Turkish Poetry and Literature |
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Sardunya´ya Ağıt- Can Yucel/ Requiem to the Gerenium
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| 1. |
06 Jul 2010 Tue 03:01 pm |
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Sardunya´ya Ağıt- Can Yucel
İkindiyin saat beşte
Baş gardiyan Rıza başta
Karalar bastı koğuşa
Ikindiyin saat beşte
Seyre durduk tantanayı
Tutuklayıp sardunyayı
Attılar dipkapalıya
İkindiyin saat beşte
Yataklık etmiş zaar
Suçu tevatür ve esrar
Elbet bir kızıllığı var
Ikindiyin saat beşte
Dirlik düzenlik kurtulur
Müdür koltuğa kurulur
Çiçek demire vurulur
İkindiyin saat beşte
Canların gözü yaşta
Aklı idamlık yoldaşta
Yeşil ölümle dalaşta
Sabahleyin saat beşte
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Requiem to the Gerenium
In the afternoon At five
With the head warden Riza with a furious drive
Dark forces entered the hive
In the afternoon At five
As we started to watch the pantomime
They apprehended the geranium for its crime
And threw it into the deepest cell for the first time
In the afternoon At five
It was harbouring and deserved to be on blacklists
Its crimes are hearsays and weeds
Of course, it has to do with the communists
In the afternoon At five
Peace is saved as well as harmony
The governor sits in his armchair comfortably
The flower is shackled detestably
In the afternoon At five
Can has a tear in his eye
His mind with his comrade about to die
Green squabbles with Death thereby
In the morning at five
Song by Yeni Turku
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAwcaoDXz2E Music: Selim Atakan
My try
Edited (7/6/2010) by thehandsom
[A minor correction :P]
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| 2. |
06 Jul 2010 Tue 04:55 pm |
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and my try as expected:
at five in the afternoon
led by Riza the head warden
men in black uniform broke in the dorm
at five in the afternoon
we watched the commotion
they captured the geranium
and put him in a cell in the back
at five in the afternoon
guess he was an accomplice
yet his crime is mystery and rumour
he surely has a red connection
at five in the afternoon
welfare and order are safe now
the warden can warm his chair
the geranium is in shackles
at five in the afternoon
Can has tears in his eyes
His minds is set on his comrade
waiting for the green death in the death row
at five in the morning
Edited (7/6/2010) by vineyards
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| 3. |
06 Jul 2010 Tue 05:23 pm |
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Is there a TC Poetry Translation competition going on I didn´t hear about?  - on this one my ´dix pointes´ go to TheHandsom - for cleverly managing to make the English translation rhyme like the original.
Edited (7/6/2010) by lady in red
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| 4. |
06 Jul 2010 Tue 08:12 pm |
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I´m not in the position to comment on the translation but I love the source text.
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| 5. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 12:37 am |
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I have already explained elsewhere that I am making these translations to help a few people who are interested in Turkish poetry or poetry in general. You don´t have to vote for anything. I like different interpretations of songs similarly I like different translations. Rhyme may be so important in the English language, it is not very so for Turkish. We tend to consider rhyme an old fashioned technique. Just like painters are not required to make paintings resembling photographs, poets are not expected to write poems following strict rhyme patterns.
Is there a TC Poetry Translation competition going on I didn´t hear about? - on this one my ´dix pointes´ go to TheHandsom - for cleverly managing to make the English translation rhyme like the original.
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| 6. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 07:50 am |
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I have already explained elsewhere that I am making these translations to help a few people who are interested in Turkish poetry or poetry in general. You don´t have to vote for anything. I like different interpretations of songs similarly I like different translations. Rhyme may be so important in the English language, it is not very so for Turkish. We tend to consider rhyme an old fashioned technique. Just like painters are not required to make paintings resembling photographs, poets are not expected to write poems following strict rhyme patterns.
I did intend my comment about a poetry competition to be a joke. 
I don´t think rhyme is important in English poetry any more than it is in Turkish poetry but the use of rhyme in this particular poem seemed to give it a certain rhythm with every line ending with exactly the same sound. Not Can Yucel´s usual style is it? - so presumably he wrote it like this deliberately and therefore I thought a rhyming translation was a good one.
Just my opinion - I´m afraid I don´t have a degree in English Literature.
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| 7. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 09:26 am |
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Rhyme may be so important in the English language, it is not very so for Turkish. We tend to consider rhyme an old fashioned technique. Just like painters are not required to make paintings resembling photographs, poets are not expected to write poems following strict rhyme patterns.
I think you took LIR´s comment too seriously. I understood her to be giving credit to theHandsom for cleverly managing to make the translation rhyme. He obviously spent some time on it and some people do enjoy simply playing with words, so all credit to him. Both translations are good for different reasons. I wouldn´t say rhyme is SO important in the English language, any more than it is in any other language. Different techniques are used in poetry, depending on the effect a poet wishes to produce, or the subject matter being explored.
IMO there´s a certain amount of snobbery, amongst some, in the Arts world. My own opinion is, yes, it may be interesting to know what motivated the creator of a particular piece, but it´s also there to stir emotion/feelings/ideas in the audience. It doesn´t matter how simplistic, complex, negative, positive etc. a response is, a response is a response and it´s a personal thing. Words in a poem may be a trigger, likewise the rhythm (or lack of it) may also trigger an emotion.
Lol . . . I remember visiting the Staats Gallery in Stuttgart and mistaking an umbrella in a brolly stand for a work of art  . It could have been worse . . . I might have been stood there for hours pondering.
