Yesterday, I dropped into Twice Told Books in Guerneville, California—a very cool little store that just happens to be be for sale for just $25,000. This sounds like a deal to me, and if anyone wants to loan me $15,000, I think I can make a go of it. (Or if you want to buy it, you can contact Richard Lester and John Genovese at 707-303-6358.)The proprietor of this charming store just happened to have the 22nd edition of El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote De La Mancha :Coleccion Austral behind the counter and let me have it for just five bucks! Generally, Spanish language versions of Don Quixote are at least twenty dollars, which is kind of strange given that they don't even require editors. This book, for example, doesn't even have a perfunctory preface, foreword, or introduction. (Not that these are necessary—Cervantes provided more than enough of that.)
Chapter 4
When last I discussed Don Quixote, I was praising its wit and modernity. But things have changed. It all started in Chapter 3. Up to that point, Cervantes was very light and funny. But then things turned dark. This is not a mistake but rather a cultural difference. I've seen it with Francois Rabelais, people's ideas of humor in the 16th century were much more coarse than ours. I'd like to look into this a little.
In Chapter 4, Don Quixote comes upon a farmer whipping a lad of fifteen who it would appear is nothing more than a slave laborer. The Don is appalled by this and forces the farmer to stop torturing the boy and to pay him what he is owed. The farmer claims that his money is at home and that he will take the boy there and pay him. The boy protests that this will not happen—that once the knight is out of sight, the farmer will renege on his promise.
"I go home with him!" cried the lad. "Never in the world! No, sir, I would not even think of it. For once he has me alone he'll flay me like a St. Bartholomew."
Don Quixote brushes these concerns aside. He believes that the farmer is a knight and is bound by honor. Having seen justice prevail, Don Quixote rides off.
As he said this, he put spurs to Rocinante and was off. The farmer watched him go, and when he saw that Don Quixote was out of the wood and out of sight, he turned to his servant, Andres.
"Come here, my son," he said. "I want to pay you what I owe you as that righter of wrongs has commanded me."
"Take my word for it," replied Andres, "your Grace would do well to observe the command of that good knight—may he live a thousand years; for as he is valorous and a righteous judge, if you don't pay me then, by Roque, he will come back and do just what he said!"
"And I will give you my word as well," said the farmer; "but seeing that I am so fond of you, I wish to increase the debt, that I may owe you all the more." And with this he seized the lad's arm and bound him to the tree again and flogged him within an inch of his life. "There, Master Andres, you may call on that righter of wrongs if you like and you will see whether or not he rights this one. I do not think I have quite finished with you yet, for I have a good mind to flay you alive as you feared."
"Come here, my son," he said. "I want to pay you what I owe you as that righter of wrongs has commanded me."
"Take my word for it," replied Andres, "your Grace would do well to observe the command of that good knight—may he live a thousand years; for as he is valorous and a righteous judge, if you don't pay me then, by Roque, he will come back and do just what he said!"
"And I will give you my word as well," said the farmer; "but seeing that I am so fond of you, I wish to increase the debt, that I may owe you all the more." And with this he seized the lad's arm and bound him to the tree again and flogged him within an inch of his life. "There, Master Andres, you may call on that righter of wrongs if you like and you will see whether or not he rights this one. I do not think I have quite finished with you yet, for I have a good mind to flay you alive as you feared."
Don Quixote is crazy, of course. And I pitied him even through Chapter 3—where he behaved rather badly. But here, I found that I was really very angry with him. He was so caught up in the romance of knighthood, that he didn't find it necessary to make sure that justice was done—just that he announced what justice ought to be done. And in the end, Andres was harmed even more than he would otherwise have been.
This episode contrasts very well with a true story about Henry Bergh, the founder of the ASPCA. During the Civil War, he had a diplomatic post in St. Petersburg, Russia. According to Nathan J. Winograd in his excellent book, Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America:
Finding the duties tiring and mundane, Bergh spent less time on official duties and more time taking aimless carriage rides throughout the city. When he witnessed a peasant beating his donkey on one such ride, Bergh ordered the man to stop, which the man did in deference to Bergh, who looked like a well-dressed gentleman of official position. According to legend, the experience completely transformed Henry Bergh and left him with an abiding sense of accomplishment. Bergh spent his remaining time in Russia traveling daily by carriage in search of such transgressions, which he could prevent by reason of his social class, official position and immense physical stature.
...
Bergh would spend the better part of the next two decades in a daily struggle for the animals in and around New York City. Turning to the event in the streets of St. Petersburg that inspired him, his first order of business was to better the plight of New York City's much abused working draft horses ... The annals of the ASPCA describe the first such encounter:
The driver of a cart laden with coal is whipping his horse. Passersby on the New York City street stop to gawk not so much at the weak, emaciated equine, but at the tall man, elegant in top hat and spats, who is explaining to the driver that it is now against the law to beat one's animal. Thus, America first encounters "The Great Meddler."
...
Bergh would spend the better part of the next two decades in a daily struggle for the animals in and around New York City. Turning to the event in the streets of St. Petersburg that inspired him, his first order of business was to better the plight of New York City's much abused working draft horses ... The annals of the ASPCA describe the first such encounter:
The driver of a cart laden with coal is whipping his horse. Passersby on the New York City street stop to gawk not so much at the weak, emaciated equine, but at the tall man, elegant in top hat and spats, who is explaining to the driver that it is now against the law to beat one's animal. Thus, America first encounters "The Great Meddler."
Bergh spent the next twenty-two years of his life daily going about New York personally stopping animal cruelty—even arresting people and taking them to jail. If he saw a horse-pulled train that was over-crowed, he would stop it and force the riders to get off. Henry Bergh was a Victorian Don Quixote, in the sense of one man out to right wrongs, no matter what the odds.I am reading Don Quixote very slowly. I just pick it up when I want something light. It almost always wins out over P. G. Wodehouse. And it can be read in much the same way as The World of Jeeves. It is highly episodic. All this means, however, that I don't know where Don Quixote is going. I'd like to think that Don Quixote really becomes the knight of his foolish fantasies. I hope that his quixotic quest leads him to the nobility of Bergh's.
My friend Andrea and I were discussing self-consciously intellectual writers and so naturally E. E. Cummings came up. We agreed that he mostly sucked, but she promised to send me two poems that she thought were okay.
As a kind of header, but perhaps more of a challenge, she wrote, "Life's not a paragraph And death i think is no parenthesis." That was curious, so I went and looked it up and found that it was from Cummings' poem "since feeling is first":
I like the word play and images in this poem. And unusually for Cummings, the rhythm is really interesting—more what we expect from the much more talented William Carlos Williams. That's as far as it goes, however. The content of the poem is—as usual—really troubling.
It seems that Cummings never really made it out of adolescence. Here, although he does it with more style, he says nothing more than Joyce Kilmer did in his poem "Trees":
Or as Cummings might have written
It isn't just that this poem indicates a romantic outlook that Jane Austen was parodying over a hundred years earlier in Sense and Sensibility; the poem is preachy. This is what most defines Cummings' work. He is always telling us—as only a youth can—about the secret of the Good Life that only he possesses.
The two poems Andrea sent me are just like this. Here is the first:
It does have the compelling ending, "nobody beautiful ever hurries." But as I think is clear in that line itself, he pushing a romantic notion of existence a lot harder than it can bear. It has other problems, but I doubt it is necessary to go into them.
The second poem is "maggie and milly and molly and may." It deserves a full hearing:
The rhythmic structure of this is maddening. It is kind of iambic pentameter, but frustratingly not. I really don't know how to "read" it. This is not a criticism—at least not of Cummings. I don't doubt that he is doing just what he intends. This is also true with the difficult assonantal scheme. Am I supposed to read "were" in the third stanza as "war"? I don't suppose it matters.
What does matter is that Cummings is again here to delight us with another tired insight. This time: the world is what you make it. Wow! Where are the neo-fascist teenagers of today? No wonder our lives are so devoid of Truth and Beau
ty.
As a kind of header, but perhaps more of a challenge, she wrote, "Life's not a paragraph And death i think is no parenthesis." That was curious, so I went and looked it up and found that it was from Cummings' poem "since feeling is first":
since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a far better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
--the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says
we are for eachother: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a far better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
--the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says
we are for eachother: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
I like the word play and images in this poem. And unusually for Cummings, the rhythm is really interesting—more what we expect from the much more talented William Carlos Williams. That's as far as it goes, however. The content of the poem is—as usual—really troubling.
It seems that Cummings never really made it out of adolescence. Here, although he does it with more style, he says nothing more than Joyce Kilmer did in his poem "Trees":
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A poem lovely as a tree.
Or as Cummings might have written
when I see your eyelids flutter
i throw my pen down in the gutter.
i throw my pen down in the gutter.
