table of contents - The University of Texas at Dallas

TRANSLATION OF FIVE POEMS BY RAÚL ZURITA:
TRANSLATION COMMENTARY
By Deborah Krainin
E
l Amor De Chile, by Raúl Zurita, was
written in 1986 during the military
dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. First
published in Chile in 1987, it met with harsh
opposition; however, when republished in
2002, it was met with warm praise. Zurita is
an active political voice and prolific author
who wrote these poems during what has
proved to be a dark historical time in Chile.
When approaching this collection as a
whole, I considered essential the idea of how
to bring to life a tribute to our permanence,
which I believe is the very essence of this
collection. In the case of El Amor De Chile,
permanence means not only what is found in
the natural landscape but also what endures
within humanity: mostly love. I approached
each poem as a message and a song. The
message was always searching for the political
undertone, the subliminal embedded in each
one. The song was the intention of making the
images flourish and breathe color, strength,
and voice, as if nature itself were singing
through these lines. History marched
alongside the collection, and I wanted it to
somehow lean in and let its presence be
known, but not in an invasive manner. Instead,
my hope is that history is almost a shadow that
leans across the pages, dark enough to
challenge the light, but not enough to
eliminate it. The natural landscape is the voice
through which Raúl Zurita chose to speak. It is
a voice made human by the humanity not just
connected to it, but embedded within it. I hope
that my translation makes that clear, and more
importantly, makes it beautiful. It was in the
language of nature where I let my senses
speak on the translator’s behalf.
Having access to a living poet enormously
helps the final draft of the translation process.
It was not until my final draft that I sat down
with the poet and visited these translations
together. For those images whose underlying
intentions were not easily discovered in language,
Zurita helped make meaning clear, and for this, I
am grateful. I spent two years from start to finish
translating the collection of El Amor De Chile.
Over that time, I have had the opportunity to truly
know the poet, and as a result, hope that I have
captured his heart within these lines.
I approached the translation of these poems
through literal, historical, and figurative doors. I
began my first draft with a literal approach,
deciding which images and phrases were based in
literal image and which seemed to be out of literal
reach. I then applied the literal to the historical
time frame in which these poems were written to
consider the duality of image and intention. In
doing so, I discovered that these poems seemed to
belong as a whole. Separate the poems and they
can appear out of place. In some measure I felt
that, like history, these poems did not want to
stand apart, but somehow insisted on being part of
a whole. This to me was the success of Zurita’s
use of nature embodying the voices of a country
and humanity silenced. The question that then
arose for me was how to reinforce this poetic
monument of a permanence to love and life
through nature, without losing the necessary
weight of political references when they appear.
This quest led me to the figurative in all of its
forms, where I tried to not lose either
metaphorical or symbolic content.
Aside from the inherent challenges that exist
when translating poetry from Spanish to English
(re: placement of adjectives, reduction of definite
and indefinite articles, the Spanish subjunctive
most often formed in our conditional tense)
arrives the challenge of making meaning carved
by memory, history, and intention. Take, for
instance, the poem Tribute Of Love From The
Deserts, where one finds the verbs cubrir and
repetir. Cubrir means to cover in various uses (to
cover something up, to cover over), and repetir
Translation Review 7