I grew up learning Spanish in my household from my parents and relatives. Then as I started school, English became more prominent in how I communicated, and I used it more during school and around siblings. Spanish has always been a part of my life, but I never got the chance to master or improve it until high school and university. Since then, I’ve been focusing on the importance of English and Spanish in a literary context. When translating, I keep in mind those who I grew up with that only speak Spanish, and my hope to reach them has helped me in translating these two literary pieces: “When You Are Old and I Am Gray” by Eric Schlich and “Birds at a Funeral” by mónica teresa ortiz.
In the flash fiction “When You Are Old and I Am Gray” by Eric Schlich, I was drawn to this piece for its content of love and how it lives on and is demonstrated between older partners. Topics filled with emotions like love can be interpreted differently in different languages, which made me want to translate this piece. I was curious to see how Spanish could elevate this story. I worked to find the satisfying phrasing that many Spanish-speaking people would understand and absorb. For example, a word that I tried to translate while still serving the purpose of creating the best possible interpretation was “their sloping grace.” I saw this as an obstacle because there is no direct translation of the words “sloping grace” in Spanish with the same conclusive elegance. I found it essential to have that same substantial ending, and I had two different options that my reviewer and I had come up with: "su gracia semicaída.” and “ su gracia casi caída.” Ultimately, I selected the first option, which both had the same significance, but grammatically flowed better. When there is a more natural-sounding sentence, this will help the reader better grasp and connect to the story, which I constantly focus on when translating.
In the poem “Birds at a Funeral” by mónica teresa ortiz, I was curious to see how Spanish can elevate the idea of a funeral as it was written originally from an English perspective. Each significant experience in human life, like a funeral, has many different connotations and meanings based on one’s language, which made me intrigued to translate this poem into Spanish. A prominent obstacle I encountered was ensuring that I correctly translated the English collective noun, “murder” for a group of crows into Spanish. Some collective nouns are understood in specific languages, while others are not. In this piece, it reads, “crows never forget / a murder they first taught,” in which “murder” serves as a double meaning, both a collective noun, and in this context of death, a literal murder. In Spanish, the collective verb for crow is “bandada,” which loses the double meaning of murder. Still, I decided to keep this word instead of translating it as “los cuervos nunca olvidan // un asesinato que primero nos enseñaron.” The actual line I used was “los cuervos nunca olvidan su bandada que primero nos enseñaron” because it resonates more with a Spanish speaker and fits with the poem's message in those lines.
Even though these were struggles I underwent, I found it part of the joy of translating literary pieces. I see translation as an intricate evolving jigsaw puzzle; there will always be a missing piece while trying to solve it until you eventually find it; it’s a relieving and satisfying sensation of accomplishment.
About the Translator
Andres Gutierrez Vasquez is an undergraduate student at Arizona State University majoring in English and minoring in Spanish. He was born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona, where his parents decided to reside, coming from Mexico. The first language he learned was Spanish, and then English when he started attending elementary school. To master both languages, he has always been enthralled with improving his bilingual skills by reading English and Spanish literature. (updated 2023)
Translations
“Birds at a Funeral” by mónica teresa ortiz (Spanish)
“When You Are Old and I Am Gray” by Eric Schlich (Spanish)
With grateful acknowledgment to Spanish language reviewers: Thomas Shalloe & Laura Dicochea