A 300-word poem I wrote for Cecilia Woloch's Paris Poetry Workshop last May.
Suzanne (Allen) never knows if she’s coming or going. She used to think this was only a statement about emotions or where she stood with certain friends or family, but now she understands that things like jet lag, weather, and living in a second language can keep one quite off balance. So she craves sleep, sleep like a princess sleeps, especially in the afternoon. With the washing machine humming along in the next room like a train softly going. Her home is a place of linens and paper, creaking chairs and bread crumbs, sunlight and socks, where she dare not sit too long. So much to do. There are draperies and dresses to sew, decorative pillows to fluff and throw. Dishes to wash and old truths to unknow. She likes pink and white roses and is also rather prickly—like so many of her favorite women. She never wanted more than an old convertible and a back house, still doesn’t really, though she has so much more. Cats and Long Beach, a Filou in Paris. A man with Mediterranean eyes. Lucky. She’s just lucky. Her kindergarten teacher, Miss Able, sent prayers and Christian love—enough to last a lifetime—home in every report card; and at naptime, she moved about in the cool of the blue-green-gray classroom, putting it back in order, backlit by the wide wall of windows. Suzanne began playing teacher after that, lined up her dolls and stuffed animals in attentive rows, took attendance. By the time she was nine, she was dragging and pushing her Sears Roebucks, Country French bedroom furniture around in her room, which ultimately lead to a whirlwind career in interior design. She can space-plan any room out of a conundrum, and she makes a mean omelet, but her favorite projects are always the poems.
Showing posts with label Suzanne Allen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Suzanne Allen. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Spoken Word in Paris
a new home...
To say that the Culture Rapide Cabaret Populare is small would almost be an understatement. It was standing room only and the windows steamed up after just a few readers, right around the time we closed the door on the pickpocket who had been casing the joint. Nevertheless, this home of French slam—poetry, not the Denny’s delight—is booked every night of the week. The drinks are c-h-e-a-p and the décor keeps the conversation going… as if this were a problem for the French! From rue de Belleville, you can’t miss the giant mural on the side of the building—complete with dummy sign hangers…
“Be wary of words.”
Belleville is just ten minutes from our apartment, direct on line 11. This is the latest home of Spoken Word in Paris. I often go alone, but at the last minute, I asked him to go with me. The theme was furniture and I knew I had plenty of things to read, but it has been a season now since the last time I went in July, so I was feeling especially nervous.
He says I read better than some, worse than others. My voice shakes—and the poems in my hands do too, and I never know how to stand. I hate microphones, though I don’t always feel strong enough to project as I should… I haven’t considered myself a performer since back in my high school dance concert days, and THAT wasn’t about my voice.
Since graduation, I’ve been in wallflower mode. It’s easy here… so many characters and talented writers—sometimes one in the same—so many languages and cultural differences, and certainly Spoken Word is the richer for them. But we mostly notice the strange and telling similarities—like how we write more about beds than other pieces of furniture.
There’s music too. Musicians always make me feel inadequate, but the female songwriters are usually my favorite moments of the evening… nimble fingers on their acoustic guitars and velvety voices—instruments themselves stretching across the scale. We left at the break so I didn’t get to hear Erica—long time regular at David’s Spoken Word events, but I did get to hear someone new. She told me she liked the “piggy bank fattened/for April in Paris” in my poem, “Writing Desk.” Nice of her to say so. Hope to see her again…
The next topic is work. I don’t think I have a single work related poem… unless you consider poetry to be a kind of work. I guess that will have to be my angle. My horoscope says that I will soon have some very interesting job offers. Seems like reason enough to send out some resumes… see what falls into place and in which corner of the world.
And the next time you’re in Paris on a Monday… click here.
To say that the Culture Rapide Cabaret Populare is small would almost be an understatement. It was standing room only and the windows steamed up after just a few readers, right around the time we closed the door on the pickpocket who had been casing the joint. Nevertheless, this home of French slam—poetry, not the Denny’s delight—is booked every night of the week. The drinks are c-h-e-a-p and the décor keeps the conversation going… as if this were a problem for the French! From rue de Belleville, you can’t miss the giant mural on the side of the building—complete with dummy sign hangers… “Be wary of words.”
