 | By Joe Millis
January 27, 2011 | Share |
I see that an Israeli poet, Uri Bernstein, has rendered T. Eliot's poetry into Hebrew. It's the first time that the entire canon of the poet acknowledged to be one of the biggest anti-Semitic writers of the 20th century has been translated into the language.
I'd be interested to see how Bernstein translated
Burbank with a Baedeker: Bleistein with a Cigar:
Tra-la-la-la-la-la-laire--nil nisi divinum stabile
est; caetera fumus--the gondola stopped, the old
palace was there, how charming its grey and pink--
goats and monkeys, with such hair too!--so the
countess passed on until she came through the
little park, where Niobe presented her with a
cabinet, and so departed.Burbank crossed a little bridge
Descending at a small hotel;
Princess Volupine arrived,
They were together, and he fell.Defunctive music under sea
Passed seaward with the passing bell
Slowly: the God Hercules
Had left him, that had loved him well.The horses, under the axletree
Beat up the dawn from Istria
With even feet. Her shuttered barge
Burned on the water all the day.But this or such was Bleistein's way:
A saggy bending of the knees
And elbows, with the palms turned out,
Chicago Semite Viennese.A lustreless protrusive eye
Stares from the protozoic slime
At a perspective of Canaletto.
The smoky candle end of timeDeclines. On the Rialto once.
The rats are underneath the piles.
The jew is underneath the lot.
Money in furs. The boatman smiles,Princess Volupine extends
A meagre, blue-nailed, phthisic hand
To climb the waterstair. Lights, lights,
She entertains Sir FerdinandKlein. Who clipped the lion's wings
And flea'd his rump and pared his claws?
Thought Burbank, meditating on
Time's ruins, and the seven laws.
Yoni1
27 January, 2011 - 17:59
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"the poet acknowledged to be one of the biggest anti-Semitic writers of the 20th century"
Amazingly, virtually every single word in the above is nonsense, including 'to' and 'of'. Quite a feat.