“Reading a poem in
translation,” wrote Bialek, “is like kissing a woman through a veil”; […] Translation is a kind of transubstantiation;
one poem becomes another. You choose your philosophy of translation
just as you choose how to live: the free adaptation that sacrifices
detail to meaning, the strict crib that sacrifices meaning to
exactitude. The poet moves from life to language, the translator moves
from language to life; both like the immigrant, try to identify the
invisible, what’s between the lines, the mysterious implications.”
―
Anne Michaels,
Fugitive Pieces
Quote of the week
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