Stephen Spender Prize 2010
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Stephen Spender Prize 2010 for poetry in translation Stephen Spender Prize 2010 for poetry in translation Winner of the 14-and-under prize Henry Miller Commended Amores 3.2 by Ovid (Latin) Dominic Hand ‘Spleen’ by Baudelaire (French) Sam Peters ‘Poem 27’ by Catullus (Latin) Winners of the 18-and-under category First Joint second Commended Patrick Heaton Iona Hannagan Lewis Amelia Hassard Emily Carpenter from Heroides 1 ‘Rhyfel’ ‘Get Drunk’ ‘The Erl King’ by Goethe by Ovid (Latin) by Hedd Wyn by Baudelaire (German) (Welsh) (French) Henry Edwards Elegies 1.3 by Propertius (Latin) Claire Ewbank ‘Grodek’ by Georg Trakl (German) Ben Pope Metamorphoses 8 by Ovid (Latin) Winners of the Open category First Second Third Commended John Richmond Duncan Forbes Jane Draycott Chen Dandan ‘The Retreat from ‘Confession’ ‘Song for Wulf’ ‘Strawberry Pie’ by Xia Yu Moscow’ by the Archpoet (Anglo-Saxon) (Chinese) by Victor Hugo (Latin) Michael Foley (French) ‘Poets Aged Seven’ by Arthur Rimbaud (French) James Knox Whittet ‘Hallaig’ by Sorley Maclean (Gaelic) Mario Petrucci ‘History’ by Eugenio Montale JEMIMAH KUHFELD (Italian) Carol Rumens ‘Canto 27’ from Dante’s Purgatorio (Italian) Introduction This year saw forty-three languages represented, with later, having read and made intelligent notes on every single Gurmukhi and Romansch making their first appearances translation; to the scholars we consulted when a language and Polish and modern Chinese creeping up the chart. It was not known to us; and to The Times for having faithfully will be interesting to see if our Primary Translation project, promoted the prize since it began life seven years ago. described at the back of this booklet, results in a spate of Our sponsors this year were the Eranda Foundation translations from community languages in the 14-and-under and The Old Possum’s Practical Trust. At a time when all category in 2011. charitable trusts are having to cut back on their grant-giving, My thanks, as ever, to the judges – Susan Bassnett, Edith we couldn’t be more grateful for their support. Hall, Karen Leeder and George Szirtes – who cheerfully took delivery of a wine box of entries at the beginning of Robina Pelham Burn their summer holidays and then came together two months Director of the Stephen Spender Trust Judges’ comments Judging this prize is a who both translated poetry and wrote the Polish Nobel laureate, Wislawa great pleasure because about translation, suggested that the Szymborska, ‘Love at First Sight’, the entries are so translator of a poem establishes in and Ian Crockatt’s translation from diverse and one never his or her own mind what he called Old Norse of a passage from the quite knows what to a ‘hierarchy of correspondences’, in ‘Orkneyinga Saga’. expect. This year, as other words, a set of priorities of We were impressed by the bold ever, the range of poems chosen by what to keep and what to discard. The choices and translation skills of the translators was vast, and included priorities of many of the translators younger entrants, though this year familiar works and writing by poets in this competition could often be we noted with regret that the demise who were completely new to me. The clearly seen: in some cases colloquial of grammar teaching in modern commentaries are often illuminating, language was used to render the language classrooms means that often a and I was struck by the fact that two colloquialisms evident in a Latin poem, potentially good translation was marred translators compared translating poetry in other cases the translator explained by basic errors due to inadequate to Sudoku, highlighting the problem- why a decision had been taken to alter understanding of the language. Once solving aspect of the task. A number patterns of rhyme. Some of the fine again, we discussed the disparity of of translators highlighted their own Welsh translators acknowledged the quality between translations of poetry involvement with a particular poem impossibility of rendering the ancient in classical languages with translations or poet, often describing how they Welsh form cynghannedd, others of poetry in modern languages, which had first encountered certain poems, wrestled with Dante’s terza rima and appears to reflect the way in which sometimes years before, and why those produced some very good unrhymed those languages are taught. Failure to poems had a particular resonance for translations of difficult passages from understand exactly how a poet has them. Close personal engagement with The Divine Comedy. structured a sentence means that a a poem and empathy with a poet can Some translators opted to produce translator is likely to misread what that result in powerful translations. poems with heavy rhyme schemes. poet is seeking to achieve. Translating poetry is a complex Sometimes this works, but