It isn't just that this poem indicates a romantic outlook that Jane Austen was parodying over a hundred years earlier in Sense and Sensibility; the poem is preachy. This is what most defines Cummings' work. He is always telling us—as only a youth can—about the secret of the Good Life that only he possesses.
The two poems Andrea sent me are just like this. Here is the first:
why
do the fingers of the little
(once beautiful)
lady
(sitting sewing this fine morning)
fly
instead of dancing
(i wonder)
is she possibly a
ware that life
(who never grows old)
is always beau
tiful and that nobody beau
tiful
ever
hurries
do the fingers of the little
(once beautiful)
lady
(sitting sewing this fine morning)
fly
instead of dancing
(i wonder)
is she possibly a
ware that life
(who never grows old)
is always beau
tiful and that nobody beau
tiful
ever
hurries
It does have the compelling ending, "nobody beautiful ever hurries." But as I think is clear in that line itself, he pushing a romantic notion of existence a lot harder than it can bear. It has other problems, but I doubt it is necessary to go into them.
The second poem is "maggie and milly and molly and may." It deserves a full hearing:
maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)
and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and
milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;
and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and
may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.
For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea
went down to the beach (to play one day)
and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and
milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;
and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and
may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.
For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea
The rhythmic structure of this is maddening. It is kind of iambic pentameter, but frustratingly not. I really don't know how to "read" it. This is not a criticism—at least not of Cummings. I don't doubt that he is doing just what he intends. This is also true with the difficult assonantal scheme. Am I supposed to read "were" in the third stanza as "war"? I don't suppose it matters.
What does matter is that Cummings is again here to delight us with another tired insight. This time: the world is what you make it. Wow! Where are the neo-fascist teenagers of today? No wonder our lives are so devoid of Truth and Beau
ty.
I am in the middle of reading E. T. Bell's Men of Mathematics. It was written in 1937, but frankly, it could have been written in 1887. The thinking and style are so Victorian. I'm sure I will have more to say about Bell's thinking at a later time—for now, take my word he has a simplistic, highly romantic view of people and history. (In its way, it is charming.) Today, I would like to talk just a little about the writing style.
Here is an example of Bell's style taken almost at random:
Yes, this in itself is not horrific, but I challenge you to put up with hundreds of pages of it. This is why I was pushed to check the book's copyright. When I bought it, I thought it was recent—in the last few decades. After reading some of it, I started to get that P. A. Motteux feeling. But both thoughts were wrong; it was written well into the Modern period when so much great—and above all, crisp—writing had been done. Ten years before Bell wrote the above quotation, Gertrude Stein wrote this for Virgil Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts:
Or I could have quoted something from The Sun Also Rises—but that's not nearly as fun.
The point of all this is that Bell was not a writer; he was a mathematician. Had he written fifty years later, Stein would doubtless have had an effect on him—even (or perhaps especially) if he had never read her. It takes such a long time for the cutting edge to become "less work around the house!" I know Bell understood that about math. I can't say whether he understood that about writing. But it doesn't matter; such knowledge would not have changed how he wrote.
Here is an example of Bell's style taken almost at random:
In spite of his demonstrated genius the harassed boy was not even now left to himself at school. The authorities gave him no peace to harvest the rich field his discoveries, but pestered him to distraction with petty tasks and goaded him to open revolt by their everlasting preachings and punishments.
Yes, this in itself is not horrific, but I challenge you to put up with hundreds of pages of it. This is why I was pushed to check the book's copyright. When I bought it, I thought it was recent—in the last few decades. After reading some of it, I started to get that P. A. Motteux feeling. But both thoughts were wrong; it was written well into the Modern period when so much great—and above all, crisp—writing had been done. Ten years before Bell wrote the above quotation, Gertrude Stein wrote this for Virgil Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts:
Pigeons on the grass alas.
Pigeons on the grass alas.
Short longer grass short longer longer shorter yellow grass. Pigeons large pigeons on the shorter longer yellow grass alas pigeons on the grass.
If they were not pigeons what were they.
If they were not pigeons on the grass alas what were they. He had heard of a third and he asked about it it was a magpie in the sky. If a magpie in the sky on the sky can not cry if the pigeon on the grass alas can alas and to pass the pigeon on the grass alas and the magpie in the sky on the sky and to try and to try alas on the grass alas the pigeon on the grass the pigeon on the grass and alas. They might be very well very well very well they might be they might be very well they might be very well very well they might be.
Let Lucy Lily Lily Lucy Lucy let Lucy Lucy Lily Lily Lily Lily Lily let Lily Lucy Lucy let Lily. Let Lucy Lily.
Pigeons on the grass alas.
Short longer grass short longer longer shorter yellow grass. Pigeons large pigeons on the shorter longer yellow grass alas pigeons on the grass.
If they were not pigeons what were they.
If they were not pigeons on the grass alas what were they. He had heard of a third and he asked about it it was a magpie in the sky. If a magpie in the sky on the sky can not cry if the pigeon on the grass alas can alas and to pass the pigeon on the grass alas and the magpie in the sky on the sky and to try and to try alas on the grass alas the pigeon on the grass the pigeon on the grass and alas. They might be very well very well very well they might be they might be very well they might be very well very well they might be.
Let Lucy Lily Lily Lucy Lucy let Lucy Lucy Lily Lily Lily Lily Lily let Lily Lucy Lucy let Lily. Let Lucy Lily.
Or I could have quoted something from The Sun Also Rises—but that's not nearly as fun.
The point of all this is that Bell was not a writer; he was a mathematician. Had he written fifty years later, Stein would doubtless have had an effect on him—even (or perhaps especially) if he had never read her. It takes such a long time for the cutting edge to become "less work around the house!" I know Bell understood that about math. I can't say whether he understood that about writing. But it doesn't matter; such knowledge would not have changed how he wrote.
15/06: The Prologue of Don Quixote
It may come as a surprise to many that Ingmar Bergman's almost three-hour-long Scenes from a Marriage was a heavily edited theatrical release of what was originally a six-part mini-series that is five hours long. Five hours! It may also surprise many that a pretentious twat like me has never seen it. So when I got my hands on the Criterion Collection release, I had to make a decision: do I watch the three-hour movie or the five-hour mini-series. Following Peter Cowie's advice, I decided to watch the series, "as it was meant to be watched": one "scene" every night for six nights. But even after making this decision, I was wary: am I really going to get much from this film when I don't speak Swedish, and thus am left to subtitles—even if they are, "New and improved"?
Then, earlier today I watched Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville. It is also from the Criterion Collection. It also promises new (although strangely no claim to being improved) subtitles. And again, I had the same concerns. Recently, it seems I fret a good deal too much about translations. But the problem is very real—especially for films. There was a documentary on the three-disk Seven Samurai (also Criterion Collection—what can I say?) about creating subtitles. It is very interesting if not surprising, and I highly recommend watching it if you get the chance.
I am happy to report that one area of my translated art ingestion is going as well as I could possibly hope: reading Samuel Putnam's translaion of Don Quixote. I just started and have only read the Prologue and Chapter I, but it is lovely—and funny as hell. For example, in the Prologue, he is complaining to friend about how he has decided not to publish the book at this time because (in part) he cannot list the authors to whom he is indebted. (Cervantes would have us believe that he is simply an ignorant dolt who happens to have a flair for spinning tall tales.) He continues that he is, "unable to follow the example of all the others by listing them alphabetically at the beginning, starting with Aristotle and closing with Xenophon, or, perhaps, with Zoilus or Zeuxis, not withstanding the fact that the former was a snarling critic, and the latter a painter."
His friend's advice is just to fake it when possible and rip it off when necessary. He then goes on to make the most beautiful statement about artistic intent that I have ever read:
Wow. I'm going to print that out and hang it on the wall next to me: right below my Mystery Science Theater 3000 mini-posters.
Reading Don Quixote, it is hard to believe that I am reading an English translation of a Spanish text written about the time of Hamlet. It is so modern: in style and content. Although I still hope to one day read the book in Spanish, I have little doubt that the experience I have now will be the superior, and dare I say it: more authentic. I fear that the original will be as far removed from modern Spanish as Shakespearean plays are from modern English. Thus I am glad for great men like Putnam.
When it comes to film subtitles, the situation is bleak for a number of reasons that I will not go into here. Nontheless, Alphaville is quite a good film. And the first scene from Scenes from a Marriage? Despite everything: it is amazing. I am looking forward to tonight's scene.
Then, earlier today I watched Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville. It is also from the Criterion Collection. It also promises new (although strangely no claim to being improved) subtitles. And again, I had the same concerns. Recently, it seems I fret a good deal too much about translations. But the problem is very real—especially for films. There was a documentary on the three-disk Seven Samurai (also Criterion Collection—what can I say?) about creating subtitles. It is very interesting if not surprising, and I highly recommend watching it if you get the chance.
