Language has always been an important part of my life. My grandmother was an English teacher turned administrator before finishing her career at ASU helping doctoral students with their theses and writing grant proposals for the office she worked in at the University. My mother is a poet and inspired my love of writing from an early age. I have always loved to read and experiment with words, so I’ve done lots of writing in several genres over the years myself as well, especially poetry.
I came into the internship this semester knowing that I wanted to translate in all of the languages I speak fluently: Spanish, French, and Italian. I was immediately drawn to poetry because it has always been one of my favorite literary genres both to read and write. My original thought was to translate a few pieces into multiple languages, but, as I was reading through various pieces to choose, I realized that there was a certain language that seemed to connect best with each piece.
For me, as I read a piece, the tone, word choice, and themes are what spoke to me and demanded that it be translated into a certain language. When I read through “The Saints of Negativity” by Norman Dubie for the first time, with its references to the Medici’s, Michelangelo, and religious allusions, my first thought was “this needs to be in Italian!” The vivid imagery and almost stern tone of the writing reminded me of the classic Italian literature I read in my Italian Composition class. As I read, I was already hearing some of the phrases translated into Italian and how eloquent they would be since I find Italian to be an incredibly poetic language in its rhythm and intonation.
So although I fully support the mission of the Thousand Languages Project to make HFR as accessible to as many people as possible around the world, I definitely wanted to be a part of it for selfish reasons too. Ever since I became proficient in Spanish, and subsequently in Italian and French, I have loved translating both verbally and in written form. It’s a brain exercise that releases some sort of endorphin because I always come out the other side feeling very accomplished and, in the case of verbal translation, useful, as I facilitated communication. This last part is what has fostered my desire to work for a multinational company or in the US Foreign Service because, at the end of the day, I just want to be talking to and connecting with people from around the world in other languages.
I believe that translation is one of the best tools for increasing visibility for a language, and I feel so privileged to be able to do so for Corsican and Sassarese (see the Earth Day Translation Challenge I led in southern France) in addition to the more widely spoken languages. This semester has only cemented and strengthened what I know to be a life-long passion for languages and translation.
Thank you to all of my reviewers for the many hours spent overthinking a single word and the insightful discussions about interpretation. I couldn’t have produced such quality translations without your support and guidance. And thank you to Dr. Jacqueline Balderrama whose continuous, unwavering support and guidance anchored me throughout the semester.
For “The Saints of Negativity” (Italian)
“The Saints of Negativity” is a special poem to me for two reasons. First, it was the first poem I really connected with when browsing HFR issues and, as I mentioned in my general translation note, the one that spoke to me and demanded to be translated into Italian. And second, because as I was finalizing my translation, I learned of author Norman Dubie’s passing. One of my Italian reviewers, actually, whose husband happened to be a colleague of Dubie’s, informed me. Though sad, I almost feel like it was fate that I picked his poem, and I am so honored to have had the opportunity to translate his work.
A few notes on the translation: First, my reviewer and I decided that I should use the literary past tense (rather than simple past) for my translation both because poetry is literature and as a nod to the historical references throughout the poem. Second, I was instantly captured by Dubie’s imagery which paints a vivid picture in the mind of the reader. His poetry is also narrative and tells a story with much to be revealed through double éntendres and allusions. These were challenging to translate at times but very satisfying when I did find the right words. My reviewer and I struggled the most with the third stanza—which describes the block of ice that Michaelangelo is supposed to carve, the servants that ruined it with blood, and the children that used it to make snowmen—because it took us a while to understand and also find the words to translate the metaphors. My final translation of, “And the young Michelangelo / Was to make a virgin and child. / Servants of Piero, as a joke, / Had spoiled the marble / With a trickle of ox blood” for example, was “Ed il giovane Michelangelo / Doveva scolpire una vergine con bambino. / I servi di Piero, per scherzo, / Avevano rovinato il marmo / Con un rivolo di sangue di bue.” I’m content with my choices and hope Italian speakers will enjoy it.
For “Water in Love” by Ed Bok Lee (Italian)
When reading this poem, it is no surprise that this poem was translated by several interns this semester and last. It is beautifully written with a tone that is simultaneously melancholic and hopeful and which speaks to the romantic heart. The metaphors throughout the poem are what make it so well written and, equally, tricky to translate. For example, the lines, “debris of thought like the dead, / the drowned, the vanished, and yet / sails your lips / on a voyage toward another’s, plying / all luck and regret” was one my reviewers and I went back and forth on for a while. We ended up settling on “il detrito del pensiero come i morti / gli annegati, gli svaniti, eppure / naviga le tue labbra / In un viaggio verso quelle d’un altro, solcando / Tutta la fortuna ed il rimpianto”.
