Athens News, an English language weekly, used to have a
column on Greek language and literature, written by a man called I think
Richard Church, who had written a good book called 'Learn Greek in 25 Years'.
For all I know the column is still running and still written by the same chap,
but it was good, and so experience suggests it's probably been abolished by
now.
Anyway, a long time ago he put in his column an English
translation of a little Greek folk poem. It was a bad translation, so I made a
good one (What's the point of having a blog if you can't use it to say things
like that?) and sent it to him. Gratifyingly he agreed my version was better,
and put it in the paper a week or two
later. The original, unusually for Greek popular poetry, doesn't rhyme; I used
rhyme to compensate for my inability to reproduce the beautiful cadences of the
Greek:
The Red Lip
I kissed a red lip, and my own
was dyed,
I wiped my lip, the handkerchief was red,
I washed it, and the river’s waters bled,
and dyed the shore, and stained the deep-sea tide;
the eagle came to drink; his wings took fire,
and red the half-sun, and the moon entire.
I wiped my lip, the handkerchief was red,
I washed it, and the river’s waters bled,
and dyed the shore, and stained the deep-sea tide;
the eagle came to drink; his wings took fire,
and red the half-sun, and the moon entire.
Anonymous, C18th or earlier
English version © Simon Darragh
English version © Simon Darragh
Hi Simon,
ReplyDeleteDo you have a version of the original poem in Greek? I have a different translation and would love to visually compare the greek original with the english translation (not because I speak any Greek . . . purely visual).
Thank you!
Emily