Nukkumaan käydessä ajattelen:
Huomenna minä lämmitän saunan,
pidän itseäni hyvänä,
kävelytän, uitan, pesen,
kutsun itseni iltateelle,
puhuttelen ystävällisesti ja ihaillen,
kehun: Sinä pieni urhea nainen,
minä luotan sinuun.
~ Eeva Kilpi
(As I'm going to bed I think:
Tomorrow, I'll heat up the sauna,
I'll treat myself kindly, I'll
take myself for a walk, a swim, I'll wash myself,
invite myself for evening tea,
I'll address myself fondly, with admiration,
I'll praise myself: You little, courageous woman,
I trust you.)
Monday, May 19, 2008
I'm saying this to myself, but you can read it too (translation mine)
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27 comments:
nothing like a bit of eeva to make one pensive - those last three words,'i trust you', wrench me somehow. x
Hei Cyberfriend, and sorry if I've made you feel gloomy. I sort of meant it as encouragement (okay, mainly for myself, but obviously willing to share) - but yes, it's clearly a lonely woman's poem, or maybe a lonely woman encouraging herself to be a woman alone. Or something. What was that quote I read the other day, probably on gmail's quote of the day thing - "If you're alone and feeling lonely, you're in bad company."
Oh dear. I don't seem to have made matters much more cheerful, have I?
Better pack my sauna bag. Be seeing you, honey. And speaking of honey - hope you got rid of the wasp (honey bees have fluffier bottoms, that's how to tell them apart).
x
If only I could walk a quarter of the way you have, Anna. Thank you for leading me on...
so that's why I like honey bees!
With you in pensive mode but not dealing with it half so well x
Honey, you didn't make me feel gloomy, just pensive and slightly melancholy, but I just love that you translate Eeva for us, right here, right now... x
Oh Nicola. I don't know what to say. That looks like a compliment, it smells like a compliment, it certainly feels like a compliment, and I thank you for it - but dear oh dear, it sort of humbles and embarrasses me anyway, you sweet and silly sis, you. If you'd seen the unglamorous stumble-waddle a fair bit of my walking has been, you'd be less inclined to claim you'd follow my lead, you know.
But still. It's super lovely to see you. Sorry to hear about the pensive mode. It can be sort of mopey beautiful sometimes, but a right bastard at others.
x
Sweet NMJ, glad you like my translationary fixations (I was cursing when I realised I'd posted yet another Eeva quote/reference - "now they'll think there's only one poet in Finland", I thought). I don't know whether I hope Eeva herself never lands up finding out I'm translating her left right and centre here, or whether I think she absolutely should find out and fall in love with my sensitive interpretations into English of her thoughts and sentiments, after which she could commission me to do an English translation of her recently-published Kootut runot (Collected Poems) (which I, stupidly, bought my favourite auntie (who is also my godmother) for Christmas, and a lovely-looking (paperback) volume it was, too, sort of vellumy-gold with silver birch leaves, in green, on the cover - "stupidly" because, obviously, I should have bought it for myself, much as I love my auntie).
But listen, sod Eeva for now. If you like my here-and-now translating for you, I've got an offer for you... Bring me a paragraph of your writing here and I'll translate you for you, right here, right now... although obviously give me, say, twenty-four or even forty-eight hours to come up with the goods. Obviously, only if you'd think it was funny and would serve to bring you cheer.
x
(And hei, some of these things here were in brackets especially for Nicola's benefit, because I was lurking over there when you nodded a bracketed head at me over in the House of Signs)
Anna, I would very much like to use your translation of this poem in an essay I am writing, and in possible future work in therapeutic settings. I would of course give you acknowledgment, but how to when your name remains a delightful mystery? I don't want to flag up my email address here, but perhaps, if you (and he)were willing, we could use a certain horseman as an intermediary?
I mean the friendly version of 'intermediary' but, brain being somewhat foggy at the moment, I can't think of the right word.
the wordver is jabpow - oh dear, oh dear, that's far too far from friendly.
Seriously, warm thoughts in your direction.
Nicola - oh oh. That's a super compliment you're paying li'l old me here and I'll not breathe a word about how tickled pink I am, instead trying to be all cool and pretend that this sort of stuff happens to me all the time. Oh yes.
Using A Certain Horseman as an intermediary-emissary-secretary is always tremendously sexy and lovely but you'll find I've spoiled it all and got in touch with you directly. God, I'm such a spoilsport (and my delightful mysteriousness is now wrecked, too, oh damn).
Seriously warm thoughts in your direction too, Nicola Sis. Hoping the foggy clears soon. x
Uh ok, but being still somewhat dimmed, how am I to receive this mysterious message? Patience is not my strong suit, but I guess if I wait all will become clear either through Finnish mists or Irish fogs.
It's been a long week here!