Belleville is just ten minutes from our apartment, direct on line 11. This is the latest home of Spoken Word in Paris. I often go alone, but at the last minute, I asked him to go with me. The theme was furniture and I knew I had plenty of things to read, but it has been a season now since the last time I went in July, so I was feeling especially nervous.
He says I read better than some, worse than others. My voice shakes—and the poems in my hands do too, and I never know how to stand. I hate microphones, though I don’t always feel strong enough to project as I should… I haven’t considered myself a performer since back in my high school dance concert days, and THAT wasn’t about my voice.
Since graduation, I’ve been in wallflower mode. It’s easy here… so many characters and talented writers—sometimes one in the same—so many languages and cultural differences, and certainly Spoken Word is the richer for them. But we mostly notice the strange and telling similarities—like how we write more about beds than other pieces of furniture.
There’s music too. Musicians always make me feel inadequate, but the female songwriters are usually my favorite moments of the evening… nimble fingers on their acoustic guitars and velvety voices—instruments themselves stretching across the scale. We left at the break so I didn’t get to hear Erica—long time regular at David’s Spoken Word events, but I did get to hear someone new. She told me she liked the “piggy bank fattened/for April in Paris” in my poem, “Writing Desk.” Nice of her to say so. Hope to see her again…
The next topic is work. I don’t think I have a single work related poem… unless you consider poetry to be a kind of work. I guess that will have to be my angle. My horoscope says that I will soon have some very interesting job offers. Seems like reason enough to send out some resumes… see what falls into place and in which corner of the world.
And the next time you’re in Paris on a Monday… click here.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
A Taste for Translation
I've been sick in bed all week, so I decided to recycle an article that I wrote last January for Kate Ozbirn at California Quarterly. She wanted something that discussed the pleasures and challenges of literary translation for a general audience, and so I think it might just be appropriate to share here and now.
At the time I wrote the article, I had just finished two translations for The Translator's French Quarter... one of my own poems into French, which required more than editorial assistance, and an English translation of a short story by one of my favorite contemporary French writers, Hélène Cixous. I was in Paris for the winter break thinking only of my thesis and trying to take some time off before my last semester of grad school. Much to my surprise, Kate received the article without hesitation and published it in her "Poetry Letter & Literary Review" with minimal revisions not reflected below. Thanks to her quick work, it was my first publication.
I have since had the honor of receiving a prize in their annual poetry contest this past summer and the poem has been published in their recent volume, 33.4. For a copy, send a note explaining your request, and a check for $7.50 to: Membership Chair, 21 Whitman Court, Irvine, CA 92617.
Thanks for reading!
A Taste for Translation
Tonight the Paris rain falls—not in “ropes” like the French idiom says it does and like it does in August, but in tiny droplets that would make weightless snowflakes if it were February instead of January—nothing to catch a cold over, but enough to turn the streets wet and dark like Ezra Pound’s black boughs; and so the word “rain” does not suffice. I find a heated terrace and duck in with my groceries, “command” a cup of tea, and pick up a menu waiting on the table next to me for the dinner crowd.
Montmartre is a tourist friendly quartier, so each item on the menu is translated into English: The Pave de Rumsteck becomes a “Rumpsteak Paving Stone,” the Cote de Boeuf is an “Ox Coast” instead of a “side of beef,” or “spare ribs,” or whatever it is, and under Tartine de Maison the translator has written “Pot House.” Given the context, these are amusing mistakes that a native English speaker could not make, but as a second language learner myself, I admire the restaurant owner’s courage—though some would say haste or simply inexperience—to sit down with a dictionary and put such literality to print.
