Poetry Meme

[sigune]

When you see this, post a poem on your journal.


66. Les Chats

Les amoureux fervents et les savants austères
Aiment également, dans leur mûre saison,
Les chats puissants et doux, orgueil de la maison,
Qui comme eux sont frileux et comme eux sédentaires.

Amis de la science et de la volupté,
Il cherchent le silence et l'horreur des ténèbres;
L'Érèbe les eût pris pour ses coursiers funèbres,
S'ils pouvaient au servage incliner leur fierté.

Ils prennent en songeant les nobles attitudes
Des grands sphinx allongés au fond des solitudes,
Qui semblent s'endormir dans un rêve sans fin;

Leurs reins féconds sont pleins d'étincelles magiques,
Et des parcelles d'or, ainsi qu'un sable fin,
Étoilent vaguement leurs prunelles mystiques.

Charles Baudelaire



66. Cats

Stiff scholars and the hotly amorous
Will in their ripeness equally admire
Powerful, gentle cats, pride of the house,
Who, like them, love to sit around the fire.

Friends both of sciences and of l'amour,
They seek the silent horror of the night;
Erebus wants them for his funeral corps,
But in their pride they'd never choose that fate.

They take in sleeping noble attitudes--
Great sphinxes in the desert solitudes,
Who seem to be entranced by endless dreams;

Within their potent loins are magic sparks,
And flakes of gold, fine sand, are vaguely seen
Behind their mystic eyes, gleaming like stars.

(Translation by James McGowan)

Comments

[the-winterwitch.livejournal.com]

Aaah, lovely! This Poetry Meme is quite the runner and really a discovery.
I love this poem, though I have to confess I read it here for the first time. But I have to agree, the English translation simply seems off, wooden in relation to the original. Like you can't draw or paint certain things with certain tools/colours/material, but only with others, there are always things, styles, feelings you can't really express in one language or the other.

[sigune.livejournal.com]

I think that's true. When I'm unimpressed by literature in translation, I always wonder whether that is due to the translation or to the author. On the other hand, some translators are so good that they give text a whole new charm. I think the case of Les Chats is a bit unfortunate in that respect - McGowan has better translations than that one. But of course I posted this because I love the original so much :-).