I am happy to report that one area of my translated art ingestion is going as well as I could possibly hope: reading Samuel Putnam's translaion of Don Quixote. I just started and have only read the Prologue and Chapter I, but it is lovely—and funny as hell. For example, in the Prologue, he is complaining to friend about how he has decided not to publish the book at this time because (in part) he cannot list the authors to whom he is indebted. (Cervantes would have us believe that he is simply an ignorant dolt who happens to have a flair for spinning tall tales.) He continues that he is, "unable to follow the example of all the others by listing them alphabetically at the beginning, starting with Aristotle and closing with Xenophon, or, perhaps, with Zoilus or Zeuxis, not withstanding the fact that the former was a snarling critic, and the latter a painter."
His friend's advice is just to fake it when possible and rip it off when necessary. He then goes on to make the most beautiful statement about artistic intent that I have ever read:
Let it be your aim that, by reading your story, the melancholy may be moved to laughter and the cheerful man made merrier still; let the simple not be bored, but may the clever admire your originality; let the grave ones not despise you, but let the prudent praise you.
Wow. I'm going to print that out and hang it on the wall next to me: right below my Mystery Science Theater 3000 mini-posters.
Reading Don Quixote, it is hard to believe that I am reading an English translation of a Spanish text written about the time of Hamlet. It is so modern: in style and content. Although I still hope to one day read the book in Spanish, I have little doubt that the experience I have now will be the superior, and dare I say it: more authentic. I fear that the original will be as far removed from modern Spanish as Shakespearean plays are from modern English. Thus I am glad for great men like Putnam.
When it comes to film subtitles, the situation is bleak for a number of reasons that I will not go into here. Nontheless, Alphaville is quite a good film. And the first scene from Scenes from a Marriage? Despite everything: it is amazing. I am looking forward to tonight's scene.
15/04: Pow Wow Theater
Wayne Poehlman is a singer/guitarist that I recently discovered on You Tube. To me, he’s the kind of performer who you listen to when you tire of the glitz and the posing and the pitch-correction of what is today called music. Of course, this goes along with my recent submersion into music of the past such as Geeshie Wiley and Mississippi John Hurt (the “Mississippi” to distinguish him from the guy who has the creature burst through his chest in Alien). Poehlman calls his online solo act "Pow Wow Theater."
I first discovered him performing a minor song off the first Jules and the Polar Bears album: Following Every Finger. The tune stands out for a number of reasons. First, he changes the chords to make them more traditional (Shear can get a little weird) and he sings the song in a more melodic manner that works better and allows the listener to understand all of the words. I highly recommend listening to it.
He performs a number of other notable songs. In particular, he performs Michael Peter Smith’s The Dutchman. If you aren’t familiar with this song, it seems to be about an old man with dementia and his wife who takes care of him. The chorus is:
Let us go to the banks of the ocean
Where the walls rise above the Zuider Zee
Long ago I used to be a young man
And dear Margaret remembers that for me
Poehlman manages to interpret the song just perfectly—like he really understands what this man and woman are going through. He also performs Them Dance Hall Girls by Allan Fraser (although I think it might be based upon a traditional tune) that is very good. His All Time Woman is not as good as John Stewart’s—plus there is some distortion when he belts out the chorus; but it’s still good. There is a nice cover of Del Amitri’s Driving with the Brakes on; Poehlman has a rather similar voice to Amitri’s, so it isn’t surprising. The cover of Good Old War’s Coney Island is probably the weakest of what Poehlman has to offer. The Amazing Rhythm Ace’s song 3rd Rate Romance is covered in an unusual manner with a drum machine; on it, he sounds like he is channeling Jules Shear at times. Finally, there is another drum machine tune: Red Ball Texas Flyer by Jerry Riopelle. It is good enough; I’m not that fond of the original song.
At 59 years-old, Wayne Poehlman (or "Pow Wow" as he goes by) is what you might call a "late bloomer." He tells me that it was less than 15 years ago that he finally learned how to write a proper song. Although he plays professionally at bars and events where he is expected to perform a lot of covers, he sees himself primarily as a songwriter. And a fine one he is too.
I have two free MP3 files of his original songs. The first is Looking for Juliet. Of this song, he writes "One night, I saw Juliette Binoche in [Krzysztof] Kieslowski's Bleu and I was reminded of an artist-friend, Julie who loved Paul Klee. Beyond the similarity in their names, I think I made a connection between both women being artists and my unrequited love for both that prompted me to reference some of the Romeo and Juliet imagery. And of course, if you use either of those two names it's going to come up, like it or not."
The second is Desperate People. This song is a little more produced than Juliet and a little more "pop." As with anything that Pow Wow does, his take on it is intelligent and knowledgeable.
He says it is "[c]omedy with poignancy. [It is d]etermination evidenced by surreal behavior in an effort to fulfill ones destiny."
In the end, what I most like about Poehlman is that he creates simple music that is intelligent (often witty) and beautiful. Check him out.
I first discovered him performing a minor song off the first Jules and the Polar Bears album: Following Every Finger. The tune stands out for a number of reasons. First, he changes the chords to make them more traditional (Shear can get a little weird) and he sings the song in a more melodic manner that works better and allows the listener to understand all of the words. I highly recommend listening to it.
He performs a number of other notable songs. In particular, he performs Michael Peter Smith’s The Dutchman. If you aren’t familiar with this song, it seems to be about an old man with dementia and his wife who takes care of him. The chorus is:
Let us go to the banks of the ocean
Where the walls rise above the Zuider Zee
Long ago I used to be a young man
And dear Margaret remembers that for me
Poehlman manages to interpret the song just perfectly—like he really understands what this man and woman are going through. He also performs Them Dance Hall Girls by Allan Fraser (although I think it might be based upon a traditional tune) that is very good. His All Time Woman is not as good as John Stewart’s—plus there is some distortion when he belts out the chorus; but it’s still good. There is a nice cover of Del Amitri’s Driving with the Brakes on; Poehlman has a rather similar voice to Amitri’s, so it isn’t surprising. The cover of Good Old War’s Coney Island is probably the weakest of what Poehlman has to offer. The Amazing Rhythm Ace’s song 3rd Rate Romance is covered in an unusual manner with a drum machine; on it, he sounds like he is channeling Jules Shear at times. Finally, there is another drum machine tune: Red Ball Texas Flyer by Jerry Riopelle. It is good enough; I’m not that fond of the original song.
At 59 years-old, Wayne Poehlman (or "Pow Wow" as he goes by) is what you might call a "late bloomer." He tells me that it was less than 15 years ago that he finally learned how to write a proper song. Although he plays professionally at bars and events where he is expected to perform a lot of covers, he sees himself primarily as a songwriter. And a fine one he is too.
I have two free MP3 files of his original songs. The first is Looking for Juliet. Of this song, he writes "One night, I saw Juliette Binoche in [Krzysztof] Kieslowski's Bleu and I was reminded of an artist-friend, Julie who loved Paul Klee. Beyond the similarity in their names, I think I made a connection between both women being artists and my unrequited love for both that prompted me to reference some of the Romeo and Juliet imagery. And of course, if you use either of those two names it's going to come up, like it or not."
The second is Desperate People. This song is a little more produced than Juliet and a little more "pop." As with anything that Pow Wow does, his take on it is intelligent and knowledgeable.
He says it is "[c]omedy with poignancy. [It is d]etermination evidenced by surreal behavior in an effort to fulfill ones destiny."
In the end, what I most like about Poehlman is that he creates simple music that is intelligent (often witty) and beautiful. Check him out.
03/04: First Draft Fear
Kristen McHenry has made a list of her fears. One of them is fear of someone reading my first draft. By this, I must assume that either her second drafts are final, or she is not afraid of someone reading her second drafts, or—and most troubling, she simply forgot to list the drafts that she fears someone reading. This last one bothers me so much because, other than this blog, I write many drafts of my work—upwards of 100 drafts for a piece of work. I don't know about Ms. McHenry; maybe it's plop, spell check, publish. But I doubt this. Thus, I wonder: does she fear someone reading any draft other than her final draft? Is it just certain drafts—say, 2,3 5, and 11? Or perhaps just the even drafts? Perhaps the prime numbers? Maybe it is even a mathematical sequence, like: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, and so on. Perhaps it is a more interesting sequence? One that I couldn't even figure out and I am rather good at these kinds of things.
I understand the desire to withhold a work of art until it is finished. I have, for example, never let anyone read my first novel Kamping on Asphalt—not that people were tripping over themselves to get a copy. The truth is that the very idea of a draft is not clear to me in the sense that it usually takes an enormous amount of writing to get to something that one might call a first draft. I find the process goes something like this: crap, crap, crap, crap, crap with an interesting idea, crap, crap, crap with that interesting idea turned into a major dorky part of it, dorky crap, dorky, dorky, something readable but bad. The final result: the "first" draft.
