Journal of Italian Translation

John Du Val
Then I murmured to myself, “Poor Paul!
What am I feeling sorry for myself for?”
There are a number of technical problems with the four solution: a) the
last line is unmetrical and too long; b) the poem now ends with a homonym
again rather than a rhyme; c) the two for’s in the last line clunk
unharmoniously together; d) the sentence ends with a preposition, which,
not ordinarily a problem, gets excessive emphasis at the end of the poem. For
some reason I was fond of this solution anyway. Maybe the technical flaws
gave it a kind of humor in accord with the sardonic Romanesco, but nobody
that I showed it to liked it.
Five:
seventeen hundred twenty-five.
Then I muttered to myself, “Poor Paul,
he’s got it worse than I’ve.”
The less said about that the better.
Six:
seventeen hundred twenty-six.
Then I muttered to myself, “Poor Paul,
he’s in an even worse fix.
I don’t think that makes Paul sound like a cat, but it’s still unpleasantly
comical to picture Paul’s condition as one which, if he were only clever
enough, he might be able to get out of.
Seven:
seventeen hundred twenty-seven.
Then I muttered to myself, “Poor Paul,
he’s worse off than I am, even.”
This is not bad. The even makes perfect sense: I’m bad off, but he’s even
worse. But at the end of the sentence, when the sentence could have ended
perfectly well without it, even sounds as if the translator stuck it there simply
for the rhyme, which he did.
Eight:
seventeen hundred twenty-eight.
Then I muttered to myself, “Poor Paul,
his is an even worse fate.”
Here there is an infidelity to reality not in the original: Paul’s fate is not
worse than Carlo’s, because they have the same fate, death. Paul’s just happens
to be sooner. Perhaps
He’s even in a worse state.”
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