Reviews for Born In Utopia: An Anthology Of Modern And Contemporary Romanian Poetry

The average rating for Born In Utopia: An Anthology Of Modern And Contemporary Romanian Poetry based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2021-01-17 00:00:00 Brad Mccurdy Whew. Where to start? In an academically coy afterword titled "Don't Burn the Translation -- Yet," John Hartley Williams expends a lot of words on the philosophical aim of translation as a process only to conclude that they, the translators, "have tried to assiduously domesticate the Romanian poems in English, without losing any of their original strangeness." Ironic that a collection called "Censored Poems" should have to go through a so-called domestication process, no? Oh, how I wish this would have been a bilingual edition! Instead, this luxury is lavished upon exactly one poem. Beyond it, the only Romanian retained is in the original titles that appear underneath their docile English versions. For instance, a title that could be rendered as "calamity" is perhaps too toothsome, thus it becomes a very defanged "ill-fated." "Executing the agreement" turns into "pleasant executions," without any care to the irony of having a poem about executions sport a title referencing humdrum legalities. "Alms" and "longing," scary words if ever there were any, are civilized into "festus interruptus" and "mal du pays" respectively. There is much hilarity in those last two choices; Sorescu eschewed inflated language, opting instead for the colloquial. To further tame whatever may have needed taming, gratuitous question marks are added at the end of English titles that, in Romanian, contain not a hint of questioning. I find these changes baffling, especially when the content of Sorescu's poems is bold, cynical and shot through with copious gallows humor. The translation does manage to retain a sense of this, but without access to the originals, I can't say how much. The only bilingual poem is not very encouraging: "to taunt" becomes, somehow, "to trap," "ruckus" turns into "witches brew," and an entire stanza on the duplicity of informers is repurposed into a convoluted metaphor. It sort of works, sort of... Again and again, as I read, I came upon word choices and whole phrases that left me wondering what the feral original was. As things stand, I'm dubious about the merits of language domestication. Good thing Marin Sorescu wrote sentences savage enough to resist the translator's attempts. Instead of being slobbered upon by a frizzy pack of yapping poodles, I was still, here and there, menaced by the howling of wolves.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-07-10 00:00:00 Ramiro Garcia I know little of Tadeusz Rozewicz and in truth so far only a handful of his poems (mostly the early ones) have really spoken to me, but those few have spoken clearly and directly, and with the humility of one who realises that his (or better, the) message is more important than any demonstration of skill or personality. Witness You know I'm in but don't suddenly enter my room You might see me silent over a blank sheet Can you write about love when you hear the cries of the murdered and disgraced can you write about death watching the little faces of children Do not suddenly enter my room You will see a dumb and bound witness to a love being conquered by death 'I felt that something had come to an end forever for me and for humanity,' Rozewicz wrote of these early poems, written in Poland in the aftermath of the war. After the end of the world after death I found myself in the midst of life creating myself building life people animals landscapes this is a table I said this is a table there is bread and a knife on the table knife serves to cut bread people are nourished by bread man must be loved I learnt by day by night what must one love I would reply man... ('In the Midst of Life') Rozewicz: 'The dance of poetry came to an end during the Second World War in concentration camps created by totalitarian systems. The departure... from the special "poetic language" has produced those poems which I call stripped of masks and costumes... (so-called) "prosaicised" works which (create) the conditions for poetry's subsistence and even survival.' The poem is finished now break it and when it grows together again break it once more at places where it meets reality remove the joints the random elements which come from the imagination those that remain tie up with silence or leave untied when the poem is finished remove the foundation on which it rests - foundations restrict movement - then the construction will rise and for a moment will soar above reality with which eventually it will collide the collision will be the birth of a new poem a stranger to reality surprising splitting and transforming it and itself undergoing transformation ('Proposition the Second') In his later poems it can seem as if the battle has been fought, but sometimes still he skewers a feeling perfectly: I feel desire he said unfortunately he has no soul the soul has gone the young waitress burst out laughing her shape was such one could soulless create with her a new man... the souls have been snatched up by previous generations and now one has to live as best one can shallowly quicker ('Shallowly Quicker') They say in Poland Rozewicz may be the most influential of post-war poets. If this is true, maybe his influence hasn't spread to the Anglo world because we have yet to experience an apocalypse comparable to that of his generation's youth in Poland. In a prison camp or blasted moonscape these are the kinds of poems I would take with me, committed to memory, and easily understood by any who would care to listen. the most tangible description of bread is a description of hunger ('Draft for a Modern Love Poem')