Let me explain with the current draft of the first chapter of my second novel Treading Asphalt. I decided that because KOA was written in limited third-person, I would like to do TA in first person. That's what Joseph Heller did, so how hard could it be? It was a bitch. It took me two years to find the voice of the narrator (and he was a major character in KOA, so I had a running start at it). And so here is what I would call my first draft of the first chapter of TA (note my fearlessness):
Okay. Okay. It is genre crap, but I'm trying to make a living here. I would show you my second draft, but I fear people reading my second drafts. No, just kidding. But I won't show you my second draft anyway—I can't find it. Here's my third (or maybe fourth), however:
So I say, free yourself Ms. McHenry! Free yourself from this first draft fear! I have never met a writer whose work didn't suck 99% of the time. Hell, I can show you writers whose published work sucks 99% of the time! Embrace your ineptitude; accept your ignorance; relish your double commas and similar typos; proudly right, "Theirs know perphection end da whirled."
I understand the desire to withhold a work of art until it is finished. I have, for example, never let anyone read my first novel Kamping on Asphalt—not that people were tripping over themselves to get a copy. The truth is that the very idea of a draft is not clear to me in the sense that it usually takes an enormous amount of writing to get to something that one might call a first draft. I find the process goes something like this: crap, crap, crap, crap, crap with an interesting idea, crap, crap, crap with that interesting idea turned into a major dorky part of it, dorky crap, dorky, dorky, something readable but bad. The final result: the "first" draft.
Let me explain with the current draft of the first chapter of my second novel Treading Asphalt. I decided that because KOA was written in limited third-person, I would like to do TA in first person. That's what Joseph Heller did, so how hard could it be? It was a bitch. It took me two years to find the voice of the narrator (and he was a major character in KOA, so I had a running start at it). And so here is what I would call my first draft of the first chapter of TA (note my fearlessness):
Waking up with your head on a steel toilet seat isn’t that bad—not any worse than waking up at all. My head feels like a million pins are sticking into it. Or maybe that it’s on fire, but just a little. Then I notice the rest of my body—it all feels that way. I push myself up using the toilet: no lid, no seat; less to clean; no assholes shitting on the lid. The blanket I’ve been wrapped in, falls away. My right foot gets tangled in it; I fall, but catch myself on the sink. Right next to the toilet—same steel. And the steel mirror—all I see are ribs; amazing what a couple weeks not eating does. I press the single metal fixture, and sort of cold water comes out; I drink it and it feels good; and that feels weird. I release the fixture, wipe my mouth with my arm, and stumble backwards onto the cot. It’s over. But only like a play—one you’ll perform tomorrow or next season or sometime. You know you’ve got one more performance in you.
I would have been ORed five days ago, but I was already sick when they picked me up. And now that I’m better, they’ll probably kick me out today. Multnomah County doesn’t have the space to spend much time on junkies—even repeat offenders like me. Even though they know I won’t likely show up to court. And I won’t. Even though they know that I won’t likely live a good clean life. And I won’t. They just don’t care. They have real crime to deal with—the violent, the evil, the psychotic; there’s no room for the merely pathetic. Hopefully it’s that way in Las Vegas and that I’m not the only person who cares who murdered Rachel.
I would have been ORed five days ago, but I was already sick when they picked me up. And now that I’m better, they’ll probably kick me out today. Multnomah County doesn’t have the space to spend much time on junkies—even repeat offenders like me. Even though they know I won’t likely show up to court. And I won’t. Even though they know that I won’t likely live a good clean life. And I won’t. They just don’t care. They have real crime to deal with—the violent, the evil, the psychotic; there’s no room for the merely pathetic. Hopefully it’s that way in Las Vegas and that I’m not the only person who cares who murdered Rachel.
Okay. Okay. It is genre crap, but I'm trying to make a living here. I would show you my second draft, but I fear people reading my second drafts. No, just kidding. But I won't show you my second draft anyway—I can't find it. Here's my third (or maybe fourth), however:
This is Rachel's fault.
I'm huddled next to the steel toilet, with my blanket wrapped around me and between me—I'm well enough to notice that I can't stand touching my own body. Occasionally, I place my chin on the rim of the toilet and vomit. But nothing comes. I just kind of gag and drool. Past the worst of it—I managed to eat a baloney sandwich earlier. Just threw it back up, but it's better than the dry heaves. I still have the sweats and the chills; and my ass feels like it's on fire from the diarrhea. Just like the vomiting though, little comes. And what does come is pure acid—it's a lot worse down there. Getting better, though; that's all that matters—in detox or in life, right?
It's all Rachel's fault, because she's dead. And because she was Rachel, which is why she's dead, I guess.
I push myself up using the toilet—the blanket drops away. My right foot gets tangled in it; I fall, but catch myself on the sink. Right next to the toilet—same steel. And the mirror—steel. It reflects no one I recognize; all I see are ribs, beneath near transparent skin—amazed at what a couple weeks not eating does. My Jack Lord hair—a point of vanity and ridicule, is mushed down with sweat and puke. I look away: down. I press the single metal fixture, and lukewarm water comes out; I drink it and it tastes good; and that feels weird. I release the fixture, wipe my mouth with my arm, and stumble backwards onto the cot. It’s pretty much over. But only like a play—one you’ll perform tomorrow or next season or sometime. You know you’ve got one more performance in you—if you don't die first.
I hate Rachel, and where I am, every thing's her fault. But I'm not in the can because of her—because they think I killed her. Nobody cares that she's dead, much less who killed her. Except me. I care. It's the only thing I care about. And that's why I got strung out again. And that's why I got popped. Or maybe I just don't have the stomach for it anymore; maybe I'm not as good I used to be; the life is too fucking hard. But I always thought Rachel made it okay—worth it all. But maybe I was just a fucking idiot. Maybe I still am.
They would have ORed me the day I got arrested, if I hadn't vomited all over their fingerprint machine. So instead of getting released, they put me in a cell alone so the detox could run its course. "Run its course!" That's kind of funny. It wasn't a bad thing though; I've done it a bunch; and I don't know what I would have done if I'd gone free. Rachel was always paranoid of going cold turkey. Of course, she never had to; I always did the dangerous stuff. She died without a record.
They'll throw me out tomorrow, probably—maybe even tonight. It doesn't much matter. They send a medic a couple times a day to make sure I'm not dead, but that's it; no meds, just tepid encouragement. I'm just taking up space—space for two, and Multnomah County doesn’t have the space to waste on junkies and shoplifters—even repeat offenders like me. They know I won’t likely show up to court; and I won’t. They know that I won’t likely live a good clean life; and I won’t, whatever the fuck that might mean. They just don’t care. They have real crime to deal with—the violent, the evil, the psychotic; there’s no room for the merely pathetic. It ain't that way in Vegas; they don't even believe Rachel was murdered, but if she were alive they'd arrest her for drugs.
The door to the cell buzzes open and startles me. I jump back and bash my head against the concrete wall behind the cot. It's not bad; I don't have the strength to move quickly, forcefully. I look to the door and Stu is standing there in his blue scrubs, hold the door half open. He's a kid, maybe twenty-two—the caring type—one of those big guys who never got in a fight because everyone was afraid of his size. He's apologized that he couldn't get me any medicine, although he did give me some Advil; that was nice, even though I could still see the partly dissolved pills when I vomited them back up.
"How you holding up, Brian?" he asks kind of sad.
"Better," I say. "You know."
"You wanna take a shower? It'll help; really."
"Maybe," I say. "In an hour? I've got to work up to it."
"Sure," he says. "I'll come back; and I'll help you."
He leaves and the door slams shut. They're pressuring him to get me out.
I'm huddled next to the steel toilet, with my blanket wrapped around me and between me—I'm well enough to notice that I can't stand touching my own body. Occasionally, I place my chin on the rim of the toilet and vomit. But nothing comes. I just kind of gag and drool. Past the worst of it—I managed to eat a baloney sandwich earlier. Just threw it back up, but it's better than the dry heaves. I still have the sweats and the chills; and my ass feels like it's on fire from the diarrhea. Just like the vomiting though, little comes. And what does come is pure acid—it's a lot worse down there. Getting better, though; that's all that matters—in detox or in life, right?
It's all Rachel's fault, because she's dead. And because she was Rachel, which is why she's dead, I guess.
I push myself up using the toilet—the blanket drops away. My right foot gets tangled in it; I fall, but catch myself on the sink. Right next to the toilet—same steel. And the mirror—steel. It reflects no one I recognize; all I see are ribs, beneath near transparent skin—amazed at what a couple weeks not eating does. My Jack Lord hair—a point of vanity and ridicule, is mushed down with sweat and puke. I look away: down. I press the single metal fixture, and lukewarm water comes out; I drink it and it tastes good; and that feels weird. I release the fixture, wipe my mouth with my arm, and stumble backwards onto the cot. It’s pretty much over. But only like a play—one you’ll perform tomorrow or next season or sometime. You know you’ve got one more performance in you—if you don't die first.
