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Poetry in Translation (CXXVI): Virgil Suárez (b. 1962, Cuba),– “ŢĂRMUL LUI REINALDO ARENAS” (The Patagonies of Reinaldo Arenas)

September 25th, 2012 · Diaspora, International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations, Uncategorized

Reinaldo ARENAS, Poet Cubanez

Poetry in Translation (CXXVI): Virgil Suárez (b. 1962, Cuba),– “ŢĂRMUL LUI REINALDO ARENAS” (The Patagonies of Reinaldo Arenas)


ŢĂRMUL LUI REINALDO ARENAS
Virgil Suárez (n. 1962, Havana, Cuba), poet Cuban American

De câte ori n-ai fost forţat, tu, Reinaldo
Să-ţi înghiţi cuvintele? Bucatele de hârtie rupte
din jurnalul tău, maţele tale, căluşul din gură, pumnii de fier în stomac. De fiecare dată ai scuipat înapoi, focul tău, în faţa câinilor. De cinci
ori ţi-au confiscat manuscrisul, dibuind-ul acolo unde l-ai
ascuns, arzându-l ca şi cum memoria s-ar fi făcut scrum, în incendiu, nu te-ar fi mântuit şi de fiecare dată,
mereu, ai rescris cuvintele, aspirându-le din
cenuşa cruzimii şi violenţei lor, iar tu
le-ai rescris, mereu şi mereu, aceşti cărbuni fierbinţi
aprinzându-se în spiritul tău nemărginit, tu espiritu bello.
Iar într-un sfârşit, cuvintele tale strălucesc
aceşte stele minunate la care exilul se roagă, te urmează
ca să renască, din conflagraţia îndepartată a propriilor lor
vieţi, cinci romane de furtună, ţărână şi apa. Oare ce ţi se oferă
în ţara infinitelor posibilităţi? Ce îţi îndeamnă gândul
în strângerea unei îmbrăţisari? Privirea se deschide la infinit.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 25 Septembrie 2012,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin ROMAN

reinaldo ARENAS – “Before Night Falls”

Virgil Suarez

The Patagonies of Reinaldo Arenas

How many times did you, Reinaldo, were forced
to eat your own words? Pieces of paper torn
from your journal, your entrails, feathers in your
mouth, rock-hard fists in your stomach. Each
time you spat fire back at those bastards. Five
times they took your novel, found it where you hid
it, burned it as though in fire your memory would
fail you, would not redeem you, and each time,
again, you wrote the words, breathed them back
from the ashes of their violence and cruelty, and you
wrote them down time and again, these bright embers
ablaze on the vastness of your spirit, tu espiritu bello.
And in the end, your words glow, these beacons
of gorgeous, hypnotic light that exiles pray to, follow
to arrive home through the distant fires of their own
lives – five novels of wind, earth, water. What gives
in this land of vast possibility? What brings memory
into the fold of an embrace? Your eyes opening, free.

Virgil Suárez (b. 1962, Havana, Cuba) is a Cuban American poet and novelist. He is a professor of English at Florida State University.[1] He is one of the leading writers in the Cuban American community,[2] known for such novels as Latin Jazz and Going Under.

Virgil SUAREZ (b. Cuba, 1962)

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Poetry in Translation (CXXV): Francesc PARCERISAS (b. 1944), Poet Catalan – “Mâna lui Virgiliu” (The Hand of Virgil)

September 23rd, 2012 · Books, International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

Publius Vergilius Maro (October 15, 70 BC – September 21, 19 BC

Poetry in Translation (CXXV): Francesc PARCERISAS (b. 1944), Poet Catalan – “Mâna lui Virgiliu” (The Hand of Virgil)

Mâna lui Virgiliu (The Hand of Virgil)

Francesc PARCERISAS (n. 1944)
Poet Catalan

Bătălia e grea şi nedreaptă,
flăcări domoale pe culmi de coline.
Suliţele şi săgeţile inamice
ne-au decimat încet
părinţii care ne-au ocrotit, încât, aproape,
fără sa ne dăm seama
ne aflăm muţi şi surprinşi peste măsură,
în toiul focului, pe câmpul de bătălie.
Atât despre scriptura după Virgiliu.
Apoi, realitatea se schimbă:
Rămânem singuri să stingem conflagraţia.
fără sfat, purtaţi dealungul drumului
de îndemnul lăuntric al milostivirii,
poate vom înţelege că zidurile
fortăreţei, vrăjmaşii şi chiar războiul însuşi
nu sunt decât umbre, crescute peste măsură
al unui incendiu ostenit în cenuşe.
Purgatoriu şi paradis lăuntric.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 23 Septembrie 2012,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin ROMAN
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

THE HAND OF VIRGIL

The battle is slow and devious,
a temporal fire on the hilltops.
The spears and darts of the enemy
have decimated so slowly
the parents who protected us that,
almost without realizing it,
we find ourselves, silent, wide open,
hard by the fires on the battlefront.
Thus far the hand of Virgil.
Hereafter the world will be different:
we are on our own to quell the fire.
Without a guide, borne along
by the secret promptings of a sense for good,
we will perhaps come to see that the walls
of the fortress, the enemy, war itself
are merely the shadows, grown enormous,
of a blaze that is light and embers.
Purgatory and paradise we bear within.