Because to translate into a second language often results in such folly, most of us stick to the target languages we know best—our native ones, but levels of fluency in source languages vary widely. Many translators maintain a certain distance from the original text hoping to most naturally replicate it by working in collaboration with others who have more instinctive facility with the source language—like Pound did, and like the owner of the restaurant should have. They may not even care to learn the source language. Others prefer to go it alone, dictionaries, thesaurus, and all their own interpretations on the table like the ingredients of a family recipe to be sampled and measured together until it tastes the way it is remembered. The main difference between the two extremes is that those who do speak the languages they translate may be more obviously under the influence of the source language than those who do not. This serves to stretch the boundaries of the target language. Furthermore, the more sharply the translator’s own voice is honed, the more likely it is to infiltrate the resulting translation.
To pretend that a translation is, can or should be free of such influence is also folly, because whatever aesthetics the translator assumes, there is always collaboration in translation, even if only between the author of the original text and the translator. Sounds of the language and their effects, the breaths and lengths of the lines, and the subtle implications of word choice and order are initially lost forcing the translator into inventions and manipulations that beg permission from the original authors. The art of translations is a process, an attempt to reconstruct the images and impressions of the source text in a language that did not give birth to them to begin with. This communication with another writer is the literary translator’s driving force, the raison d’être, the passion for slowly transforming a text’s every word, and it is as tantalizing to the poet translator as a Tartine de Maison would be to someone with the munchies.
More importantly, this exchange makes the process of translation an inevitably regenerative exercise that teaches us, word by word, the possibilities and limitations of our own languages. We must decide what strangeness can be stretched and still understood and what will take our readers too far away from the original, especially those readers who cannot penetrate the text as we can by having an understanding of both languages. We revel in the multitudinous gains and losses before deciding how best to recast the text to keep meaning from being lost or even only refracted taking the reader to places never implied while the meaning and music of the poem slip and slide between languages, cultures, and epochs. For example, the French word vrai divides itself into two English ones: “true” and “real.” How the translator chooses one or the other should have as much to do with the sounds and rhythms of the surrounding words as it will with theoretical debates about the differences between the two. The translator must look forward into the minds of the readers and back into the mind of the author being channeled, and the older the source text, the more complicated the questions.
Despite all this reader-writer-text interplay, ultimately, like an archer shooting arrows at a bull’s eye, the translator pursues the target language alone word by word finding it sometimes easy to hit the mark, sometimes impossible. If, for example, a native French speaker were to read this article, the image of a duck—perhaps dunking its head into a lake after tiny bits of food—would be evoked by my ducking into the café terrace. The verb “to duck” does not translate, but the resulting image is almost appropriate. On the other hand, the menu’s implication that a choice cut of meat is a paving stone is hardly a desirable one in a town so chock full of competing restaurants.
Still, I decide not to report the menu’s miscommunications to the server, pay for my tea, and head off into the evening. Perhaps the absurd connections will inspire some non-Franglais speakers to reconsider the assumptions of their relationships with English. Besides, the slight rain has stopped and the clouds are clearing. By the time I reach my apartment, I will have a different sky above me and a whole new batch of questions to try to answer. I will be up late tonight for there is much to be said, and re-said.
Unfortunately, not all poems can be translated, but we continue to try, to search for ways of conveying what can be said in other languages. After all, the main reason we translate is to share the foreign texts we so enjoy with others who do not speak the language, and, as with any collaboration, there will be compromises, but we believe the rewards of such gifts to be greater than the costs.
At the time I wrote the article, I had just finished two translations for The Translator's French Quarter... one of my own poems into French, which required more than editorial assistance, and an English translation of a short story by one of my favorite contemporary French writers, Hélène Cixous. I was in Paris for the winter break thinking only of my thesis and trying to take some time off before my last semester of grad school. Much to my surprise, Kate received the article without hesitation and published it in her "Poetry Letter & Literary Review" with minimal revisions not reflected below. Thanks to her quick work, it was my first publication.
I have since had the honor of receiving a prize in their annual poetry contest this past summer and the poem has been published in their recent volume, 33.4. For a copy, send a note explaining your request, and a check for $7.50 to: Membership Chair, 21 Whitman Court, Irvine, CA 92617.
Thanks for reading!