For “Pahá Sápa” by Julia Peçanha (French)
This poem was a fun one for me as it is short and sweet and immediately evoked for me the image of a warrior on horseback with arrows whizzing past her: “My horse must be crazy, / wefting through the warp of so many /close deaths, enemy arrows blow kisses as they pass.” These were the images I had in mind while translating. Two phrases I had difficulty translating were “chinese finger trap” and “racecar-angel” for which, after much deliberation I settled on “un piège à doigts chinois” and “un ange-bolide” respectively.
For “Head of Dvarapalas” by Jenny Yang Cropp (French)
The first thing I did after deciding to translate “Head of Dvarapalas” was look up a photo of the statue which is found in the Gyeongju National Museum in South Korea. I couldn’t find a picture of the exact statue but did learn that a dvarapala (which literally translates to “door protector” in Sanskrit) is a fearsome guardian statue found at entrances and gates throughout southeast Asia. While translating, I used this picture as a visual reference to make sure I stayed true to the image the author was describing. An element of the poem that I really enjoyed was the change in tone from reverent to casual, with words like “top-knot” and “pissed off,” as I got to ask my French friends their favorite ways to say “pissed off” and choose which one fit the tone I was trying to convey.
For “The Train” by Norman Dubie (Spanish)
In a kind of full-circle moment, “The Train” was the last poem I translated this semester as I decided that I wanted to translate another of Dubie’s poems following the news of his passing. I also had not done a Spanish translation yet, the language I am most comfortable in after English, so this translation is also special to me in that way. I specifically selected South and Central American Spanish vocabulary since the poem is set in North America. This aligned well with my language ability because my Spanish vocabulary is Ecuadorian, the result of a high school foreign exchange program I did there and became fluent. Interestingly, “The Train” was also the poem I annotated the most before translating as it is chock-full of allusions. I read it many times and with the aid of my reviewers before I really understood what Dubie was saying. For example, the diamond with a “fire of fat” in it, I first thought was alluding to the expression, “the fat’s in the fire” to mean that trouble was brewing and the diamond was a harbinger of bad things to come. Then, I searched for the equivalent Spanish idiom and decided to use the “tiene cara de problemas” to say that the diamond “looked like trouble.” My reviewer then warned me against not translating word for word and to re-examine the phrase which, upon further reflection, brought me to the conclusion that Dubie wasn’t referring to the expression “the fat’s in the fire” but rather the reaction from which the expression is derived in which fire spits and burns hotter when fat drips off meat on a spit. I took the phrase now to mean that the diamond was stunningly bright, white-hot like fire with fat in it. So, I translated literally from the English: “the diamond she's wearing / Has the fire of fat in it.” to “el diamante que lleva / Tiene el fuego de grasa.”
I was also extremely fortunate to have Alberto Ríos as one of my reviewers as he was close friends with Dubie and was able to provide invaluable insight into how Dubie wrote and his thought processes. This context—namely that Dubie’s father was a minister and had a religious upbringing—helped immensely with deepening my understanding of the poem and gave me a new perspective when reading it. I now saw the allusions in a different light. I’d like to dedicate this translation, as well as the one I did for “The Saints of Negativity,” to Dubie as a tribute to both him and the gift that is the body of work he left behind for us and future generations to enjoy.
About the Translator
Born and raised in Phoenix and a third generation Sun Devil, Acacia Wastchak is a third-year undergraduate student in Barrett, the Honors College at ASU studying International Trade with a minor in French. Travel and foreign languages are two of her biggest passions and what has led her to study abroad in Ecuador, Italy, and now France for the spring semester. Both her mother and grandmother are writers, so literature - and especially poetry - have always been a big part of Acacia's life and inspired her own love of writing and language. Acacia is a polyglot and speaks Spanish, Italian, French, and Portuguese in addition to English and is currently learning German. As an intern for TLP this semester, she is both translating poetry from HFR into Spanish, Italian, and French as well as running the Earth Day Translation Challenge in Aix-en-Provence, France at the local universities. (updated 2023)
Translations
"Head of Dvarapalas" by Jenny Yang Cropp (French)
“Pahá Sápa” by Julia Peçanha (French)
"The Saints of Negativity" by Norman Dubie (Italian)
"The Train" by Norman Dubie (Spanish)
"Water in Love" by Ed Bok Lee (Italian)
With grateful acknowledgment to French Language reviewers: Markus Cruse & Feriel Guennoun; Italian language reviewers: Juliann Vitullo & Gina Pietrantoni; and Spanish language reviewers: Alberto Rios & Belén Agustina