I hate Rachel, and where I am, every thing's her fault. But I'm not in the can because of her—because they think I killed her. Nobody cares that she's dead, much less who killed her. Except me. I care. It's the only thing I care about. And that's why I got strung out again. And that's why I got popped. Or maybe I just don't have the stomach for it anymore; maybe I'm not as good I used to be; the life is too fucking hard. But I always thought Rachel made it okay—worth it all. But maybe I was just a fucking idiot. Maybe I still am.
They would have ORed me the day I got arrested, if I hadn't vomited all over their fingerprint machine. So instead of getting released, they put me in a cell alone so the detox could run its course. "Run its course!" That's kind of funny. It wasn't a bad thing though; I've done it a bunch; and I don't know what I would have done if I'd gone free. Rachel was always paranoid of going cold turkey. Of course, she never had to; I always did the dangerous stuff. She died without a record.
They'll throw me out tomorrow, probably—maybe even tonight. It doesn't much matter. They send a medic a couple times a day to make sure I'm not dead, but that's it; no meds, just tepid encouragement. I'm just taking up space—space for two, and Multnomah County doesn’t have the space to waste on junkies and shoplifters—even repeat offenders like me. They know I won’t likely show up to court; and I won’t. They know that I won’t likely live a good clean life; and I won’t, whatever the fuck that might mean. They just don’t care. They have real crime to deal with—the violent, the evil, the psychotic; there’s no room for the merely pathetic. It ain't that way in Vegas; they don't even believe Rachel was murdered, but if she were alive they'd arrest her for drugs.
The door to the cell buzzes open and startles me. I jump back and bash my head against the concrete wall behind the cot. It's not bad; I don't have the strength to move quickly, forcefully. I look to the door and Stu is standing there in his blue scrubs, hold the door half open. He's a kid, maybe twenty-two—the caring type—one of those big guys who never got in a fight because everyone was afraid of his size. He's apologized that he couldn't get me any medicine, although he did give me some Advil; that was nice, even though I could still see the partly dissolved pills when I vomited them back up.
"How you holding up, Brian?" he asks kind of sad.
"Better," I say. "You know."
"You wanna take a shower? It'll help; really."
"Maybe," I say. "In an hour? I've got to work up to it."
"Sure," he says. "I'll come back; and I'll help you."
He leaves and the door slams shut. They're pressuring him to get me out.
So I say, free yourself Ms. McHenry! Free yourself from this first draft fear! I have never met a writer whose work didn't suck 99% of the time. Hell, I can show you writers whose published work sucks 99% of the time! Embrace your ineptitude; accept your ignorance; relish your double commas and similar typos; proudly right, "Theirs know perphection end da whirled."
02/04: Leak
I have so much to do, especially finish my article and interview with Pow Wow (Wayne Poehlman), but I just ran into an old friend Yana Bogosian who I wrote a song with about eleven years ago. Actually, we didn't write it together. She had written a little nursery rhyme about a pipe that was leaking behind the wall in her apartment. She wrote more than I'm going to quote, but I don't remember the rest, because I didn't rip that part off. Here's what I remember:
There's a leak, but we can't find it
There's a bust hiding behind it
I was struck with this. For her it was a poem/song that was concrete: it was about her life. But it started in me a creative explosion. And never being one to shy away from ripping off other people's lives (and I gave her lead songwriting credit even though I wrote all of it except for those two line), I went with it. I thought it would be really surreal if a leaky pipe caused a whole town to flood. Hence the song.
There's a leak, but we can't find it
There's a bust hiding behind it
I was struck with this. For her it was a poem/song that was concrete: it was about her life. But it started in me a creative explosion. And never being one to shy away from ripping off other people's lives (and I gave her lead songwriting credit even though I wrote all of it except for those two line), I went with it. I thought it would be really surreal if a leaky pipe caused a whole town to flood. Hence the song.
21/02: About to Read Don Quixote
Gentle reader: you already know that this article on Don Quixote—the product of my eccentric intellect—is intended to be the greatest article I could possibly write. Unfortunately, it will probably suck; but I urge you onward nonetheless. The problem is not me, you see, but Miguel de Cervantes, and the fact that he was born in Spain and thus spoke Spanish. This is a problem, for just as you know the worthiness of my intent, you surely know that I am fluent in the Spanish language, in the sense that I can neither read nor write it. Not surprisingly, I am also unable to speak it.
The Need for Translators
Perhaps I am being too hard on Cervantes; had he been born in, say, England, he would have written in that transitional early modern English—which really means, "not modern English". In fact, at least Miguel (if only he had been born 420 years later in California, I'm sure we would have been on a first name basis) is translated. These days, Shakespeare's plays are set everywhere other than where and how they were intended, but we're still left with the same damn language. I often wonder why we can't get over this. Let's just acknowledge that we all know all the common Shakespeare misquotes (like "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" which is way more pithy than what that bard actually wrote anyway) and let the translators have at those plays. And by "have at", I don't mean in that Tom Stoppard "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" way; I mean in the way that translators of de (if only he had been born 420 years later in California, I'm sure we would have been on a second name basis, too) try to recreate the experience the original readers had for modern readers. (Or translators of Goethe or Rabelais—writers who, strangely, I like a lot more than that bard.)
But this does present a problem. You see, being as I am a poorly educated physics PhD ("fud"), I have been working for years trying to read all the books that my humanities studying friends always seemed like they had read. (I later found out that they had not read most of those books—they had simply read about them; but that has not quelled my urge.) I have only two books left that I must read: Moby Dick and Don Quixote. So recently, I decided to buy a copy of DQ (I already own a copy of MD), and I went into a bookstore: one of those big ones with the coffee and multiple floors (no, not Powell's Books—I would have noticed if I had been there; it was Borders or Barns and Noble or something like that; not a bad bookstore, but certainly not a good one, and certainly not one with any used books; but I digress). And I go to the Literature section and after much difficulty (I have real trouble alphabetizing), I find Don Quixotes. That's right: plural. There were six different translations. Imagine if I had been in Powell's?!
Which Don Quixote will I read?! There is no one around to help, or rather, the help I am offered is like that from my sister, who tells me, after reading Moby Dick in high school, "You don't need to read it." I have two options: go to a used bookstore and read the cheapest version I can find, or determine for myself which translation to read. I settle on the latter, so I can write this article. If you are starting to imagine the snowball effect, I assure you, it is more like Sisyphus.
The Test
Obviously, I can't read all the translations in order to determine which transition to read. I needed a test. I decided to take a single sentence from Don Quixote and compare how the different translators handled it. In this way, I figured that I could find the one with the most modern punch—the one that would thrill me like "A Confederacy of Dunces". I chose the first sentence of the Prologue of Part One. Here it is in Spanish:
Google translates this as follows:
Are computers good at translating or what? Based on this, you would think Cervantes was a nut-job: he's talking gibberish here! But you can glean a few things from this "translation". First: Miguel was a nut-job, but in a good way; he is directly addressing the reader, but he's being sarcastic—I think. Second: he seems to be promising something, and that something seems to be that this book is, while not exactly good, a lot better than you would expect from him. Third: I can't think of anything. And this is after reading six human translations of this sentence. Google Translate has me completely confused. "I would this book as a child's understanding"?! And these guys are billionaires!
Samuel Putnam
The Modern Library translation uses the not so modern translation of the great Samuel Putnam. For years, this seems to have been the translation, because it is the one I find in many different forms most often in used bookstores. It is the only copy I currently own, but this should not be taken to mean I believe it the best. Putnam translates our sentence thusly:
Actually, Putnam goes on to the next sentence by use one of my favorite punctuation symbols: the semicolon. And this makes sense, but I cannot go into it here, we have many other translations to get to. Let me just say about this translation that it isn't bad. Sure, "the child of my brain" is kind of Google-like. Just the same, it is clear that Putnam "gets" the humor. I particularly like the phrase, "should have" that no other translator uses; I think it makes a great deal of difference.
Also, one cannot avoid a few facts about this translation. First, it is considered to be the first truly modern translation. Of course, we are in the post-modern period, which is why we have so many different translations now: who is to say which is the best? (Harold Bloom, of course.) Second, Putnam has pretty much been in print ever since it was published—over sixty years. That must say something, but don't ask me what.
Burton Raffel
The Norton Critical Editions version of Don Quixote was translated by a live guy—in 1999: Professor Burton Raffel. Here's his shot:
Okay, the prose is better than Putnam, but Raffel had 50 years to out-do him. And here, I really like the phrase, "I longed for." This edition does include a very helpful map of "Spain at the End of the Sixteenth Century." But I am not one to be swayed by such editorial tricks.
