This is my day 30 (final one for the year) effort for National Poetry Writing Month.
It’s a homophonic translation (according to sound, not meaning – I don’t know Norwegian!) of this Norwegian poem by Jan Erik Vold.
And as a final flourish, I decided to have a go at an experimental ‘quick and dirty’ video poem (having recently bought a new laptop and some editing sofware).
The purposes of the exercise was mainly having a go at one of my own, using bits and pieces I happened to have filmed on my mobile phone, and to continue getting to grips with my editing sofware.(Also, I really enjoy homophonic translations for their nonsense quality!)
So it’s far from polished, nor does it really have a ‘concept’! But that’s NaPoWriMo sometimes…Hopefully there are some interesting juxtapositions – and it’s made me want to experiment more with poetry, video and sound together.
NaPoWriMo been a really enjoyable endeavour this year and I’ve written various things I’m certainly going to develop – so I’ll see you all in 2017 🙂
Here’s the original poem, followed by the text version of my homophonic translation, followed by the actual translation (which is not, as you might imagine, very similar):
ET NYTT MØTE
Et nytt møte – og all den smerte
dét innebærer. Likevel
gleder vi oss, likevel trekker vi
i alle salighetens spaker håndtak og hendler, jackpot
på jackpot! mens myntene raser
ut, de er flere og kommer fortere enn vi kan samle
dem opp – la gå med det, la gå med det.
Å veksle disse sjetongene inn, det er der
det virkelige arbeidet ligger.
**My homophonic translation**
Ate Night Moat
Ate night moat, ogled and smarter
debt imbiber. Like evil
gladder vile, like evil Trekkie vile
Eye all her Sally eaters speaker handbag or handler, jackpot
pi jackpot! Men’s minty razor
out, deer flair hog Frontera envy can smelly
them up – lager Med debt, lager Med debt.
A Vesper disses shit on jeans in, debtor dear
debt twerker liger* albeit liger.
**Real translation**
A New Meeting
A new meeting – and all the pain
bound to follow. Even so
we’re happy about it, pulling at all the
handles, levers and sticks of joy, jackpot
upon jackpot! while the coins gush out
so fast and so many that we cannot
collect them – never mind about that, never mind.
Cashing in these chips, that’s where
the real work begins.
© 1988, Jan Erik Vold From: En som het Abel Ek Publisher: Gyldendal, Oslo, 1988, 82-05-17792-9
© Translation: 1988, Jan Erik Vold First published on Poetry International, 2012