Translation As Art - Hélène Cardona (Literary Event)

When I was younger and sillier, I thought that in order for a novel, story, or poem to be translated, the author had to be fluent enough to write their story in multiple languages.  Little me, who had little dreams of writing one day, thought that my work could only ever be in English - or maybe Spanish if I learned it perfectly.  It took ages for me to learn that other people translated the work for artists in many cases, and that that meant those words weren't actually necessarily the original story.  That was a surprise to me.  [I categorize this realization with the more recent realization that all the Great Illustrated Classics I read - all the great novels I read at so young an age - I never actually read them.  They're so short, and so much of the story is missing, it's like it isn't the story at all.  But that is an internal struggle for another post, I suppose.]
This realization has taken a long time to process.  There are things I will never be able to read - authors' words I can never understand.  But the translations of their texts are an art to their own.  That is why I enjoyed Hélène Cardona's poetry talk for Tabula Poetica.  Cardona is a translator, poet, and actor.  She speaks more languages than I could ever hope to.  She speaks French as her first language, but says she chooses often to write poems in English.  I cannot imagine being fluent enough in another language that I could write poetry in that language without writing it in my first language first.
I am sorry to say that last semester if you had played a word association game and gave me the word "translation", the first thought in my head would not have been the word "art".  Now I see it differently.  Cardona's talk was enlightening, giving insight into the experience of translating, and the role the translator plays in taking a piece of art and moving it between languages.  One thing that has always bothered me about translation in poetry, is that I know some of the nuances of the poems are lost in the process of moving it out of it's natural language.  Rhyme is often, as I've observed, the first thing that cannot be translated.  But Cardona's discussion on her work as a translator and poet helped me understand what goes into a translated poem, the rhythm and phrasing, which must be carefully sculpted.  She explored the creative liberty of the translator in creating a new piece of art which preserves the purpose and meaning of the work it is born of, sometimes using new tools and new feelings to convey these ideas.
Cardona painted translation in a new light for me, one which has mediated my original concerns about translation, cementing its immense value in my appreciation of literature.  Translation is art.  I get that now.  I should have understood that much sooner, but it's never too late too change your mind, right? 

Poetry Has Value - Jessica Piazza (Literary Event)

When Jessica Piazza came to discuss poetry at a talk for Tabula Poetica, she told her audience that she would be discussing the (commercial) value of poetry, something which I had not heard discussed at any length by any professor or poet before.  Piazza's project, Poetry Has Value, is a year-long practice of submitting to journals, magazines, and reviews that pay for poetry, as opposed to publications that offer "exposure" to people who offer their creative work in exchange for their living.
The project itself is an interesting introspection into the life of a poet and the way poetry is treated in the literary world.  With her project mere days from completion, I found myself completely agreeing with Piazza, the system is broken, and something needs ti be fixed.
If you've got even a couple minutes to read, I highly recommend the blog.  Piazza has provided lists of paying publications and month to month updates of her progress in getting published, or rejected, by these publications, as well as a tally of costs and earnings.
One thing she discussed during her talk that I loved was (and I don't remember if this was quite how she referred to it, but...) Literary Citizenship.  This phrase here refers to the process of engaging in and contributing to the communities from which you seek literary works of art.  For instance, you go to a bookstore and buy a novel - that is an act of your literary citizenship.  But if you seek out poetry online for reading, do you pay for those poems?  How are you contributing to these communities who provide this art?  If you don't pay or subscribe, it makes it really difficult for them to provide the artists with compensation for their work.
Piazza offered several solutions.  One was to subscribe to journals, magazines, reviews, etc. that provide art you consume.  My favorite solution, was her suggestion to buy poetry for people you know.  She mentioned giving a book of her poems to her aunt, I believe, and how in doing so she made her aunt realize that she actually enjoys poetry.  One of my favorite poets has published several books now, one collection and two illustrated books of one poem each, one of which is still in preorder.  Since I heard this suggestion, I realized that I can be gifting loved ones with poetry that means a lot to me.  I've got 3 people who will be getting books of poems in the next 4 to 18 months, and the idea of sharing these poems - at a time I think is meaningful, a stage in their lives when they need to read them - is wonderful, kind of like that warm feeling you get when someone lends you a jacket or blanket they've been using.  I love sharing poetry with those I am close with, but never once had I considered giving a collection to someone else.  But now, I will.
And that is a wonderful form of literary citizenship, continuing the cycle of discovering a love for poetry by passing poems on in a way that supports the writers - giving them "exposure" AND compensating them for the beautiful work they do.
I think it's something we should all try to do more.

The Book of My Life (Reader Response 20)

While I love reading the Chapters in Imaginative Writing - each one explaining aspects of the craft in different ways - I had a lot of trouble siting down an committing to talking about one of the stories in this chapter besides Tandolfo the Great, which I responded to earlier this semester.

After a lot of deliberating, I decided upon The Book of My Life, partly because of it being creative non-fiction, which I don't often get to read, and partly because the way the narrator described his Professor reminded me of a teacher I had in high school.

Technically he wasn't a teacher yet.  He was still a student, a paid assistant to our teacher on who would soon be on maternity leave.  It was months into the semester, her reactions to students growing harsher with every day her child swelled in her belly.  When she left in the middle of the year to tend to her newborn, it was as if the class had been freed.  All we had was our class assistant, Mr. X [Let's just assume his last name was actually X...].  Mr. X became our teacher the remainder of the semester.  But we didn't really call him Mr. X.  We called him Saint X.  To his face.  I have to admit it's a ;little embarrassing, and he insisted it wasn't right, but he was an angel compared to our teacher and he understood us, and helped us out of hell.  I remember a joke shrine in the corner of the classroom, and the liberation of having a teacher who still remembered what it was like being a student.

He taught us, without a fight.  He showed us he supported our passions and the causes we cared about - even if it meant buying boba for a fundraiser when he hated the drink. He promised to take some of us surfing.  He passed out phone numbers in case any of us needed someone to talk to.  He let us carry on with our hero worship because he understood us.  he was closer to us in age than anyone in authority really ever had been.  And he care about each of us in a way many of us don't get often from complete strangers.

I find the little slip of paper where he wrote down his first name every once in a while, remembering that over 5 years ago he promised to accept any friend request once we graduated.  Whenever I see it,  I think about what he meant to us, then and now.  But he's a human being.  And just like running into a teacher outside of school, we would one day surprise ourselves by realizing he was more than what we had seen.

I'm sometimes terrified to think of who are heroes really are, all their faults and fumbles and beliefs that they held back from us.  The problem with heroes is that most times we don't know who they are.  Not really.  Unless you limit your heroes to your immediate family or your best friends, you won't know.  And even then, you still really can't.

Mr. X is still a saint to me.  But I call him Mr. X now, because it's what he preferred and I owe him that much.  But I never reached out after graduation and I still haven't gone in search of his Facebook.

In the non-fiction piece, the professor turns out to be someone dangerous, who taught with a mind full of things students don't learn in a classroom - ideologies and justifications that teachers usually never share.  And that's a good thing, probably.  But it prevents us from really knowing the kinds of people who inspire us and shape us.   And that is a dangerous thing, too.