Yes, this is true, foggy Nicola of dim (sorry, just trying to come up with various nicknames for you, because such is the nature of the game over here. Obviously, only gentle and friendly-loving sibling offence is intended). The weeks are considerably long over there, whereas here, closer to the Arctic, the weeks veer endwards, wholly in keeping with the laws of physics and in accordance to the 23.5° tilt of the Earth's axis. This makes the population of these latitudes experience weeks to be shorter, during the light months of the year, than their counterparts in more southern parts. Conversely, during the dark months of the year, the weeks are experienced as extended. Believe me, Nicola, a lot of bollocks has gone into this research.
(Oh - and I would log into your flickr account, if I were looking for the information you seek. Call it a hunch. x )
Seestahs, Not trying to give myself airs, big myself up or anything, and far be it from me to take the hubristic step of attempting, or even thinking about stepping into the shoes of the aforementioned Horseman. But. I too have powers ye know not of, and could, if you were to give me the wink and the nod, provide linkage from one to t'other of you.
Oh, but I see you've gone and sorted it anyway. All resolved then.
Well if I can be of any future service etc.
Signs of Berlin, I am at your Haus taking forever over a comment at your latest post. It is very sehr gut to have you zurück, you know - and you need not big yourself up because you're big here, you know. A bit like being big in Japan, only better.
To tell you the truth, though, I don't know whether Nicola has discovered the route to my message to her - and I thought I was being all clever. Oh dear.
It's very lovely to see you, Signs, let me please repeat myself. Hope that throat is not too nasty. Mwah and mwah, and as soon as your well I'll be expecting a return to craziness down over at the six-word no-e portrait thread, because that was just beginning to go places when it was so cruelly cut short by your having to incessantly galavant around the planet like some teenage interrailer, you wild thing you (hoping, obviously, that you had a wunder time. Your photos made a totally gorgeous collection, and I was trying to say something along these lines over there at yours. Now I'm going for a ciggie, but I hope to see you soon.)
x
("you're" not "your". I hate that bloody typo.)
The return of the 'E's? Shouldn't we be taking this a step further and doing something really hard like, oh I don't know, writing everything in Yiddish?
("Omlet, Omlet, ich bin de Poppa's spooke!" kind of thing. Doing the works of Shakespeare.)
But I agree that something like this ought to be pushed to its limits. And rather appreciate being thought of as a wild young interrailer, esp in view of the unalterable fact that Mr. S and I are going to IKEA tomorrow. No, don't even ask, it really is unalterable and Swedish meatballs do not compensate. I will think of you out in the wilds with Ms Dogot. And ciggies. Oh!
We should certainly challenge ourselves to the utmost limits, sweet sees, although I feel doing Shakespeare in Yiddish would give you a bit of an unfair advantage, given that you seem to speak it (Yiddish) (and Shakespeare too, of course) to conversational fluency and I only know one word (schmuck, since you must know).
IKEA? Bless you, sister, I'll be thinking about you whilst in the wilds with my dogot and my ciggies. Ew ew, Swedish meatballs really do not compensate. You poor thing.
schmuck is good. You can use it to call someone a complete and utter dingbat, but it also means jewellery. Anyway, what I really wanted to say is that I did not go to IKEA. I don't know why it is important that you (and anyone else here) should know this, but some things just feel right. Just as some things, like going to IKEA, just feel wrong. And it is raining cats and dogs - natch, it's Bank Holiday.
'We were all guilty of clichés. Have to get worse before you get better. Tomorrow’s another day. Light at the end of the tunnel was the favourite, but my symptoms continued to synchronise themselves in a vicious kaleidoscopic pattern and all I could see was black.'
Okay, Missy, translate this.
Sorry it's taken me a few days to find your sweet offer... x
A-ha. I never knew the jewellery thing, Signchen, and there is probably some synchronicity and sign-magic about, since, you see, I brought schmuck-jewellery in here when you were meant to go to IKEA, and (wait for this) - jewellery is smycke in Swedish - and you didn't have to go to IKEA after all.
I'm sure you follow my drift. Very happy for you, pleased with my own benign powers. Hurrah. (Still uncertain about doing a whole Shakey in Yiddish with a one-word vocabulary, even if it has two different meanings.)
Sorry about the cats and dogs. Sorry for them too, what a rotten way to be spending Bank Holiday.
Syyllistyimme kliseisiin jokainen. Paistaa se päivä risukasaankin. Huomenna on uusi päivä. Suosituin oli valoa tunnelin päässä, mutta minun oireeni asettuivat edelleen armottomiin kaleidoskooppikuvioihin, enkä minä nähnyt muuta kuin pimeyttä.