Translated by D. Sam Abrams
Five Poets, Institute of North American Studies, Barcelona, 1988

Francesc PARCERISAS (b. 1944) – Catalan Poet

BIOGRAPHY:
Francesc PARCERISAS
(n. Begues, 1944) Poet Catalan, Spania
Born in 1944, Francesc Parcerisas, the author of fourteen volumes of poetry, including Still Life with Children, Triumph of the Present, and The Golden Age, is considered the premier Catalan poet of his generation—a “miracle generation” of poets who came of age as Franco’s public banning of the Catalan language abated. He is also an accomplished, award-winning translator of an impressive array of significant international writers, such as Joseph Conrad, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Doris Lessing, Katherine Mansfield, Joyce Carol Oates, Cesare Pavese, Edgar Allan Poe, Ezra Pound, Rimbaud, Susan Sontag, William Styron, and Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney. Among his numerous translations from French, Italian, and English into Catalan, he is most famous in Catalonia for his translation of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. From 1998 to 2005 he was director of the Institute of Catalan Letters in Barcelona. He teaches at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. His own poems have been translated into Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Basque, Gallego, and Welsh, among others.
Among his awards are the 1966 Carles Riba Prize, the 1983 Critics’ Prize for Catalan Poetry, the 1983 Catalan Government Prize for Catalan Literature, the 1992 Lettre d’Or Prize for his volume Mana lui Virgiliu (The Hand of Virgil), Triumph of the Present, the 1992 Serra D’Or Critic’s Prize for his Catalan version of Seamus Heaney’s The Haw Lantern, and the 2001 Cavall Verd-Rafael Jaume Prize for his translation of Ezra Pound’s A Draft of XXX Cantos.

Boxing scene from the Aeneid (book

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Poetry in Translation (CXXIV): Kim CHI-HA (b. 1941), Poet Corean – “Din întuneric” – “From the Darkness ”

September 21st, 2012 · International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

Kim Chi-Ha, Korean Poet (b. 1941)

From the Darkness
Kim CHI-HA (b. 1941, Korea)

From the darkness yonder
Someone is calling me
A pair of glaring eyes lurking in the darkness
The blood-red darkness
Of rusty prison bars.
Silence beckons me
And clogged, halting breath.

On a rainy day of grey lowering clouds
Faltering through the calls
Of pigeons cooing the eaves
It keeps calling and calling me
A tattered blood-stained shirt
Hanging from the window sill
That red soul which thrashed through endless cellar-nights
the congealed cry of a body racked and torn
Beckoning me
Beckoning me.
The silence yonder is calling me
Calling on my blood
To refuse
To refuse all lies.
From the darkness yonder
On a rainy day of grey lowering clouds
From that darkness of blood-red bodies
A pair of glaring eyes.

“From the Darkness” by Kim Chi-Hua (b.1941, Korea)

Din întuneric
(Kim Chi-Hua (n. 1941) Poet Corean)

Din întunericul de departe
Aud o chemare
Doi ochi ţintesc din ceaţă
O ceaţă ca roşul sângelui
Zăbrelelor din închisori
Liniştea mă îndeamnă
Cu un suflu stânjenit, sugrumat.

Sub o ploaie deasă de nori grei si negri
Stânjeniţi de cântecul
Turturelelor de pe streaşină
Care mă cheamă neîncetat
O cămaşe ruptă însângerată
Atârnată pe fereastră
Acel suflet bătut în nopţile nesfârşite
Ţipăt îngheţat al trupului schilodit pe roată
Îndemnându-mă,
Îndemnându-mă.
Tăcerea de departe mă chiamă
Îndeamnă sângele
Să refuze
Să refuze orice minciună
Din întunericul de departe
Aud o chemare
Doi ochi ţintesc din ceaţă.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 21 Septembrie 2012,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin Roman

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE:
Kim Chi-ha (actually Kim Yong-il) was born in Mokpo in South Korea in 1941. He began to study aesthetics at the Seoul National University in 1959, and published his first poems in »Shi-in« (tr.: The Poet), a literary journal in Korea, in 1969. »The Five Bandits« (tr.) appeared in 1970.
This social satire emulates the rhythm of the traditional Korean Pansori, the author, however, merges the popular epic style with the poetry of resistance, and expands its scope by including themes and motifs that reflect the everyday life of farmers, fishers, and workers. His anthology »The Yellow Earth« (tr.) is published in the same year. The poet converted to Catholicism in 1971, and the authorities prohibited the performance of his plays »The Copper Yi Sun-sin« (tr.) and »Napoleon Cognac« (tr.). A strong opponent of the dictatorial regime of Park Chung-hee, Kim Chi-ha, whose nom de plume means »underground«, was arrested several times and finally sentenced to death in 1974. The verdict was changed to a life sentence shortly after. Thanks to the sharp protest of an international committee, involving Jean-Paul Sartre, Heinrich Böll, Noam Chomsky and others, Kim Chi-ha was set free in 1975, but soon imprisoned again, and released only in 1980 for humanitarian reasons. While, in the years of the dictatorship, the poet saw the poem as a »weapon of the word«, he gave up his role as the mouthpiece of the democracy movement after the ban on his poems was lifted in 1984. He turned towards a »philosophy of life« that has its roots in traditional Asian thinking, which is reflected in his poems in the early 1980s. His lyrical oeuvre is henceforth dedicated to the contemplation of nature, the recognition of universal contexts, and the themes of love, death, grief and loneliness.

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Poetry in Translation (CXXIII): Reinaldo ARENAS (1943, Cuba – 1990 New York), Poet Cubanez – “My Lover the Sea” – “Iubita mea Marea” – “NIÑO VIEJO”

September 20th, 2012 · International Media, OPINION, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

Reinaldo ARENAS, Cuban Dissident Poet, Exile (1943-1990)

Poetry in Translation (CXXIII): Reinaldo ARENAS (1943, Cuba – 1990 New York), Poet Cubanez – “My Lover the Sea” – “Iubita mea Marea” – “NIÑO VIEJO”

–
Reinaldo Arenas (1943-1990)
Cuban revolutionary poet & author,
exiled in NYC under Castro

My Lover the Sea
I am that child with the round, dirty face
who on every corner bothers you with his
“can you spare a quarter?”

