Monday, September 28, 2020

Reading Comments - 9/28

     There is much at work when one is translating poetry. It is not a surprise to find out that poetry can be extremely difficult to translate from one language to another considering poetry requires a lot of thought and insight to even make. Something that both Pulvers and Beichman mention is that the poetry translated are not carbon copies but rather recreations of the poem suitable to the respective language. Beichman goes over various qualities and decisions that translators, themselves and others, make while translating from one language to another. Each language has their own mechanics, literary devices, sounds, rhythms etc. The translator must not only understand the meaning behind the poem, but also how all such things previously mentioned are being used by the author. Understanding all this, the translator does not necessarily have to directly copy the poem, but recreate it in such as sense that may capture the original in a different way. There is the obvious such as editing a few words or choosing others to have better flow or alliteration, but there are also decisions such as Beichman's translations of Yosano Akiko that overall physically change how the reader views the poem. All in all, the mastery that a translator must have to recreate a poem in another language is outstanding.

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