A Taste for Translation
Tonight the Paris rain falls—not in “ropes” like the French idiom says it does and like it does in August, but in tiny droplets that would make weightless snowflakes if it were February instead of January—nothing to catch a cold over, but enough to turn the streets wet and dark like Ezra Pound’s black boughs; and so the word “rain” does not suffice. I find a heated terrace and duck in with my groceries, “command” a cup of tea, and pick up a menu waiting on the table next to me for the dinner crowd.
Montmartre is a tourist friendly quartier, so each item on the menu is translated into English: The Pave de Rumsteck becomes a “Rumpsteak Paving Stone,” the Cote de Boeuf is an “Ox Coast” instead of a “side of beef,” or “spare ribs,” or whatever it is, and under Tartine de Maison the translator has written “Pot House.” Given the context, these are amusing mistakes that a native English speaker could not make, but as a second language learner myself, I admire the restaurant owner’s courage—though some would say haste or simply inexperience—to sit down with a dictionary and put such literality to print.Because to translate into a second language often results in such folly, most of us stick to the target languages we know best—our native ones, but levels of fluency in source languages vary widely. Many translators maintain a certain distance from the original text hoping to most naturally replicate it by working in collaboration with others who have more instinctive facility with the source language—like Pound did, and like the owner of the restaurant should have. They may not even care to learn the source language. Others prefer to go it alone, dictionaries, thesaurus, and all their own interpretations on the table like the ingredients of a family recipe to be sampled and measured together until it tastes the way it is remembered. The main difference between the two extremes is that those who do speak the languages they translate may be more obviously under the influence of the source language than those who do not. This serves to stretch the boundaries of the target language. Furthermore, the more sharply the translator’s own voice is honed, the more likely it is to infiltrate the resulting translation.
To pretend that a translation is, can or should be free of such influence is also folly, because whatever aesthetics the translator assumes, there is always collaboration in translation, even if only between the author of the original text and the translator. Sounds of the language and their effects, the breaths and lengths of the lines, and the subtle implications of word choice and order are initially lost forcing the translator into inventions and manipulations that beg permission from the original authors. The art of translations is a process, an attempt to reconstruct the images and impressions of the source text in a language that did not give birth to them to begin with. This communication with another writer is the literary translator’s driving force, the raison d’être, the passion for slowly transforming a text’s every word, and it is as tantalizing to the poet translator as a Tartine de Maison would be to someone with the munchies.
More importantly, this exchange makes the process of translation an inevitably regenerative exercise that teaches us, word by word, the possibilities and limitations of our own languages. We must decide what strangeness can be stretched and still understood and what will take our readers too far away from the original, especially those readers who cannot penetrate the text as we can by having an understanding of both languages. We revel in the multitudinous gains and losses before deciding how best to recast the text to keep meaning from being lost or even only refracted taking the reader to places never implied while the meaning and music of the poem slip and slide between languages, cultures, and epochs. For example, the French word vrai divides itself into two English ones: “true” and “real.” How the translator chooses one or the other should have as much to do with the sounds and rhythms of the surrounding words as it will with theoretical debates about the differences between the two. The translator must look forward into the minds of the readers and back into the mind of the author being channeled, and the older the source text, the more complicated the questions.
Despite all this reader-writer-text interplay, ultimately, like an archer shooting arrows at a bull’s eye, the translator pursues the target language alone word by word finding it sometimes easy to hit the mark, sometimes impossible. If, for example, a native French speaker were to read this article, the image of a duck—perhaps dunking its head into a lake after tiny bits of food—would be evoked by my ducking into the café terrace. The verb “to duck” does not translate, but the resulting image is almost appropriate. On the other hand, the menu’s implication that a choice cut of meat is a paving stone is hardly a desirable one in a town so chock full of competing restaurants.
Still, I decide not to report the menu’s miscommunications to the server, pay for my tea, and head off into the evening. Perhaps the absurd connections will inspire some non-Franglais speakers to reconsider the assumptions of their relationships with English. Besides, the slight rain has stopped and the clouds are clearing. By the time I reach my apartment, I will have a different sky above me and a whole new batch of questions to try to answer. I will be up late tonight for there is much to be said, and re-said.