I am that child with the dirty face
no doubt unwanted
that from far away contemplates coaches
where other children
emit laughter and jump up and down considerably

I am that unlikeable child
definitely unwanted
with the round dirty face
who before the giant street lights or
under the grandames also illuminated
or in front of the little girls that seem to levitate
projects the insult of his dirty face

I am that angry and lonely child of always,
that throws you the insult of that angry child of always
and warns you:
if hypocritically you pat me on the head
I would take that opportunity to steal your wallet.

I am that child of always
before the panorama of imminent terror,
imminent leprosy, imminent fleas,
of offenses and the imminent crime.
I am that repulsive child that improvises a bed
out of an old cardboard box and waits,
certain that you will accompany me.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Iubita mea – Marea
Reinaldo Arenas (1943-1990)
Poet, autor si revolutionar Cuban,
exilat la New York

Sunt copilul acela cu faţa rotundă si murdară.
Care la orice colţ de stradă te plictiseşte cerşind:
“dă-mi un leu, domnule!”

Sunt copilul acela cu faţa murdară,
nedorit de nimeni
care dela distanţă priveşte autocarele
in care alţi copii
sunt plini de viaţă şi joacă sărind într-una în sus şi-n jos.

Sunt acel copil neiubit
mai mult chiar nedorit
cu faţa rotundă şi murdară
care sub felinarele străzilor sau
sub privirea matroanelor sub reflectoare
sau în faţa fetiţelor care par că dansează
îşi arată faţa murdară ca o insultă.

Sunt copilul mânios şi siguratic dintotdeauna
care îţi aruncă insulta lui de copil mânios dintotdeauna
care te pune în gardă
dacă mă vei mângâia pe cap, ca un ipocrit,
o sa profit să-ţi şterpelesc portofelul.

Sunt acel copil din totdeauna
în faţa panoramei iminentei terori,
iminentei lepre, iminenţilor purici,
a delicvenţei şi crimei iminente.
Sunt acel copil respingător care-şi improvizează un culcuş
făcut dintr-o cutie de carton, care te aşteaptă
convins că îl vei însoţi.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 20 September 2011,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin Roman
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

NIÑO VIEJO
Yo soy ese niño de cara redonda y sucia
que en cada esquina os molesta con su
“can you spend one quarter”

Yo soy ese niño de cara sucia
-sin duda inoportuno –
que de lejos contempla los carruajes
donde otros niños emiten risas y saltos considerables.

Yo soy ese niño desagradable
-sin duda inoportuno –
de cara redonda y sucia que ante los grandes faroles
o bajo las grandes damas también iluminadas
o ante las niñas que parecen levitar
proyecta el insulto de su cara redonda y sucia

Yo soy ese niño hosco, más bien gris,
Que envuelto en lamentables combinaciones
pone una nota oscura sobre la nieve
o sobre el cesped tan cuidadosamente recortado
que nadie sino yo, porque no pago multas se atreve a pisotear.

Yo soy ese airado y solo niño de siempre
que os lanza el insulto del solo niño de siempre
y os advierte: si hipócritamente me acariciais la cabeza
aprovecharé la ocasión para levantarles la cartera.

Yo soy ese niño de siempre
ante el panorama del inminente espanto.
Ese niño, ese niño,
ese niño que corrompe el poema con su nota naturalista.
Ese niño, ese niño,
ese niño que impone arduos y aburridos ensayos
y hasta novelas, aún más aburridas, sobre “los bajos fondos”.
Ese niño, ese niño,
ese niño de cara airada y sucia que impone arduas
y siniestras revoluciones
para luego seguir con su cara aún más airada y sucia.
Ese niño, ese niño
ese niño ante el panorama siempre inminente
(sólo inminente)
del inminente espanto, de la inminente lepra, del inminente
piojo,
del delito o del crimen inminentes.
Yo soy ese niño repulsivo que improvisa una cama
con cartones viejos y espera, seguro, que venga usted a
hacerle compañía.

NOTE:
Original Spanish version provided through the kind offices of
Mr. Ray Escamez, Madrid, to whom the Editor expresses his grateful thanks.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

OBITUARY:
Reinaldo Arenas, 47, Writer Who Fled Cuba, Dies
By EDWIN McDOWELL
Published: The New Yok Times, December 09, 1990

Reinaldo Arenas, a novelist who spent several years in prison in Cuba under Fidel Castro, committed suicide on Friday in his apartment in Manhattan, the police said. The 47-year-old author was suffering from AIDS, his literary agent, Thomas Colchie, said.
After a decade of struggling to become a successful writer in the United States, to which he escaped during the Mariel exodus from Cuba in 1980, Mr. Arenas at his death had five novels under contract as well as a recently completed autobiography.
Mr. Arenas’s works were not always easy going, leading one reviewer to say they were “in the sardonic nightmare tradition” of Francisco Gomez de Quevedo y Villegas, the picaresque 17th-century Spanish novelist, and of Goya, whose “black paintings” were of macabre subjects. Reviewing the novel “Farewell to the Sea” in The New York Times, Jay Cantor wrote: “Mr. Arenas is not interested in ordinary realistic drama. He wants to give the reader the secret history of the emotions, the sustaining victories of pleasure and the small dishonesties that callous the soul.” Teen-Age Revolutionary
Born in the rural Oriente province of Cuba on July 16, 1943, Mr. Arenas began writing as a child. He joined Castro’s revolution as a teen-ager and moved to Havana in 1961. He was a researcher in the Jose Marti National Library from 1963 to 1968.
In 1965, his novel “Singing From the Well,” was awarded first honorable mention by a committee of judges headed by Alejo Carpentier, the diplomat and Cuba’s most famous contemporary novelist. The book won the Prix Medici in France for the best foreign novel of 1969 but was never reprinted in his homeland because Mr. Arenas, like other homosexuals, had become the object of the Castro regime’s disfavor.
His second novel, published here in the late 1960’s by Harper & Row under the title “Hallucinations,” was never published in Cuba.