unless a Carping about grammar aside, the task; you have first to acquaint writer feels at ease with rhyme, the quality of the entries was impressive yourself thoroughly with the poem, to result can appear stilted or even come and our final list of winners and understand its structures, its rhythms, across as doggerel. The winning entry, commended entries is only the tip its wordplay, all its different patterns, a version of Victor Hugo’s ‘The Retreat of an iceberg. What this competition and then seek to reproduce the poem from Moscow’ uses rhyme very shows is that there are some very for readers in a totally different culture. skilfully, and impressed us all. Indeed, talented translators and some fine poets Reproducing a poem in its entirety we found ourselves in agreement on of all ages engaging actively with the is impossible. Shelley compared the the winners in all three sections, and complexities of translating poetry. process to transplanting a seed in new only disagreed as to which poems to Long may they continue! soil, so that a similar yet different plant commend. I particularly liked Anita will grow elsewhere. James Holmes, Debska’s translation of a poem by Susan Bassnett 3 Judges’ comments It was the greater vari- aftershave or M&S groceries. But responding to the spirit of the poem. ety of the translations Henry Miller’s pacy take on Ovid’s There was a fine rendering of Catullus, in the Open category racy Amores 3.2 was uncontested for example by Sam Peters, that had the which made judging winner in the under-fifteen category. lyric subject sipping not just any wine it such a delight this Although far from a faithful but ‘M&S wine’; and Dominic Hand’s year. When I opened translation, this is a well considered beautiful version of Baudelaire’s ‘Spleen the plain cardboard box of stapled and structured version in which the IV’ with its dense use of masculine sheets of A4, I heard the rival voices emotional suffering of the young man rhymes was memorably lyrical. of poets from archaic Greece to mod- in love can be heard authentically In the 18-and-under category the ern Korea, in forms from the epi- beneath the playful surface. In the judges wrestled with a more diverse gram (there was a touching version 15–18 category, it was the turn of longlist of contenders. As in the 14-and- of Martial’s funereal 5.34 by Jason an Ovidian woman in love, in the under category many had outstanding Warren) to the acidic prose poetry of first of his ‘Letters from Heroines’, qualities but failed to sustain the tone Francis Ponge translated by Conor where Penelope addresses Ulysses. across the poem as a whole or lost Kelly. An almost uncanny unanim- The intelligent commentary increased grammatical confidence here and there. ity greeted the winning entry, ‘The my admiration for this authoritative, In Patrick Heaton’s ‘Penelope Ulixi’ Retreat from Moscow’; its driving elegant reading of an important from Ovid’s Heroides we found a rhythms powerfully suggested the poem (the earliest ever reading of the worthy winner, which took inspiration chaos of retreat and the rattling hors- Odyssey in which Penelope is actually from Carol Ann Duffy’s treatment of es’ hooves. It is no slur to record that allowed to express anger with her the figure of Penelope but found a my ten-year-old, coerced into hearing wandering spouse). It is a sign of the voice of his own. This poem headed up me recite my longlist, instantly iden- times that I wrongly assumed that its a very impressive list of entries from tified Hugo as the winner and asked advanced gender politics must mean Classical languages which demonstrated to hear him again. Nineteenth-cen- that the translator was female! a metrical and lexical confidence often tury narrative poems are not today The most successful poems, as lacking in the entries from modern the most fashionable medium; it is ever, were strikingly independent in foreign languages. I was also taken wonderful that they can still produce their creation of a new artwork, while with Iona Hannagan Lewis’ emotional a version of such genuine conviction simultaneously disciplined in their version of ‘Rhyfel’ by Hedd Wyn, and style. thinking about metre, rhythm and which tried to recreate the complex For me it was a close call for second structure. This year’s most recurrent Welsh rhyme scheme in English; and place. In his witty version of the fault was hyperbaton – word order in enjoyed Amelia Hassard’s ‘Get Drunk’ Archpoet’s ‘Confession’, Duncan the English translation so distorted by Baudelaire which, after a slightly slow Forbes conveyed the wry individual as to be off-putting. Translators in all start, found a wonderfully confident humour underneath the near-doggerel categories need to trust in their own voice: ‘time to get drunk […] on wine, of the insistent mediaeval Latin rhyme languages and literary sensibility, on poetry, on virtue, on whatever’.