I liked the subject matter of this poem and I´m reminded of one of my favourite genres in poetry . . . war poems. This one was written during WWI, but I think it transcends time and nationality.
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Three hours ago he blundered up the trench,
Sliding and poising, groping with his boots;
Sometimes he tripped and lurched against the walls
With hands that pawed the sodden bags of chalk.
He couldn´t see the man who walked in front;
Only he heard the drum and rattle of feet
Stepping along barred trench boards, often splashing
Wretchedly where the sludge was ankle-deep.
Voices would grunt `Keep to your right -- make way!´
When squeezing past some men from the front-line:
White faces peered, puffing a point of red;
Candles and braziers glinted through the chinks
And curtain-flaps of dug-outs; then the gloom
Swallowed his sense of sight; he stooped and swore
Because a sagging wire had caught his neck.
A flare went up; the shining whiteness spread
And flickered upward, showing nimble rats
And mounds of glimmering sand-bags, bleached with rain;
Then the slow silver moment died in dark.
The wind came posting by with chilly gusts
And buffeting at the corners, piping thin.
And dreary through the crannies; rifle-shots
Would split and crack and sing along the night,
And shells came calmly through the drizzling air
To burst with hollow bang below the hill.
Three hours ago, he stumbled up the trench;
Now he will never walk that road again:
He must be carried back, a jolting lump
Beyond all needs of tenderness and care.
He was a young man with a meagre wife
And two small children in a Midland town,
He showed their photographs to all his mates,
And they considered him a decent chap
Who did his work and hadn´t much to say,
And always laughed at other people´s jokes
Because he hadn´t any of his own.
That night when he was busy at his job
Of piling bags along the parapet,
He thought how slow time went, stamping his feet
And blowing on his fingers, pinched with cold.
He thought of getting back by half-past twelve,
And tot of rum to send him warm to sleep
In draughty dug-out frowsty with the fumes
Of coke, and full of snoring weary men.
He pushed another bag along the top,
Craning his body outward; then a flare
Gave one white glimpse of No Man´s Land and wire;
And as he dropped his head the instant split
His startled life with lead, and all went out.
Siegfried Sassoon |
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Another favourite poet of mine is Roger McGough (ex Scaffold member). He loves playing with words. The only one I know my heart is . . .
"To amuse emus on warm summer nights,
Kiwis do weewees from spectacular heights."
Rhyme is also a very important tool for literacy in children :
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/learning-read-rhyme-important.html
Of course this doesn´t mean to say rhyme is a childish technique.
Thanks, boys for both translations 
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| 8. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 09:54 am |
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Three hours ago he blundered up the trench,
Sliding and poising, groping with his boots;
Sometimes he tripped and lurched against the walls
With hands that pawed the sodden bags of chalk.
He couldn´t see the man who walked in front;
Only he heard the drum and rattle of feet
Stepping along barred trench boards, often splashing
Wretchedly where the sludge was ankle-deep.
Voices would grunt `Keep to your right -- make way!´
When squeezing past some men from the front-line:
White faces peered, puffing a point of red;
Candles and braziers glinted through the chinks
And curtain-flaps of dug-outs; then the gloom
Swallowed his sense of sight; he stooped and swore
Because a sagging wire had caught his neck.
A flare went up; the shining whiteness spread
And flickered upward, showing nimble rats
And mounds of glimmering sand-bags, bleached with rain;
Then the slow silver moment died in dark.
The wind came posting by with chilly gusts
And buffeting at the corners, piping thin.
And dreary through the crannies; rifle-shots
Would split and crack and sing along the night,
And shells came calmly through the drizzling air
To burst with hollow bang below the hill.
Three hours ago, he stumbled up the trench;
Now he will never walk that road again:
He must be carried back, a jolting lump
Beyond all needs of tenderness and care.
He was a young man with a meagre wife
And two small children in a Midland town,
He showed their photographs to all his mates,
And they considered him a decent chap
Who did his work and hadn´t much to say,
And always laughed at other people´s jokes
Because he hadn´t any of his own.
That night when he was busy at his job
Of piling bags along the parapet,
He thought how slow time went, stamping his feet
And blowing on his fingers, pinched with cold.
He thought of getting back by half-past twelve,
And tot of rum to send him warm to sleep
In draughty dug-out frowsty with the fumes
Of coke, and full of snoring weary men.
He pushed another bag along the top,
Craning his body outward; then a flare
Gave one white glimpse of No Man´s Land and wire;
And as he dropped his head the instant split
His startled life with lead, and all went out.
Siegfried Sassoon |
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Thanks, boys for both translations
What´s the saying? ´I don´t know much about poetry (art/music) but I do know what I like´! And I like this very moving poem. [I do know who Siegfried Sassoon is btw  ]
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| 9. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 10:53 am |
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Thanks for your comments. These translations appear exclusively on Turkish Class and they are meant for notifying users of their existence. In most cases, there are no English translations. Advanced learners of Turkish could use them in their studies.
In the past, a few people suggested that I compile these and publish elsewhere. I told them that most of these poems are five minute translations and that I do not consider them valuable from an artistic point of view.
I feel the best way to contribute from an educational point of view would be offering alternative translations. This is pretty much what I am doing.
Edited (7/7/2010) by vineyards
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| 10. |
07 Jul 2010 Wed 11:47 am |
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Is there a TC Poetry Translation competition going on I didn´t hear about? - on this one my ´dix pointes´ go to TheHandsom - for cleverly managing to make the English translation rhyme like the original.
Ha ha.. It seems like..
Thanks for the ´dix pointes´ but what are ´dix pointes´ exactly?
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