Unfortunately, not all poems can be translated, but we continue to try, to search for ways of conveying what can be said in other languages. After all, the main reason we translate is to share the foreign texts we so enjoy with others who do not speak the language, and, as with any collaboration, there will be compromises, but we believe the rewards of such gifts to be greater than the costs.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Au Marchée
It's Sunday in Paris and we woke up unusually early, (8 am ;) so we headed off to our favorite market... our favorite mostly because it's the one in our old neighborhood where we met three years ago. We took Metro line 1 (from Châtelet, bien sûr) to Concord and transfered to line 8 to Ecole Militaire so we could have coffee and walk past the Tour Eiffel and my old apartment on Avenue de la Motte Piquet. People were out jogging and walking their dogs, but we left Filou at home.
When you go, take either line 6, 8, or 10. The market stretches all the way between two stations on line 6... La Motte Piquet and Bir Hakim. The view from Bir Hakim is worth a stop on the stairs...
There are markets all over Paris on Sundays, and on every other day also. This one is also open on Wednesdays. You can find just about everything you need here.
... shopping baskets and bags, quilts, tablecloths and linens, rugs, furniture--old and new, scarves, gloves, clothing, jewelery, handbags, shoes, souveniers, kitchenware, wine, milk, fresh eggs, cheeses...
...we bought my favorite camembert, La Vache Normande, and some fresh chèvre--goat cheese, which I like to put in omelettes with shallots and fines herbs. He loves my omelettes.... fois gras, dried fruit, tarts and cookies, bread, spices--dried and fresh...
... garlic...
... fish...
we bought two hands full of scallops--at least I think that's what the giant Noix St Jacques are called in English--that I will attempt to cook for New Years...
... roasted pig, cow's tongue, whole chickens, roasted and raw, rabbit, duck, organs and body parts of all sorts... I'll spare you the visuals!
... paella and potatoes ready to eat... fruits and vegetables, of course!
... cherries from Chili,
and mushrooms...
... litchis must be in season... they're everywhere! A screen saver for Eric... thinking of you! xOO!
Some of the merchants will let you select your own produce, but many prefer that you let them pick it for you... a sort of hands off policy. We've been scolded more than once!
And you can see why...
... this vendor even took the time to line up his haricots verts... so French!
The displays are very often artistic, especially first thing in the morning. There's nothing like arriving before dawn to see them all arrive and set up their stands in the dark...
... some provide samples or cut their goods open so you can see what's inside...
Two, please... s'il vous plait!
The flowers are always tempting, but he bought me a lovely bouquet of red tulips and lillies the other night on his way home from work... it has been a trying week. ;)
When we got home, the streets were still fairly empty...
... and the cats were very happy to see us!
So what exactly do we do with all these vegetables?!?!
Couscous, of course!
... which reminds me, my poem "Couscous" is due out in the spring in Pearl ... for a copy, go to Pearl Magazine and send in an order for issue number 39.
In the meantime, here's a poem I wrote this past May while I was visiting Paris to study with Cecilia Woloch... I read it at Shakespeare and Company. It may be a bit sentimental, but it's a very telling way to top off a very expat day... untitled because it is, perhaps, forever unfinished.
I love him for his
mother’s paprika—smokey
like his lips, spicy as a spanking.
His smart derrière is softly firm
like camembert. I love his big
ears, how they hear further
than sound, even across the
Atlantic and North America.
His eyes—demanding blue—
can sing the notes missing
from his broken English.
His teeth—the imperfect
tiles of an ancient mosaic—
embellish his smile like
a picket fence on a country
hillside. His kisses— meticulously
messy, relentless—are too many
too early in the morning, and his
faithful beard—too prickly.
He has the hands of a carpenter
of love, smooth as purple,
hospitable as ladyfingers with tea
under the bending birch trees
that are his arms. He reprograms
my hardrive when he eats
his words, never too proud
to dance naked.
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