Charles Jarvis
Now we must go way back to the 1742 publication of the painter Charles Jarvis (or Jervis, depending upon whom you ask). Note that this was when the translation was first published; Jarvis must have done the translation some time before then, because he was dead at that time. It is now used as the basis for the Oxford World Classics version. Here's Jarvis' crack:
Again with the brain! The main thing to notice with the last two translations is that they aren't hooking into the humor. Cervantes is playful, and while you hear this with Putnam, you just don't with Raffel and Jarvis. In Raffel's defense, he gets going after this sentence and his translation is far better than Jarvis' and in some ways better than Putnam.
A Most Vexing Trip
Now we must take a vexing trip into the late Victorian mind. Yes, we are going back a mere 101 years, a far shorter distance than we did for Mr. Jarvis, and yet, when we are done, we will have to peel away a thick layer of sticky pomposity. This translation, by P. A. Motteux, is from that period when reading Great Books was supposed to be no fun; it was supposed to enriching. Are you ready to be enriched? Motteux will now hit us with his best shot:
If this translation actually does strike you as humorous, it is simply because it now reads as parody. This is the stuff of Monty Python lampoon; you can imagine the "great" Shakespearean actor reciting these lines with much bombast. And in this way, the translation only gets better. But for my purposes, it gets worse; I want a modern Don Quixote, not a parody of a Victorian Don Quixote (even if it isn't actually a parody).
There is at least one nice thing to be said about the Motteux translation: It was used as the basis for a "young adult" condensation of the story in 1939, "The Adventures of Don Quixote De La Mancha" by Leighton Barret and illustrated (beautifully) by Warren Chappell. It is perhaps a day's read for a very slow reader, and worth the effort if you do not feel up to the full text.
Walter Starkie
Moving on to 1964 and Walter Starkie's unabridged translation (yes, he did it more than once), which is found in the Signet Classic Don Quixote. Let's just get to it, shall we:
A little dry, I think. Like Raffel, however, he does get a bit of a groove going after this. Unfortunately, also like Raffel, it isn't that good a groove. It definitely seems readable, and at $7.95 for a new copy, it is the cheapest, I have found.
The Blue Whale: Edith Grossman
But now all of the Sperm and Humpbacks must scatter, because the Blue Whale has arrived: Edith Grossman's 2003 translation of Don Quixote. I must admit to starting out with a bit of a prejudice against this version because of its stamp of approval by the ranting—western civilization is going to hell because of post-modern scholarship, even though I am a post-modern scholar—Harold Bloom. But let us leave this for now; I can rant about Bloom's ranting some other time. Let's see what Dr. Grossman has to offer:
It does have a certain self-deprecating charm that is not found in any of the other translations. And it doesn't use the word "brain"! (Although I think this is academic; to me, the word is "mind"; what Cervantes goes on to talk about is what we would now call the workings of his "mind" or his "creativity"—not his "understanding".) But after it, the humor becomes more muddled than that of most of the other translations. Perhaps this is due to age, she is about to turn 74; maybe she just isn't feeling that funny. Plus, she's probably had to spend some time with Bloom.
But there are other problems. You will notice that this translation has the most words of the lot, except for Putnam, who has the same number: 37. And it has bigger words; her translation has far more characters than any other. She probably does capture aspects of Don Quixote that no other translator has (Bloom makes this claim, and as much as I may dislike his popular writing, he is a very intelligent and erudite man). But I am not looking for a Don Quixote that makes me feel "the spiritual atmosphere of a Spain already in steep decline"; I want a fun read.
My Decision
Where does this leave me? (Probably without readers as of the appearance of Putnam several screens back.) There are many more translations; what I have presented is quite incomplete. But from what I've seen, from Putnam onward, there isn't much difference between the translations. This is based upon very little evidence, of course—but more than just the sentence I have been discussing.
My decision is to read Putnam. It helps that I already own it, but this is not why I am choosing it. Raffel's translation is quite good. I think it is a close second to Putnam, but it is second. After him would probably come Starkie.
If I were looking for something other than a good read, I might well go with what looks like the most scholarly of the translations: Edith Grossman's. If it came down to it, Jarvis' almost 300-year-old translation seems quite readable. As for Motteux, I don't think I would read it at all if I had to put up with such prose.
The Need for Translators
Perhaps I am being too hard on Cervantes; had he been born in, say, England, he would have written in that transitional early modern English—which really means, "not modern English". In fact, at least Miguel (if only he had been born 420 years later in California, I'm sure we would have been on a first name basis) is translated. These days, Shakespeare's plays are set everywhere other than where and how they were intended, but we're still left with the same damn language. I often wonder why we can't get over this. Let's just acknowledge that we all know all the common Shakespeare misquotes (like "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" which is way more pithy than what that bard actually wrote anyway) and let the translators have at those plays. And by "have at", I don't mean in that Tom Stoppard "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" way; I mean in the way that translators of de (if only he had been born 420 years later in California, I'm sure we would have been on a second name basis, too) try to recreate the experience the original readers had for modern readers. (Or translators of Goethe or Rabelais—writers who, strangely, I like a lot more than that bard.)
But this does present a problem. You see, being as I am a poorly educated physics PhD ("fud"), I have been working for years trying to read all the books that my humanities studying friends always seemed like they had read. (I later found out that they had not read most of those books—they had simply read about them; but that has not quelled my urge.) I have only two books left that I must read: Moby Dick and Don Quixote. So recently, I decided to buy a copy of DQ (I already own a copy of MD), and I went into a bookstore: one of those big ones with the coffee and multiple floors (no, not Powell's Books—I would have noticed if I had been there; it was Borders or Barns and Noble or something like that; not a bad bookstore, but certainly not a good one, and certainly not one with any used books; but I digress). And I go to the Literature section and after much difficulty (I have real trouble alphabetizing), I find Don Quixotes. That's right: plural. There were six different translations. Imagine if I had been in Powell's?!
Which Don Quixote will I read?! There is no one around to help, or rather, the help I am offered is like that from my sister, who tells me, after reading Moby Dick in high school, "You don't need to read it." I have two options: go to a used bookstore and read the cheapest version I can find, or determine for myself which translation to read. I settle on the latter, so I can write this article. If you are starting to imagine the snowball effect, I assure you, it is more like Sisyphus.
The Test
Obviously, I can't read all the translations in order to determine which transition to read. I needed a test. I decided to take a single sentence from Don Quixote and compare how the different translators handled it. In this way, I figured that I could find the one with the most modern punch—the one that would thrill me like "A Confederacy of Dunces". I chose the first sentence of the Prologue of Part One. Here it is in Spanish:
Descoupado lector: sin juramento me podras creer que quisiera que este libro, como hijo del entendimiento, fuera el mas hermosa, el mas gallardo y mas discreto que pudiera imaginarse
Google translates this as follows:
Idle reader: I swear you can not believe that I would this book as a child's understanding, was the most beautiful, the most gallant and more discreet than one might imagine.
Are computers good at translating or what? Based on this, you would think Cervantes was a nut-job: he's talking gibberish here! But you can glean a few things from this "translation". First: Miguel was a nut-job, but in a good way; he is directly addressing the reader, but he's being sarcastic—I think. Second: he seems to be promising something, and that something seems to be that this book is, while not exactly good, a lot better than you would expect from him. Third: I can't think of anything. And this is after reading six human translations of this sentence. Google Translate has me completely confused. "I would this book as a child's understanding"?! And these guys are billionaires!
Samuel Putnam
The Modern Library translation uses the not so modern translation of the great Samuel Putnam. For years, this seems to have been the translation, because it is the one I find in many different forms most often in used bookstores. It is the only copy I currently own, but this should not be taken to mean I believe it the best. Putnam translates our sentence thusly:
Idling reader, you may believe me when I tell you that I should have liked this book, which is the child of my brain, to be the fairest, the sprightliest, and the cleverest that could be imagined.
Actually, Putnam goes on to the next sentence by use one of my favorite punctuation symbols: the semicolon. And this makes sense, but I cannot go into it here, we have many other translations to get to. Let me just say about this translation that it isn't bad. Sure, "the child of my brain" is kind of Google-like. Just the same, it is clear that Putnam "gets" the humor. I particularly like the phrase, "should have" that no other translator uses; I think it makes a great deal of difference.
Also, one cannot avoid a few facts about this translation. First, it is considered to be the first truly modern translation. Of course, we are in the post-modern period, which is why we have so many different translations now: who is to say which is the best? (Harold Bloom, of course.) Second, Putnam has pretty much been in print ever since it was published—over sixty years. That must say something, but don't ask me what.
Burton Raffel
The Norton Critical Editions version of Don Quixote was translated by a live guy—in 1999: Professor Burton Raffel. Here's his shot:
Leisurely reader: you don't need me to swear that I longed for this book, born out of my own brain, to be the handsomest child imaginable, the most elegant, the most sensible.