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Mircea Milcovitch receives the French Literary Prize: Prix Contrelittérature 2012

September 10th, 2012 · Books, Diaspora, International Media, OPINION, PEOPLE, Reviews

Mircea MILCOVITCH

Mircea Milcovitch receives the French Literary Prize: Prix Contrelittérature 2012

Wikipdia:
Dès sa parution la revue se présente comme « à contre-courant de toutes les idéologies » .

Elle prétend défendre une conception « contre-moderne » de la littérature et rejette le nihilisme « égobiographique » du roman contemporain. Elle se propose d’amorcer « un retour à l’origine ontologique de l’écriture ».

Elle ne se veut pas un mouvement artistique4 mais un état d’esprit à la fois réactif et progressiste. Réactif, parce qu’il repose sur une anthropologie réaliste incluant le spirituel dans l’homme ; et, progressiste, parce qu’il se fonde sur une positivité du temps.

Le concept de « contrelittérature »5 a été exposé par Alain Santacreu dans un manifeste paru en annexe de son roman Les sept fils du derviche 6. C’est autour de ce texte-germinatif qu’a été publié, en 2005, un ouvrage collectif, dirigé par Alain Santacreu, qui développe la notion de « contrelittérature »7. En désignant la « littérature » comme l’infrastructure idéologique de la modernité, l’herméneutique contrelittéraire s’ouvre aux domaines artistique, philosophique, politique et religieux.

On enregistre d’abord une phase pérennialiste suivie, à partir de 2005, sous l’impulsion d’Alain Santacreu, d’une optique se revendiquant de la métaphysique chrétienne. Ces deux périodes constituent la première époque revuiste qui se clôt avec le numéro n° 21 (été 2008). En 2010, l’essai d’Alain Santacreu, Au cœur de la talvera, édité aux éditions Arma Artis8, marque la ligne de passage vers une autre époque éditoriale.

Alain SANTACREU (n. 1950)

Biographie:
Né en 1950 à Toulouse de parents catalans, Alain Santacreu, avant de devenir professeur de lettres, étudie à la Faculté de Toulouse puis se dirige vers la pratique du théâtre au Conservatoire de Toulouse. Acteur et metteur en scène au Théâtre de l’Acte (Artaud/Grotowski) puis au Grenier de Bourgogne et au Théâtre de Bourgogne. Il deviendra ensuite Directeur de Centre culturel de Belfort. En 1999 paraît son premier texte : Les sept fils du Derviche suivi du Manifeste contrelittéraire , éditions Jean Curutchet. En 2000 il créé la revue trimestrielle Contrelittérature. A l’automne 2005, il a dirigé la publication d’un ouvrage collectif aux éditions du Rocher La Contrelittérature : un manifeste pour l’esprit .

Prix Contrelittérature 2012

« Journal d’exil » de Mircea Milcovitch

« Le colonel Lawrence d’Arabie disait par expérience que tout homme qui appartient réellement à deux cultures perdait son âme » : phrase vertigineuse du Démon de l’absolu d’André Malraux, remontée à ma mémoire, telle une épigraphe fulgurante, après avoir lu Journal d’exil de Mircea Milcovitch.
Je ne parlerai pas concernant cet auteur de talent littéraire car il s’agit de bien plus que cela : d’être, de densité humaine, d’âme et de corps, toutes choses ignorées des plates égobiographies d’aujourd’hui. Journal d’exil montre que la grandeur d’un écrivain, autant que sa prédication même, se trouve dans le lieu d’où il écrit. Le lieu de l’écriture est sa vraie profondeur, il est ce « Lieu seul situé » dont parle le poète Oscar Venceslas de Lubicz Milosz dans Ars Magna, lieu de l’exil qui exige le refus du mensonge et seul contient la mélancolie de l’instant : « moi dans le Lieu seul situé j’écris ».
En octobre 1968, Mircea Milcovitch, jeune artiste roumain, met à profit une exposition de peinture officielle à Paris pour choisir l’exil. L’écriture d’un journal est la technique qui se présente au narrateur pour oblitérer son passé, distiller les images de sa conscience, procéder à un bouleversant transvasement alchimique de son âme. À la réalité de son présent, qui est le temps de l’écriture, se superposent des images surgies de sa mémoire. Écrit directement en français, ce Journal va lui permettre de retrouver son lieu d’énonciation perdu. La langue de l’exil devra entièrement s’incorporer en lui pour lui dévoiler sa nouvelle culture.

