, and a Greek term indicating the gods’ advent to help. Set in the aftermath of the 2017 hurricane season in the Caribbean, the poem is an ode to the resilience of a region that is a constant revelation.

¿De qué otra forma saber que estamos vivos? Ábrete camino a través de este mundo; calienta tus huesos; crea vida en la lucha. ¿No son los poemas plegarias? Despliegues de esperanza, maravilla —vendavales de palabras a mí—. Y tributos de olas.

Otra que se va.

Ahora, Jabá, haz tus libros nuestra galera.

Mira al vencejo, ahueca tu canoa.

Allá, baila, buena poeta, azur adentro.

Yo me quedo aquí, con la mano cubriéndome de las rojeces del sol, hasta que el viejo se esconda, salado, tras el horizonte.

‘nightly sunrise’, Meghan Flood

¿Qué voy hacer con todo lo que me das sino luchar, trabajar, amar, vivir?

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Contributors TRANSLATORS Claudio Sansone is a Humanities Teaching Fellow at the University of Chicago. He works on labor, affect, and ideology in premodern literatures, primarily from Greece, the Near East, Iran, and India. He is also currently working on an article that explores receptions and translations of classical works in Medieval Ireland.

Alexandra Corey is a fourth-year PhD candidate in the Department of French at TCD. Her doctoral thesis involves establishing a critical edition of 16th-century court poetry written by Emmanuel-Philibert de Pingon (1525-1582), a diplomat and poet at the Court of Savoy. Her thesis also involves establishing a biography of the author.

Nayara Güércio is a translator and PhD candidate in Translation Studies at the Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation. She has an MPhil in Literary Translation (TCD/2020) and an MA in Communication studies (UnB/2018). Nayara is a grantee of the ABEI/Haddad Fellowship for Brazilian students.

Kotryna Garanasvili is a writer, translator and interpreter working with English, Lithuanian, French, German, Georgian and Russian. She is currently a PhD Candidate and Associate Tutor at the University of East Anglia. Her research is supported by CHASE Arts and Humanities Research Council. She has completed the Emerging Translator Mentorship at the National Centre for Writing and has been awarded translation traineeships at the EU Council and the European Parliament. More at https:// kotrynagaranasvili.wordpress.com.

Khushi Jain holds a Bachelors in English literature from the University of Delhi, and is currently pursuing a Masters in Classics from Trinity College, Dublin. She reads. A lot.

Frank Caundle is the nom-de-plume of the sole Swedish student at the MPhil in Literary Translation. Raised Anglophone in Stockholm, then ground to a pulp in Berlin, his focus in Dublin has been on German, although distance from Scandinavia seems to make the heart grow fonder.

Is file agus aistritheoir é Eoin Mc Evoy. Tá duaiseanna gnóthaithe aige ó REIC agus Comórtais Liteartha an Oireachtais agus is duine de chomhbhunaitheoirí an chomharghrúpa ealaíne AerachAiteachGaelach é. Chéimnigh Eoin ón Dioplóma Iarchéime sa tSean-Ghaeilge i gColáiste na Tríonóide sa bhliain 2016.

Is mac léinn as an Chabhán é Árón Stiofán Ó Conaill agus tá sé ag staidéar na Gaeilge agus na Gearmáinise. Tá suim mhór aige i litríocht na Gaeilge agus sa Ghaelachas ar fad agus is maith leis a bheith ag cumadh filíochta agus gearrscéalta chomh maith.

Seán Staunton is a Junior Freshman student of French and Spanish. This is Seán’s first time contributing to JoLT. 76

Marija Girevska, PhD, is a literary translator and an author. She was awarded the Golden Pen Award for her translation of James Joyce’s Ulysses in 2013. As a Joyce scholar she has read at Joyce symposia and at the Trieste Joyce school. Head of the Macedonian Centre for Irish Studies.

Luna Ciarma is currently pursuing an M.Phil in Literary Translation at Trinity College after obtaining a BA in Translation from the University of Bologna, Italy. She grew interested in translation as a way to bridge cultural differences.

Lucy McCabe is a screenwriter, translator, musician, and occasional pasta maker. She is completing her masters in Film Studies and tries to make all of her screenplays as Italian as possible.

Seoirse Swanton is a student of English and French, for his sins, which he does here repudiate and heartily repent himself of. He may often be found collecting moss, birdwatching, muttering phrases to ‘test their euphony’ and complaining about Dublin and Dubliners bitterly, as he is from Mayo.

Martina Giambanco was the Editor-in-Chief of JoLT 2020/21. She produced Volume 9, Issues I and II of the journal, ‘Prophecy’ and ‘Enchantment’. She holds a BA from Trinity in English and Classical Civilisation and is currently a full-time trainee English language teacher. She suffers from a severe form of Sehnsucht.