Okay, the prose is better than Putnam, but Raffel had 50 years to out-do him. And here, I really like the phrase, "I longed for." This edition does include a very helpful map of "Spain at the End of the Sixteenth Century." But I am not one to be swayed by such editorial tricks.
Charles Jarvis
Now we must go way back to the 1742 publication of the painter Charles Jarvis (or Jervis, depending upon whom you ask). Note that this was when the translation was first published; Jarvis must have done the translation some time before then, because he was dead at that time. It is now used as the basis for the Oxford World Classics version. Here's Jarvis' crack:
You may believe me without an oath, gentle reader, that I wish this book, as the child of my brain, were the most beautiful, the most sprightly, and the most ingenious, that can be imagined.
Again with the brain! The main thing to notice with the last two translations is that they aren't hooking into the humor. Cervantes is playful, and while you hear this with Putnam, you just don't with Raffel and Jarvis. In Raffel's defense, he gets going after this sentence and his translation is far better than Jarvis' and in some ways better than Putnam.
A Most Vexing Trip
Now we must take a vexing trip into the late Victorian mind. Yes, we are going back a mere 101 years, a far shorter distance than we did for Mr. Jarvis, and yet, when we are done, we will have to peel away a thick layer of sticky pomposity. This translation, by P. A. Motteux, is from that period when reading Great Books was supposed to be no fun; it was supposed to enriching. Are you ready to be enriched? Motteux will now hit us with his best shot:
You may depend upon my bare Word, Reader, without any farther Security, that I cou'd wish this Offspring of my Brain were as ingenious, sprightly, and accomplish'd as your self could desire.
If this translation actually does strike you as humorous, it is simply because it now reads as parody. This is the stuff of Monty Python lampoon; you can imagine the "great" Shakespearean actor reciting these lines with much bombast. And in this way, the translation only gets better. But for my purposes, it gets worse; I want a modern Don Quixote, not a parody of a Victorian Don Quixote (even if it isn't actually a parody).
There is at least one nice thing to be said about the Motteux translation: It was used as the basis for a "young adult" condensation of the story in 1939, "The Adventures of Don Quixote De La Mancha" by Leighton Barret and illustrated (beautifully) by Warren Chappell. It is perhaps a day's read for a very slow reader, and worth the effort if you do not feel up to the full text.
Walter Starkie
Moving on to 1964 and Walter Starkie's unabridged translation (yes, he did it more than once), which is found in the Signet Classic Don Quixote. Let's just get to it, shall we:
Idle reader, you need no oath of mine to convince you that I wish this book, the child of my brain, were the handsomest, the liveliest, and the wisest that could be conceived.
A little dry, I think. Like Raffel, however, he does get a bit of a groove going after this. Unfortunately, also like Raffel, it isn't that good a groove. It definitely seems readable, and at $7.95 for a new copy, it is the cheapest, I have found.
The Blue Whale: Edith Grossman
But now all of the Sperm and Humpbacks must scatter, because the Blue Whale has arrived: Edith Grossman's 2003 translation of Don Quixote. I must admit to starting out with a bit of a prejudice against this version because of its stamp of approval by the ranting—western civilization is going to hell because of post-modern scholarship, even though I am a post-modern scholar—Harold Bloom. But let us leave this for now; I can rant about Bloom's ranting some other time. Let's see what Dr. Grossman has to offer:
Idle reader: Without my swearing to it, you can believe that I would like this book, the child of my understanding, to be the most beautiful, the most brilliant, and the most discreet that anyone could imagine.
It does have a certain self-deprecating charm that is not found in any of the other translations. And it doesn't use the word "brain"! (Although I think this is academic; to me, the word is "mind"; what Cervantes goes on to talk about is what we would now call the workings of his "mind" or his "creativity"—not his "understanding".) But after it, the humor becomes more muddled than that of most of the other translations. Perhaps this is due to age, she is about to turn 74; maybe she just isn't feeling that funny. Plus, she's probably had to spend some time with Bloom.
But there are other problems. You will notice that this translation has the most words of the lot, except for Putnam, who has the same number: 37. And it has bigger words; her translation has far more characters than any other. She probably does capture aspects of Don Quixote that no other translator has (Bloom makes this claim, and as much as I may dislike his popular writing, he is a very intelligent and erudite man). But I am not looking for a Don Quixote that makes me feel "the spiritual atmosphere of a Spain already in steep decline"; I want a fun read.
My Decision
Where does this leave me? (Probably without readers as of the appearance of Putnam several screens back.) There are many more translations; what I have presented is quite incomplete. But from what I've seen, from Putnam onward, there isn't much difference between the translations. This is based upon very little evidence, of course—but more than just the sentence I have been discussing.
My decision is to read Putnam. It helps that I already own it, but this is not why I am choosing it. Raffel's translation is quite good. I think it is a close second to Putnam, but it is second. After him would probably come Starkie.
If I were looking for something other than a good read, I might well go with what looks like the most scholarly of the translations: Edith Grossman's. If it came down to it, Jarvis' almost 300-year-old translation seems quite readable. As for Motteux, I don't think I would read it at all if I had to put up with such prose.
After Cher's 1998 hit Believe, I honestly thought I would never again have to hear digital pitch-correction used as an effect. The first time I heard it, I hated it. Every digital engineer had played around with it, but it wasn't something you allowed in public except maybe to scare kids on Halloween. Mark Taylor is responsible—not just for the monstrosity that is this song, but for starting a deeply scarring trend. My brother-in-law (and Emmy Award winning sound engineer for Fox) Lee Walker promises me that the trend is almost dead. I hope he is right, but I have noticed that it still lingers—though more subtly—on singers such as Taylor Swift; this makes me think that Swift can't sing. So now we just have to find "cute" little things, correct their woefully out of tune singing, and claim we are just "producing" their music.
All of this explains, in part, why more and more I gravitate to older music. When a guy stands in front of a mic with just his voice and guitar, you get as close as possible to a real human interaction—a human connection. Recently, I've been listening to a lot of music from the 1920s and 1930s. One artist—Geeshie Wiley (there are MP3 files of three of her songs)—I was introduced to at a free concert that I attended by Eric & Suzy Thompson back on 25 September 2009 at the Sonoma County Library.
In general Suzy sings and plays the fiddle and Eric plays guitar. But they mix it up; they are both multi-instrumentalists. What is more important is that they perform an eclectic mix of music, and I don't mean Death Metal as well as Glam Metal; they do everything from Country (like the Delmore Brothers, not modern Country that seems to be nothing more than pop with a slide guitar and optional affected southern accent); and diverse Blues (Memphis Minnie and Peg Leg Howell who are almost from different planets, much less the same musical genre—Minnie is the one from earth in case you were wondering); and Cajun music (the Thompsons were part of the California Cajun Orchestra with the late Danny Poullard and are now Aux Cajunals).
They were engaging, fun, and musical throughout their 12 song, hour and ten minute set before an audience of a little less than 100. In addition, there were two high points for me. First, Eric Thompson's guitar playing on Memphis Minnie's Nothing In Rambling was magical; if I hadn't been watching him, I would have thought he was playing slide guitar; I'm still trying to figure out just what he was doing. Second, Suzy sang Geeshie Wiley's Skinny Leg Blues—having reworked the lyrics to suit her style. The song is about a wronged woman who is coming to have her revenge. The original is sexual and violent. Wiley sings:
I'm gonna cut your throat baby, gone look down in your face ...
I'm gonna let some lonesome graveyard, be your resting place.
Thompson removes the violence and makes it all about sex and maybe domination:
I'm gonna squeeze you tight baby, until you scream and shout
Cause this little bitty mama knows what it's all about.
The bottom line is that she killed the song; I loved it.
If you get a chance to see either or both of these fine musicians, don't pass it up. You won't be bothered with electronic effects or stage histrionics—just good music well performed. There are not many better ways to spend an hour or two.
Postscript One: Bluegrass Guitar
In 2000, Eric Thompson reissued his first album Bluegrass Guitar (1979) under the title Thompson's Real. The reissue includes one extra song with David Grisman. It is all instrumental and doesn't include anything that blows me away. However, it is a very enjoyable album; I like to listen to it when I'm cooking dinner.
What is most remarkable about the album is the musicianship—especially of Thompson. As a fairly capable guitarist myself, listening to Thompson reminds me how much I get away with playing Rock. Rock is sloppy and I love it. Bluegrass, on the other hand, is as demanding as classical music. Listening to this album, I often just marvel at the technique. "Wow! 'Wow' is the word you're looking for!" I couldn't say it better myself (so I didn't).
Postscript Two: Dream Shadows
I just got a copy of the Thompson's 2008 album Dream Shadows.