L’ouvrage se compose de 64 chapitres, comme autant de cases noires et blanches d’un jeu d’échecs. Tissé d’ombre et de lumière, l’échiquier est traditionnellement orienté : chacun de ses côtés correspond à une direction cardinale. Les joueurs se faisant face, les échecs se jouent dans l’axe Est-Ouest. Le jeu reflète donc l’espace de l’exil qui sépare les deux moi du narrateur : celui qu’il a été, à l’Est ; celui qu’il doit devenir, à l’Ouest. L’exil creuse en lui cette distance tragique qui pourrait l’empêcher d’exister. Écrire est un acte décisif pour tenter de mettre en échec la mémoire du double. Il lui faut franchir cet abîme blanchi, comme la page vierge, comme la neige – élément récurrent qui traverse le livre. Ce combat du narrateur avec lui-même est la trame de l’œuvre et s’identifie à une partie d’échecs dont l’enjeu est son âme. Sans doute le motif de l’échiquier est-il à peine suggéré, il n’y a pas vraiment, comme dans le roman de Nabokov La défense Loujine, d’homologie structurale entre le jeu et le processus narratif, mais l’entrecroisement des visions rétrospectives du passé et de l’introspection de la réalité présente rappelle l’alternance du déplacement des pièces par les joueurs.

L’exil entraîne la réclusion physique. Par son ancrage dans le présent de l’énonciation, l’auteur tente de reconstruire le lieu de son corps – ce lieu d’où il écrit. La narration est sans cesse traversée par les figures féminines qui ont jalonné son destin et dont l’étrangeté évoque les héroïnes romanesques nervaliennes, le « filles du feu » : Maria, la femme élue ; la « fillette blonde » ; la jeune actrice Mélusine ; et jusqu’au prénom, Sylvie, de l’étudiante en Philosophie qu’il rencontre à Paris, dès les premiers jours de son exil. Car l’éloignement est aussi celui de la femme aimée, restée en Roumanie. Elle est la véritable destinatrice du Journal dont la lecture lui demeure interdite. Le narrateur parle des lettres où il ne peut écrire ce qu’il voudrait lui dire puisqu’elles seront interceptées par la censure de la Securitate. Écrire ce qui ne peut être lu, jusqu’à cette dernière lettre, à la fin du livre, que l’auteur n’enverra jamais et dont le style épuré retrouve celui de la plus haute littérature amoureuse. L’incorporation par le narrateur de sa langue d’exil se fait au fur et à mesure qu’avance l’écriture du livre. Peu à peu les errances syntaxiques disparaissent, jusqu’à l’ultime et sublime lettre d’amour qui marque la victoire de la dame blanche sur l’échiquier.
Mais, dans une autre partie, les noirs ont joué et gagné. Du nouveau lieu de son exil, le diariste constate l’emprise idéologique qu’exerce le marxisme sur la jeunesse française de l’époque. Son analyse se heurte à l’incompréhension des étudiants « révolutionnaires » qu’il fréquente. Le Journal dénonce la technique de l’esclavage mise en place par le système communiste, la colonisation intérieure des âmes qu’il décrit scrupuleusement, à partir de tableaux de la vie quotidienne où le tragique se teinte parfois de tendresse et d’ironie. Sa réflexion devient prospective quand il compare les deux mondes, de l’Est et de l’Ouest, et s’attache à relever les « germes similaires ».
La publication de Journal d’exil, plus de quarante ans après son écriture, ne peut que susciter l’angoisse du lecteur ; car, c’est notre monde qui, par anticipation, surgit de ce livre. Pourquoi, depuis que le mur de l’Est est tombé, le monde occidental est-il lui-même devenu une prison sans mur ? La disparition du bloc soviétique a permis au communisme de se faire oublier. Il a cessé d’être un enjeu idéologique et stratégique mondial pour devenir un simple objet d’étude historique. Mais la trahison des clercs s’est poursuivie sous de nouvelles formes. L’esprit du matérialisme marxiste imprègne désormais nos sociétés de l’esclavage volontaire où le parti de la bien-pensance noyaute toutes les consciences. La déloyauté et la félonie, la prodition des intellectuels occidentaux, la forfaiture de l’Université presque totalement acquise à la pensée marxiste, sans oublier la prévarication insidieuse de l’Église de Rome [2] ont contribué à l’immonde oubli des crimes communistes. Dans les micro-récits du Journal de Milcovitch, les gens du pays natal n’engendrent pas de nostalgiques souvenirs, ils sont des cris lancés à la face de l’Occident, des appels à notre mémoire vivante.

Alain Santacreu

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Poetry in Translation (CXXII): Rafael MORALES (Toledo, 1919 – 2005), Poet Spaniol – “Nud de Femeie” (Mujer Desnuda, Naked Woman)

August 31st, 2012 · International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

Rafael MORALES (1919-2005) Poet Spaniol

NUD DE FEMEIE
Rafael Morales
(b. 1919, Toledo – d. 2005)

Nud de femeie, corp minunat,
Ţinut plin de fruct,
Zori cântate de ciocârlii,
Curs liniştit al serii în ape adormite.

În fildeşul tău pur mijesc zorii,
Trandafiri fierbinţi se nasc în sângele tău,
Ziua surâde în cireşul captiv al buzelor tale.

Lumina crestelor de zăpadă sclipeşte în sânii tăi
Dimineaţa vine curgând domol în braţele tale,
Iar păsărelele ciripesc
În şuvoiul de aur al pletelor tale.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 29 August 2011,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin Roman

Amadeo Modigliani – Nude

MUJER DESNUDA
Rafael MORALES (b. 1919 Toledo region – d. 2005)

Hermoso cuerpo de mujer desnuda,
Territorio frutal,
País de las calandrias aurorales,
Tierno fluir del alba sobre un agua dormida.

El día está naciendo de tu nácar temprano,
De las cáldas rosas que emergen de tu sangre,
El día esta naciendo del cerezal cautivo de tu boca.