Danielle Plunkett is currently studying the M.Phil in Literary Translation at Trinity after graduating with a degree in French and Art History from the University of St. Andrews.

American-born and having studied in Paris and Brittany, she is especially interested in translating literature with confusion as a central theme.

Eoghan Conway is a second year student in Trinity College Dublin studying Joint Honours Spanish and Sociology.

Silvia Fini is an M.Phil. in Literary Translation student at TCD. Born and raised in Rome, she got her undergrad in Languages, Cultures, Literature and Translation from Sapienza Università di Roma. She is somewhat competent in many things but not very competent in anything, to sugarcoat it, a ‘multipotential’.

Anna Tomlinson is currently studying an M.Phil in Literary Translation at Trinity after graduating with a degree in French from the University of Bristol. After living abroad in Geneva, Nice and Québec, she is especially interested in translation in different francophone cultural contexts.

Mac léinn tríú bliana i gColáiste na Tríonóide is é Cuán de Búrca, agus an Ghaeilge mar phríomhábhar aige. Tá dúil mhór aige san fhilíocht agus san astriúchán. Tá sé ag caitheamh seimeastair ag stáidéar staire in Ollscoil California, Berkeley faoi láthair.

77

Álanna Hammel is a twenty-year-old writer, performer and podcast host based between Wexford and Dublin. Her writing has appeared in several anthologies, magazines and newspapers in Ireland as well as abroad. She is the editor of The Wexford Bohemian. Álanna is studying Irish and French in Trinity.

Eduardo Torres is 29 years old and a 2nd year PhD student in Philosophy, currently writing a thesis on the junction between ordinary language and metaphysics; he is deeply interested in the interface between semantics and pragmatics, contemporary classical music, and the philosophy of literature.

Octavio Pérez Sánchez is a Mexican writer and translator currently undertaking postgraduate studies at Trinity College. He is particularly fascinated by the relationship between literature and music and, when translating, prioritises reproducing the musicality of the source text.

Yairen Jerez Columbié (Havana, 1985) is the author of the monograph Essays on Transculturation and Catalan-Cuban Intellectual History (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).

Her poetry has appeared in Aigne and Eñe: Revista Para Leer. She works as Assistant Professor in Latin American Studies and Intercultural Communication at Trinity College Dublin.

ARTISTS A proud native of Dublin’s North Inner City, Alexander Fay studies physics and entered Trinity through the Access Programmes (TAP). He enjoys cereal, staring, and having regular epiphanies. Most recently he realised that The The were right; the stains on the heartland can never be removed from this country.

Naemi Dehde is in her early twenties and studies film (which gives her the great opportunity to call “binge-watching” “research for academic purposes”). She draws in her free time.

Oona Kauppi (she/her) is a third-year English Studies student. She is trilingual. Someone told her last week that it is confusing when she switches languages in the middle of a conversation. The same person told her that soft pastels suck.

Meghan Flood is a final year English and History student. This year she’s a co-editor for the historian magazine and Design editor for SPR and WGM. She also has art published in TN2 and UT. She still thinks she’s witty, but isn't really. Check out @floodme_ and @thefloodflow on Instagram.

Penny Stuart, an experimental and published Dublin artist, draws from life using a variety of mediums including charcoal/pastels and watercolour/acrylic paint. She also does very large abstract acrylic paintings that are strong colour and textural statements.

She is showcased in the first edition of the Bloomer Magazine 'The role of the new artist in Contemporary World' 2020. She recently won a prize for an online lifedrawing with Newlyn School of Art in Cornwall in 2021.

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Delphine De Luca is a Swiss visual arts student. Currently doing her last year of Bachelor in the HEAD (Geneva) in Representation (option around the image/picture), she’s interested in creating paintings and pictures around the impact of a cultural patrimony on the construction of the identity.

Ellecia Vaughan went to college in Brighton for a bit to study Fine Art, but it took the fun out of painting for her, so she settled on Trinity, and now she is in her fourth year studying Classics and Art History. She has always found it easier to translate her innermost thoughts into little pictures rather than speaking aloud, so that’s why she loves art, the history of it and how it can mean so much to different people.

Ella Sloane is a second year English literature and sociology student and artist. She is currently attempting to tackle Joyce's Ulysses - how fitting!

Kanak Agrawal is a nomad, currently based in Bombay, India. She is a trained film photographer and primarily creates portraits and landscapes. Find her at facebook.com/ qanaq' Patrick Balfe is a third-year student of English and History at Trinity College Dublin.

‘Adoration of the Magi’, Patrick Balfe 79

‘meshification’, Meghan Flood

—But suddenly, lifting your eyes to heaven's light, you realize: your life is a sheer gift.

"January 1, 1965" Joseph Brodsky Translated by George L. Kline

Trinity Journal of Literary Translation Volume 10, Issue II (spring 2022) www.trinityjolt.org