What a wonderful album this is! It is somewhat like the concert I attended. There are a number of the same songs such as Beaver Slide Rag and Lloyd Bateman. And, of course (because Suzy Thompson seems to be as aware as I that she kills the song), Skinny Leg Blues—which she calls Little Bitty Mama. I wish I could provide it for you here, but that would be illegal and unethical and really unfair to these fine performers; but the good news is that you can download the MP3 for just 99 cents—like most songs. The album also includes a beautiful tune by Geshie Wiley and Elvie Thomas: Motherless Child. Suzy's voice really takes to this kind of song. The same goes for Wiley's Last Kind Words.
I have to agree to some extent with Ralph in the comments that their Cajun music was not particularly good live. On this album, it is different. There are two stellar Cajun tunes: Gasport Two-Step and Valse de Vieux Temps. It helps to have a few more musicians; Cajun music is a little hard to do as a duo—not that they don't; live their Cajun music was enjoyable, just not as great as the rest of their stuff.
I'm not going to go into the background of the original artists and songs or even list them any more than I already have. The Thompson's have already done this. Buy this album; it is just $8.99 for the MP3 download of the whole album from Amazon. Now. Really.
All of this explains, in part, why more and more I gravitate to older music. When a guy stands in front of a mic with just his voice and guitar, you get as close as possible to a real human interaction—a human connection. Recently, I've been listening to a lot of music from the 1920s and 1930s. One artist—Geeshie Wiley (there are MP3 files of three of her songs)—I was introduced to at a free concert that I attended by Eric & Suzy Thompson back on 25 September 2009 at the Sonoma County Library.
In general Suzy sings and plays the fiddle and Eric plays guitar. But they mix it up; they are both multi-instrumentalists. What is more important is that they perform an eclectic mix of music, and I don't mean Death Metal as well as Glam Metal; they do everything from Country (like the Delmore Brothers, not modern Country that seems to be nothing more than pop with a slide guitar and optional affected southern accent); and diverse Blues (Memphis Minnie and Peg Leg Howell who are almost from different planets, much less the same musical genre—Minnie is the one from earth in case you were wondering); and Cajun music (the Thompsons were part of the California Cajun Orchestra with the late Danny Poullard and are now Aux Cajunals).
They were engaging, fun, and musical throughout their 12 song, hour and ten minute set before an audience of a little less than 100. In addition, there were two high points for me. First, Eric Thompson's guitar playing on Memphis Minnie's Nothing In Rambling was magical; if I hadn't been watching him, I would have thought he was playing slide guitar; I'm still trying to figure out just what he was doing. Second, Suzy sang Geeshie Wiley's Skinny Leg Blues—having reworked the lyrics to suit her style. The song is about a wronged woman who is coming to have her revenge. The original is sexual and violent. Wiley sings:
I'm gonna cut your throat baby, gone look down in your face ...
I'm gonna let some lonesome graveyard, be your resting place.
Thompson removes the violence and makes it all about sex and maybe domination:
I'm gonna squeeze you tight baby, until you scream and shout
Cause this little bitty mama knows what it's all about.
The bottom line is that she killed the song; I loved it.
If you get a chance to see either or both of these fine musicians, don't pass it up. You won't be bothered with electronic effects or stage histrionics—just good music well performed. There are not many better ways to spend an hour or two.
Postscript One: Bluegrass Guitar
In 2000, Eric Thompson reissued his first album Bluegrass Guitar (1979) under the title Thompson's Real. The reissue includes one extra song with David Grisman. It is all instrumental and doesn't include anything that blows me away. However, it is a very enjoyable album; I like to listen to it when I'm cooking dinner.
What is most remarkable about the album is the musicianship—especially of Thompson. As a fairly capable guitarist myself, listening to Thompson reminds me how much I get away with playing Rock. Rock is sloppy and I love it. Bluegrass, on the other hand, is as demanding as classical music. Listening to this album, I often just marvel at the technique. "Wow! 'Wow' is the word you're looking for!" I couldn't say it better myself (so I didn't).
Postscript Two: Dream Shadows
I just got a copy of the Thompson's 2008 album Dream Shadows.
What a wonderful album this is! It is somewhat like the concert I attended. There are a number of the same songs such as Beaver Slide Rag and Lloyd Bateman. And, of course (because Suzy Thompson seems to be as aware as I that she kills the song), Skinny Leg Blues—which she calls Little Bitty Mama. I wish I could provide it for you here, but that would be illegal and unethical and really unfair to these fine performers; but the good news is that you can download the MP3 for just 99 cents—like most songs. The album also includes a beautiful tune by Geshie Wiley and Elvie Thomas: Motherless Child. Suzy's voice really takes to this kind of song. The same goes for Wiley's Last Kind Words.
I have to agree to some extent with Ralph in the comments that their Cajun music was not particularly good live. On this album, it is different. There are two stellar Cajun tunes: Gasport Two-Step and Valse de Vieux Temps. It helps to have a few more musicians; Cajun music is a little hard to do as a duo—not that they don't; live their Cajun music was enjoyable, just not as great as the rest of their stuff.
I'm not going to go into the background of the original artists and songs or even list them any more than I already have. The Thompson's have already done this. Buy this album; it is just $8.99 for the MP3 download of the whole album from Amazon. Now. Really.
Some time ago, I stumbled upon Christopher Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love." It delighted me—it is so beautifully written. Instinctively, I picked up my guitar and quickly set it to music. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, you really need to read this poem:
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
There I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle;
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair linèd slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;
A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.*
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepared each day for thee and me.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.
Not long after discovering this—even before my dear friend Andrea could ruin it by pointing out that it was foolish youthful sentimentality—I discovered that Sir Walter Raleigh (yes, that guy) had written a response: "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd." It too is a beautiful poem (although Marlowe's is clearly superior in poetic beauty):
If all the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.
Time drives the flocks from field to fold
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold,
And Philomel becometh dumb;
The rest complains of cares to come.
The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields;
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall,
Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten—
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.
Thy belt of straw and ivy buds,
Thy coral clasps and amber studs,
All these in me no means can move
To come to thee and be thy love.
But could youth last and love still breed,
Had joys no date nor age no need,
Then these delights my mind may move
To live with thee and be thy love.
I don't have a lot to say about this poem, other than that it says exactly what Andrea would have said had I posted only the "The Passionate Shepherd." However, it occurred to me that the two poems would work well together as a male-female duet. In fact, the phrasing of the two poems are identical—so I didn't even have to change the music. Here is the chord structure which would cover two verses:
A / / / | A / / / | D / / / | A / / / |
E / / / | D / / / | E / / / | D / / / ||
And the structure would consist of four male verses (two music), four female verses, two male verses, two female verses, and then the last two verses sung at the same time by both—sort of like "Touch me in the Morning." This is six verses each. You might have noticed that Marlowe's poem has seven verses; I omit the verse above that has an asterisk after it.
I am not yet happy with the second part of the melody, but here is the first part (the AADA part). Note that the triplets are not strict (as you can tell from the chord structure, it is kind of bluesy and thus loose). Eventually, I will try to get a couple of kids from the local college to come over and record it and I'll post it here. But even before that, I'll post the second half of the melody.
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
There I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle;
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair linèd slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;
A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.*
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepared each day for thee and me.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.
Not long after discovering this—even before my dear friend Andrea could ruin it by pointing out that it was foolish youthful sentimentality—I discovered that Sir Walter Raleigh (yes, that guy) had written a response: "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd." It too is a beautiful poem (although Marlowe's is clearly superior in poetic beauty):
If all the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.
Time drives the flocks from field to fold
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold,
And Philomel becometh dumb;
The rest complains of cares to come.
The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields;
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall,
Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten—
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.
Thy belt of straw and ivy buds,
Thy coral clasps and amber studs,
All these in me no means can move
To come to thee and be thy love.
But could youth last and love still breed,
Had joys no date nor age no need,
Then these delights my mind may move
To live with thee and be thy love.
I don't have a lot to say about this poem, other than that it says exactly what Andrea would have said had I posted only the "The Passionate Shepherd." However, it occurred to me that the two poems would work well together as a male-female duet. In fact, the phrasing of the two poems are identical—so I didn't even have to change the music. Here is the chord structure which would cover two verses:
A / / / | A / / / | D / / / | A / / / |
E / / / | D / / / | E / / / | D / / / ||
And the structure would consist of four male verses (two music), four female verses, two male verses, two female verses, and then the last two verses sung at the same time by both—sort of like "Touch me in the Morning." This is six verses each. You might have noticed that Marlowe's poem has seven verses; I omit the verse above that has an asterisk after it.
I am not yet happy with the second part of the melody, but here is the first part (the AADA part). Note that the triplets are not strict (as you can tell from the chord structure, it is kind of bluesy and thus loose). Eventually, I will try to get a couple of kids from the local college to come over and record it and I'll post it here. But even before that, I'll post the second half of the melody.