Sobre tus pechos brota la luz de los nervos,
Y port us brazos llega fluvial y prezosa la mañana,
Mientran cantan la saves
Por la clara elemeda de tu pelo.

Picasso – Toro

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE:
Rafael Morales is one of the most lyrical and humanistic poets of the post-civil-war era in Spain. Whether describing a solitary lover, a fighting bull, or an old jacket, he evokes the lyricism he perceives in all things. Among contemporary Spanish poets he has been admired for his innocence and the childlike love of all people that serves as a base for his poetic explorations.
He has also published literary criticism and children’s stories.

Born on 31 July 1919, a native of Talavera de la Reina, near Toledo, Morales grew up during the turbulent yearss of King Alfonso XIII’s reign, of the short-lived Republic, and of the civil war. During this period. Morales remained in his hometown to complete his baccalaureate, but moved to Madrid to graduate in Romance philology, at the University of Madrid. During World War II he received a scholarship to study in the Facultad de Letras de Coimbra, in Portugal and after the war he was elected Professor of Spanish literature at the Complutense University in Madrid.
His poems are resonant of a Rilkean interest in objects, animals and humans.
Rafael Morales volume Poemas del Toro remain a classic of the genre.

(Prado de serpientes, 1969-81)

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Poetry in Translation (CXXI): Gabriel CELAYA (Guipúzcoa, 1911 – Madrid, 1991), Basque Poet – “TEROAREA SPAŢIULUI” (Terror of the Open, Terror de lo Abierto)

August 29th, 2012 · International Media, OPINION, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

Gabriel CELAYA
(Hernani, Guipúzcoa, 1911 – Madrid, 1991)

Celaya is an artiste of many facets: born in the Basque country at the time of its heavy Industry boom, he forged for himself a career in his family’s Engineering works, which allowed him sufficient financial independence to follow the interest closest to his heart: poetry and left-wing politics. He succeeded to carve for himself a reputation of an “engaged” poet and fan of Fidel Castro and his Cuban social experiment.
Celaya’s silence over the plight of his fellow writers in Berlin (1953), Budapest (1956), Prague (1968), or indeed in Stalin’s gulags, is consistent with his putting his name forward as a candidate of the Spanish Communist Party, in the 1977 general elections, in his native Guipuzkoa. He did not get in, but it did not matter! By this time he was idolised as a national literary hero (and survivor), having heaped on him moult Literary prizes: Critics’ Award (1957), Libera Stampa International Award (1963), Etna-Taormina International Award (1967), Atalaya Award (1967) and finally the National Spanish Literature Award (1986).
Given such success, it is reasonable to think that Celaya may have dreamt of a Nobel Prize, but this, sadly, eluded him, as by then, such accolades went instead to other “engaged” fellow-writers in the East, such as Pasternak (1958), Solzhenytsyn, (1970) Walesa (1983), or Brodsky (1987), who appraised the world of the stark realities of the ‘communist paradise’ – realities which Celaya, sadly, chose to ignore.
Notwithstanding such reticence, the poet remains one of the greats of Basque (and Spanish) literature, who left behind a prodigal output: he was lucky to be a gentleman of independent means – he had the family fortune behind him to allow him the freedom of following his literary and political dreams: it does not make him a lesser poet for it, but certainly one who enjoyed the spoils of personal riches to allow him the freedom of his thoughts.

Terror of the Open (Terror de lo Abierto)

TEROAREA SPAŢIULUI
Labirint din exterior –
siluete, înconjur;
labirint din interior,
lumini, oglinzi.
Ce aflăm?
Spaţiu fără centru
Sfială faţă de nimeni,
univers la punctul zero.
Nicăieri nici un control,
Nici o piedică.
Teroare! Spaţiu
fără iertare.
Doar urlet. Şi e teribil,
fără ecou.
Întoarcere în peşteră
şi în spaimă,
vorbind singur despre
cerul la punctul zero.
Labirint final: Şarpele
cugetului.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin Roman
Londra, 29 August 2011,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin Roman

TERROR DE LO ABIERTO

Laberinto de fuera,
figures rodeos;
laberinto de dentro,
focos, espejos.
¿Qué se descumbre?
El espacio sin centro
La conciencia sin nadie
Y el mundo al cero.
No hai vigilante.
No hay nadie en medio.
¡Terror! El espacio
simplemente abierto.
Se grita. Y es terrible,
No hay eco.
Y uno vuelve a la cueva
y al miedo,
y a hablar consigo mismo
Del cero-cielo.
Laberinto final: Sepiente
del pensamiento.

(Buenas dias. Buenas noches, 1976)

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Poetry in Translation (CXX): Joseba SARRIONANDIA (Vizcaya, Spain, b. 1958), Basque Poet – “Încălţări găurite” (A pile of broken shoes)

August 26th, 2012 · International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

“Încălţări găurite” (Joseba Sarrionandia, n.1958)

Încălţări găurite
Joseba Sarrionandia (b.1958)

Drumul poate fi metafora vieţii,
Iar moartea doar nişte incălţări găurite, tânjind sub oglinda lunii,
Care luceşte subtil, pentru propria ei satisfacţie.
După o viată întreagă de umblat, pingelele
Nu-şi mai amintesc pe ce caldarâm au păşit:
O grămadă de pantofi găuriţi, cu şireturile pierdute
Pentru că drumeţii le-au luat pe toate
Ca să le spânzure de grindă.