Ooooh, tricky, Ms Legs Cyberfriend. I have taken some liberties ("darkness" instead of "black" - works better in Finnish. Trust me) and the first sentence could be said in at least half a dozen ways, depending on what came before it. "Have to get worse before you get better" was the worst, because Finns don't actually say that or anything of the sort - I have substituted with a completely Finnish saying which, translated literally, means "The sun will shine even into a pile of sticks". Sorry but it's better than first saying "we were all guilty of clichés" and then, immediately afterwards, saying something that clearly isn't a cliché (again - trust me). Additionally, it's quite nice the way it mentions light in each cliché (as päivä, day, in Olde Finnish - including in the Finnish truism I inserted - is also used for the sun. Oh, NMJ, trust me, go on) before going into the darkness Helen sees. These little quirks of the target language makes a translated work live, rather than reading like a translation (trust me trust me trust me).
Okay - that was fun, if a little nerve-wrecking. Hope you like your little paragraph of translated you (and glad you found the offer in the end, better late than never, other like clichés). Now did I get the job? Did I? Did I?
x
The job is all yours, Cyberhoney. I had no idea such a wee small extract could have such 'repercussions'. x
Thank you kindly. I would be in a full-on tizzy if I was doing the whole thing, you know, because there'd be a million things like that. It would be super lovely, though.
I find it quite painful to read translations from English to Finnish. Not because they're all terrible (although some, sadly, are - hurried and horrible. Never tell a living soul but I've been guilty of a couple of hurried and horrible translation jobs myself. It happens) but because very often it's the things like untranslatable idioms and sayings which have been forced into the target language, and you can hear it and see it and smell it and feel it and it feels like a translation. It's odd. Do you have that with French lit?
Do you know what I wish, oh linguistically gifted one? That I were properly, Germanly bi-lingual - just so I could be a translator, because I know I would find it intensely satisfying. Sometimes I do it for fun, just to see if I can convert the untranslatable things into something that tastes like the original.
Sorry to be butting in - carry on my dears - er -
Signs of Butting, you are forbidden to apologise for anything you undertake on these pages. This said in a schwesterly-severe fashion. (i wish my German wasn't two years' worth, learnt twenty-five years ago, with a refresher course of a few years of (trying to) help the firstborn with his German (now dropped). I am a fake linguist, you know, two and a half properly-mastered languages does not a linguist make. Again, not a word to anyone, ever, k? K. I like to pretend I speak the handful of others I've had a stab at, but it's more on the "I have a brother and a bunch of grapes" level of things.)
Signs? Carry on Butting... x
I get rather a thrill you know, from your 'older schwester' tone. In RL of course, it just may be that I have a few years edge on you, but who cares about such details in Blogoslavia?
You have a brother and a bunch of grapes? Well blow me down if my postillion hasn't been struck by lightning. And the pen of my aunt, also.
Details schmetails, meine kleine Schwesterchen. Who cares for such trifles, such - wait for it - schlemozzle as are "facts"? We will be and make our own bloody facts around these parts, thank you very much, and if we wish to change them periodically (hello, honey), then we will bloody well do so, and if it doesn't suit someone they can go and write their own.
(Whether my usage of "schlemozzle" was contextually correct or not, I have anyhow here proven my earlier theft-claim elsewhere. Ha.)
And my brother and my bunch of grapes belong to the universe of Blogoslavia, but I am dying to hear more about the fate of the pen of your aunt. As for the word "postillion", I can but thank thee, sweet schwestah. It was totally new to me in English (although the postman in Finnish is posteljooni, which is uncannily close), in both its meanings. Oh postillion. I LOVE new words. I've had two today. I am crushed that yours has been struck by lightning, though. What happened to your post-chaise? Did the journey end? Oh, don't keep me in suspense for too long.
'The Postillion Has Been Struck By Lightning'.
This phrase has entered the language as a verbal eccentricity, the rather odd opening entry in one of the first published foreign language phrasebooks in Regency times. Perhaps it’s not as ludicrous as at first it seems. Consider, if you were doing the Grand Tour in 1800, rattling through some little Alpine mountain village, and a dreadful storm broke out, you might well want to tell the indigenous populace if a bolt from above had finished off your coachman.
ok, truth to tell big schwesterchen, the bolt from above done finished my coachman a long time back, if you get my drift. And some of us have been plodding it on foot, so to speak. But all was not lost, for I still had the trusty Plume de ma Tante so was able to keep an account of all my adventures in the embossed leather notebook I carried on me.
Schlemozzle is just wonderful, and was really used in a yiddish translation of Merchant of Venice. Yeah.
(ha ha lidvm, how I love the word vers today)
And long may the trusty Plume de votre Tante serve you. I'll bet that embossed leather notebook travelogue diary has become a right riveting read over the years.
I see you're back to Shakey in Yiddish. I beginning to fear this is really going to have to happen. I am going to cheat and take Yiddish classes on Youtube - Merkin has just pointed me towards one such link and I feel certain there must be more, out there, somewhere, just waiting for me to master them. A mentsh tracht und Gott lacht, a nahr bleibt a nahr.
Be seeing you, number six...
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