Thursday, January 7, 2010

Vicente, by Miguel Torga - Part I

[Unpublished translation by Luciana Lhullier]

That afternoon, the time the sky showed itself harder and more sinister, Vicente spread his black wings and left. Forty days had already elapsed since, integrated to the group of the chosen ones, he had given entrance in the Ark. But from the first moment everyone saw there was no peace in his spirit. Quiet and frowning, he walked to and fro in continuous agitation, as if that great ship where the Lord had kept life was an outrage to creation itself. In similar disorder - wolves and lambs together in the same fate -, just his black and dry figure kept bitter about God´s procedure. In a silent indignation he asked: - to what purpose were the animals involved in the confusing issue of Babel? What did they have to do with men's fornications, that the Creator wanted to punish? Fair or unfair, the high purposes that determined that flood clashed against a deep feeling of irrepressible repulse. And, the more inexorable prepotency was presented, the more Vicente's revolt increased.

Forty days, however, his weak flesh kept him there. Not even he could explain how they had left Lebanon to the boarding wharf and then, in the Ark, for so long he had received from Noah's servile hands his everyday feed. But he had been able to win. He had, finally, overcome the instinct of self-preservation, and had opened his wings towards the terrible immensity of the sea.

The unusual departure was witnessed by big and small in a quiet and reserved respect . Amazed and dazzled, they saw him, reckless, with an open chest, cross the first fire wall with what God had wanted to prevent him from escaping, and disappear in the distance in the boundaries of space. But nobody said anything. His gesture was, at that moment , the symbol of universal liberation. The conscience, in active protest against the will that divided the beings between the chosen ones and the doomed.

Still, in spite of everyone´s savoring that rescue flavor, and already high, releasead as a thunder, penetrating as a ray, terrible, the voice of God:

- Noah, where is my servant Vicente?

Bipeds and quadrupeds were petrified. On the deck, swept of illusions, a heavy, a silent shroud went down.

(To be continued)

4 comments:

Vincent said...

It's a gripping tale, Luciana, and one which extends my love of Portuguese literature from Pessoa to - another author!

I like the allegorical approach which allows Torga a critique of Biblical legends, and thereby a critique of Catholicism itself (I'm assuming).

I like your translation though it seems to me more literal than idiomatic. So long as I understand everything that 's fine. But in one sentence I could not understand every nuance:

"Still, in spite of everyone´s savoring that rescue flavor, and already high, releasead as a thunder, penetrating as a ray, terrible, the voice of God:"

I wonder if this could be paraphrased to make it clearer?

Luciana said...

Hi Vincent, thanks so much for the feedback! It´s definitely an unpolished translation - I should have let it sit for a while and work on it again as I usually do. Reading it again now I can see what you mean.
Maybe you could help me with that one if I explain it: God - who obviously saw everything- didn´t like what Vicente did and decided to interrupt that moment of hope in everybody´s hearts. But he wanted to punish them all as well, specially men, so he decided to start pressuring/bullying Noah.

" God´s voice, terrible, released as a thunder, penetrating as a ray, interrupted that moment of redemption in everybody´s hearts"

What do you think?

Vincent said...

I understand it better now, Luciana, but still I think it needs to be tweaked a little more.

The key point of interest here is that everyone was on the side of the raven (by the way the reader doesn't know yet that it's a raven!) Torga has written in such a way that we have sympathy with the bird with black wings. But in this sentence the reader discovers for the first time that "everyone" (humans? animals?) are also in sympathy with the bird and therefore by implication rebellious in their hearts against God.

"everyone´s savoring that rescue flavor" is a powerful phrase despite sounding peculiar in English. Then there is the phrase "already high". What does this refer to and is it meant literally or metaphorically? The bird already high in the sky? Everybody's hopes for release? And is it a "rescue flavor"? It seems to me more like a "successful escape flavor". Except that you don't say this kind of thing in English. It's so unusual that you would have to extend it a little, and make it "the flavor of": "everyone was savoring the flavor of anticipated escape", perhaps. But savoring the flavor is too rhyming, and redundant. Everyone knows that you savor flavor. Perhaps everyone was savoring the sense of escape. If it is "rescue", who who would perform the rescue? Clearly not God.

I'm not sure about "redemption" in your alternative translation, either. The Oxford English Dictionary gives as its first meaning "Deliverance from sin and damnation, esp. by the atonement of Christ; salvation."

It's true that the OED supplies a secondary meaning "The action of freeing a prisoner, captive, or slave by payment; the fact of being freed in this way".

But in your context, in a story featuring God as one of the characters, the primary theological meaning would surely take precedence, and cause puzzlement.

Luciana said...

Torga is a difficult one. That´s why I like the challenge so much :-)
It´ll be clearer as I translate more, of course, but there´s a division between humans and animals, and Vicente is the animals' hero. Noah is definitely not a leader in this story, and God is bossy (like Zeus).
Thanks again. I´ll be posting the other parts soon.