Versiune în limba Română
de Constantin ROMAN
Londra, August 2012
© Copyright 2012, Constantin Roman

TRANSLATOR’s CAVEATS:

Joseba Sarrionandia is a man of many facets and therefore, unsurprisingly, a figure who means different things to different people. In some media quarters, in Spain, he is branded as a Basque terrorist, to the Spanish Ministry of Justice, he is a fugitive, who jumped the prison wall, in 1985, and has not been seen ever since. By contrast, to Basque nationalists he is a hero, whilst to Humanists, unconcerned with Politics, he is a writer, poet and translator of Coleridge, T.S, Eliot, Manuel Bandeira and Fernando Pessoa. This is a rather singular, if intriguing, combination of feats, which confounds the critics, challenges the authorities and, at the same time, puzzles those bystanders, who depict the world in black and white. In spite of his physical eclipse, trying to elude the hand of Spanish Justice, this reinvented Scarlet Pimpernel basks (no pun intended) in being the object of much debate, in the rarefied spheres of Academia, unconcerned about the rights or wrongs of Justice, whether he may be classified as a “Post-Modernist”, or even, at all, as a translator… As Sarrionandia has the propensity of ignoring the straitjacket of literary translation tenets and would rather offer HIS version of a reinvented Elliot or Coleridge, all turned into different personae, for the benefit of a Basque public. Clearly, this may not be sufficient in absolving Sarrionandia from the wrath of Justice in Spain, but then, history is full of such examples, where former terrorists survived to tell a story, some of them even becoming Heads of State, or high-profile politicians.
Given the above considerations, all this translator is attempting to highlight is the convergence between the lyrical expression (and poetical license) of a Basque writer (and former political prisoner too) on one hand, and on the other that of his many fellow poets, who perished under torture, in the Communist jails, for the only sin of having expressed different truths to the accepted mantra.

George Orwell: 1984

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Poetry in Translation (CXIX): Joseba SARRIONANDIA (Vizcaya, Spain, b. 1958), Basque Poet – “Memoria fostului condamnat”

August 26th, 2012 · International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

“Memoria fostului condamnat”
Joseba SARRIONANDIA (n. 1958)

Memoria fostului condamnat
se întoarce mereu în închisoare.
El vede judecători, magistraţi
şi avocaţi, peste tot, pe stradă,
şi chiar dacă nu îl recunosc,
poliţiştii toţi îl privesc
mai îndelung decât oricine, pentru că
mersul lui este prea stânjenit
sau poate nu destul de stânjenit
În sufletul lui trăieşte mereu un condamnat.

versiune în limba Română
de Constantin ROMAN
Londra, 17 August 2012
© Copyright Constantin ROMAN, 2012

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Poetry in Translation (CXIX): Bernardo ATXAGA (Guipúzcoa, 1951), Basque Poet – “Vechiul Testament după Adam” (“Adan eta bizitza”, “La vida según Adán”)

August 26th, 2012 · International Media, PEOPLE, Poetry, quotations, Translations

“Adam and Eve”, Romanian Icon on Glass

Vechiul Testament după Adam (Bernardo Atxaga)

In prima iarnă după alungarea din Rai, Adam a zăcut la pat
Şi, alarmat fiind, tare, de simptomele lui (tuse, călduri, dureri de cap)
A izbucnit în hohote de plâns, aidoma Cuvioasei Magdalena, mult după vremurile aistea.
Şi aşa, Adam îi zise Evei, jelind: ‘nu ştiu care-i năpasta ce m-a trăsnit.
Vino lângă mine, muiere dragă, căci ceasul când îmi voi da duhul, simt că este aproape’.

Eva, mirându-se, foarte, de aiste voroave de dor, frică si moarte,
Toate dintr-o limbă varvară, neştiută în Rai,
A început să le mestece în gură, precum sămânţa de rod sau de lingoare,
Ca să se dumirească mai bine ce-s voroavele astea de dor, frică şi moarte,
Dar până atunci, Adam s-a însănătoşit, regăsindu-şi buna dispoziţie, în fine, nu chiar.

Această lingoare, neştiută în Rai, a fost doar începutul,
Căci Adam şi Eva s-au înhămat să înveţe o limbă străină
Care pomenea de dragoste, frică şi moarte, şi iărăsi, cuvinte noi precum
Corvoadă, sudoare, plăcere, pumnal, pierzanie, cântec, mângâiere şi temniţă;
Pe măsură ce limba lor creştea, tot aşa li se increţea şi pielea.

Când ora Mântuirii a venit, de astă dată, cea adevărată, când Adam era tare bătrân,
El a vrut să impărtăşească cu Eva, tot ce învăţase, adică ultimul adevăr.
‘Ştii tu, muiere’, a mărturisit el, ‘alungarea din Rai, n-a fost, până la urmă, un lucru rău.
În ciuda corvoadei şi necazului cu Abel sau alte probleme,
Noi am primit harul a tot ce reprezintă nobilul sens al vieţii’.

Pe mormântul lui Adam, au căzut câteva lacrimi amare
Şi acolo unde s-au scurs. nici zambile, nici trandafiri, nici alte flori n-au mai crescut,
Iar în mod paradoxal, doar Cain a fost singurul care s-a jelit cel mai mult.
După care, Eva şi-a amintit, duios, cât de speriat a fost Adam de prima sa răceală,
Iar apoi, au încetat, cu toţi, plânsul şi s-au dus sa ciocnească un pahar şi să ia o îmbucătură.

Varianta în limba Română,
de Constantin ROMAN
Londra, 26 August 2012
© Copyright 2012, Constantin Roman

Casting from Paradise

Life according to Adam

The first winter after leaving Paradise, Adam fell ill,
And, alarmed by his symptoms: coughing, fever, headache,
He burst into tears, just as Mary Magdalene would many years later.
Then, addressing Eve, he cried: ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
Come here, my love, I fear the hour of my death is near.’

