irregulars
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irregulars
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Once again we, at the Irregulars section, have decided to exploit the talent of those multilingual students and ask them for English translations of established foreign writers. The translations range from Dante’s Inferno to an extract from the new Literature Nobel Prize’s winner Mario Vargas Llosa, so there is something for everyone!
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He, Nessus, hadn’t even reached the far side from us again, before we started walking through a wild wood, no path or way through it.
And not just no path, no colourful, pea-coloured leaves that we could see, just mud-shades of leaves; no glass-smooth tree-trunks, all like gravel and sandpaper. No fruit either, no fruit, no beauty at all, just thorny venombarbs.
Entering the Wood of the Suicides. Inferno Canto 13
Not even the animal-monsters, that wander between Cecina and the worked-on, picture-perfect farmland of Corneto, not even those creatures, growling, fierce have a wooded lair like this, when they skulk in darkened woods! And d’you remember those screaming harpies, that chased out the Trojans from the Strophades? They live here. The ones that told the Trojans that only doom and death awaited them? They live here, which have massive reaching wings, people’s scrawny necks and leering faces, talons scratching from their feet and stomachs all feathers. And they scream, they scream and cry like hand-brakes breaking, from the fucked-up trees.
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by Dante Translator: Patrick Davidson Original Language: Italian
IRREGULARS And my man, my mentor, he goes: “Wait. Before you get anywhere further on, you’re in the second circle of all this, all this that is the domain of the punished, you’re in the second circle and you’ll be here until y’ get to the horrifying, hide-your-gaze-from sands of screams. But you’re here now, and look around, go on, take a good long look ‘round, ‘cos you won’t believe what y’see, and you won’t believe a single word I’ve said, once you’ve seen all this.”
The Bad Girl
Fifty years ago the Madrilenian borough of Lavapiés, former enclave of Jews and Moors, was still considered to be one of the purest regions of Madrid, where lived conserved, like curious arqueological objects; opera singers, men wear(extract) ing waistcoasts, flat check caps and neck handkerchiefs alongside women in polka dot dresses, with large earrings, parasols and close fitting bandannas over coiled up hair. by Mario Vargas Llosa When I came to live in Lavapiés, the area had had changed so much, that occasionally I asked myself whether Translator: Sasha Magill Original Language: Spanish in this Babel there still remained some remainder of the traditional Madrilenians, or whether all of our neighbours were, like Marcella and I, imported. The Spaniards of the region came from every corner of the country, and with their accents and variety of physical appearances they came to give this mixture of races, languages, regional lilts, costumes, and traditions of Lavapiés the semblance of a kind of microcosm. The human geography of the planet seemed to be represented in a fistful of apples. At the end of Ave María Street, where we lived on the third floor of a damaged and discoloured building, one would come across a Babylonia in which lived Chinese and Pakistanis merchants, Hindi shops and launderettes, Moroccan tea salons, bars full of South Americans, Colombian and African drug dealers and everywhere, forming groups in the hallways and on corners, a large quantity of Romanians, Yugoslavians, Moldovans, Dominicans, Ecuadorians, Russians and Asians. The Spanish families opposed these transformations by forming social gatherings from balcony to balcony, hanging their clothes to dry on lines hung up on eaves and windows, and on Sundays, going to church; the men wearing ties and the women wearing black, to hear mass at the church of San Lorenzo, on the corner of Doctor Piga and Salitre streets. Our apartment was smaller than the one that I had had in the Rue Joseph Granier, or it seemed like it, cramped as it was with the cardboard models and paper and wooden decorations of Marcella, which like the toy soldiers of Salomón Toledano, invaded the two small bedrooms, even reaching the kitchen and bathroom. In spite of being tiny and full with books and disks, it didn’t seem claustrophobic thanks to the windows onto the street where streams of vibrant Castilian light shone in, so different to the Parisian light, and because it had a balcony, where at night we could lay out a table and dine under the Madrilenian stars, which do exist, although blurred by the lights of the city.
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IRREGULARS Old people no longer talk, Or when they do, it’s only with the corner of their eyes. Even rich, they are poor, They don’t have any illusions left And only have one heart for two.
The Old People by Jacques Brel Translator: Alexis Grigorieff Original Language: French
Their homes smell of thyme, of clean, Of lavender and quaint phrases. Though you may live in Paris, You always live in the sticks When you live for too long.
And for the time of a sob, Forget just for one hour That silver clock which keeps Purring in the parlour, Saying yes, saying no, And waiting for them.
Is it from having laughed too much That you can hear their voices crack When they talk about yesterday? And from having cried too much That tears keep pearling from their eyes?
Old people do not die. They fall asleep one day And just sleep for too long. They hold each other’s hand, They fear to lose one another And yet, can’t help it.
And if they somewhat tremble, Is it because they see The silver clock growing old, Purring in the parlour Saying yes, saying no, Saying, I’m waiting for you.
And the other one stays there, The better or the worse, The meek or the mean, It doesn’t matter: The one who stays behind Will find himself in hell.
Old people no longer dream, Their books fall asleep, They keep their pianos closed, The little cat is dead, And the Sunday wine will never Make them sing again.
Maybe you’ll see him, Or even see her, In rain and in sorrow, Walking through the present, Already apologizing For not being farther gone.
Old people no longer move, Their gestures are too wrinkled, Their whole world is too small From the bed to the window, Then, from the bed to the armchair, And then, from the bed to the bed.
And flee before you, One last time, the silver clock Purring in the parlour, Saying yes, saying no, Telling them, I’m waiting for you.
And if they still go out, Arm in arm, dressed in stiffness, It’s only to follow In the sun, the funeral Of some older man, Of some uglier woman.
Purring in the parlour Saying yes, saying no, While waiting for us all.
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IRREGULARS
The Paper Soldier by Bulat Okudzhava Translator:Sylvain Aliocha Original Language: Russian There once was a soldier, handsome and bravebut he was just some child’s toy, a paper soldier. He wanted to change the world, make everyone happybut he himself is a puppet on string, a paper soldier. He’d be glad to rush into fire, smoke and death for youbut you make fun of him, the paper soldier. You wouldn’t trust him with your precious secretsbut why? but why! because he’s just... a paper soldier. He cursed his fate, his uneventful lifeand begged ‘the fire, the fire’, forgetting... the paper soldier. To the fire? What? Off you go then! He’s gone, steps forward suddenly burns into ashes, just there. He was just a paper soldier.
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