Eve was very surprised to hear the words love, fear and death,
they seemed to belong to a strange language, quite unlike the language of Paradise,
And she rolled them around in her mouth, chewing on them like tomato seeds or roots,
Until she felt she had understood them fully: love, fear, death,
But by then, Adam had recovered and was happy again – well – almost.

That extra-paradisaic event was only the first in a long series,
And Adam and Eve continued their intensive course in that language
which spoke of love, fear and death, learning words such as
Drudgery, sweat, delight, dagger, perish, song, caress and prison;
As their vocabulary increased, so did the wrinkles on their skin.

The hour of Adam’s death, the real one this time, came when Adam was very old,
And he wanted to tell Eve all that he had learned, his ultimate truth.
You know, Eve, he said, ‘losing Paradise wasn’t really such a bad thing.
Despite all the hard work, the business with poor Abel and other such problems,
We have experienced the only thing that deserves the noble name of life.’

On Adam’s tomb a few ordinary saltwater tears were shed,
And where they fell to earth no hyacinths or roses or flowers of any sort sprang up,
And paradoxically enough, it was Cain who cried the most.
Then Eve recalled fondly how frightened Adam had been by that first bout of flu,
And they all stopped crying and went off for a drink and a bite to eat.

Translated by Margaret Jull Costa

Bernardo Atxaga

Adan eta bizitza

Gaixotu zen Adan paradisua utzi eta aurreneko neguan,
eta eztulka, buruko minez, hogeita hemeretziko sukarraz,
negarrari eman zion Magdalenak gerora emango bezala,
eta Evagana zuzenduz “hil egingo naiz” esan zion oihuka,
“gaizki nago, maite, hilurren, ez dakit zer gertatzen zaidan”.

Harritu egin zen Eva hitz haiekin, hil, hilurren, gaizki, maite,
eta berriak iruditu zitzaizkion, hizkuntza arrotz batekoak,
eta ezpain artean ibili zituen maiz, hil, hilurren, gaizki, maite,
harik eta zehazki ulertzen zituela iruditu zitzaion unerarte.
Ordurako sendatua zegoen Adan, eta poz pozik zebilen.

Paradisuaz geroko lehen gertaera hark segida luzea izan zuen ,
eta lehengoez gain, hil, hilurren, gaizki, maite, Adan zein Evak
hitz berriak ikasi behar izan zituzten, min, lan, bakardade, poz
eta beste hamaika, denbora, neke, algara, eder, ikara, kemen;
hiztegia hazten zenarekin batera, zimurtuz joan zitzaien azala.

Zahartu zen erabat Adan, sentitu zuen hurbil heriotzaren ordua,
eta Evarekin elkarrizketa sakon bat izateko gogoa sortu zitzaion;
“Eva”, esan zion, “ez zen ezbehar bat izan paradisuaren galtzea;
oinazeak oinaze, minak min, gure Abelen zoritxarra halako zoritxar,
bizi izan duguna izan da, zentzurik nobleenean esanda, bizitza”.

Adanen hilobi atarian malko arruntak ixuri ziren, gatz eta urezkoak,
lurrera erortzerakoan hiazinto edo arrosa alerik eman ez zutenak,
eta Kain izan zen, paradoxaz, negarrez bortitzen puskatu zena;
Gero Evak irribarre xamurrez gogoratu zuen Adanen lehen gripea
eta halaxe, lasai, etxera joan eta salda beroa hartu zuten, eta txokolatea.

Basque Burial Egilaz, Vitoria

La vida según Adán

Enfermó Adán el primer invierno después de su salida del paraíso
y asustado con los síntomas, la tos, la fiebre, el dolor de cabeza,
se echó a llorar igual que años más tarde lo haría María Magdalena,
y dirigiéndose a Eva, “no sé qué me ocurre” gritó, “tengo miedo”
“amor mío, ven aquí, creo que ha llegado la hora de mi muerte”.

Eva se sorprendió mucho al oir aquellas palabras, amor, miedo, muerte
y le pareció que pertenecían a una lengua extraña, ajena al paradisiaqués,
y anduvo con ellas en la boca, masticándolas como pepitas, como raíces,
hasta que creyó, amor, miedo muerte, comprender enteramente su sentido.
Para entonces Adán ya se había repuesto, y volvía a sentirse feliz, o casi.

Fue sólo, aquel hecho extraparadisíaco, el primero de una larga serie,
de modo que Adán y Eva siguieron, por así decir, recibiendo clases intensivas
de la lengua que decía amor, miedo, muerte, aprendiendo palabras como
cansancio, sudor, carcajada, carcaj, carcamal, canción, caricia o cárcel;
a medida que crecía su vocabulario, las arrugas de su piel aumentaban.

La hora de la muerte, la verdadera, le llegó a Adán siendo ya muy viejo,
y quiso entonces transmitir a Eva lo que había aprendido, su última verdad.
“¿Sabes, Eva?”, le dijo, “la pérdida del paraíso no fue en realidad una desgracia”.
A pesar de los trabajos, a pesar de lo del pobre Abel y todos los demás conflictos,
hemos conocido lo único que, noblemente hablando, puede llamarse vida.

Sobre la tumba de Adán se derramaron lágrimas corrientes, de agua y sal,
que cayeron a tierra y no criaron jacintos, ni rosas, ni flores de ninguna clase,
y de todos ellos fue Caín el que, paradójicamente, con más desgarro lloró;
Luego Eva recordó con cariño el susto de Adán cuando su primera gripe,
y todos se calmaron, y se fueron, y tomaron algo, y comieron un bollo.

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