Aleksander Gomola, Jagiellonian University Who does John Donne go to bed with or how not to translate a love poem [Published in: Misztal, M., M. Trawiński (eds.), Current Issues in English Studies, Kraków 2009, 217-227] Introduction Poetry, unlike music or visual arts, is always constrained by the limits of a particular language. To reach those speaking other languages, a poem has to be translated, in other words it has to undergo a process of a linguistic transformation resulting in a text with a different linguistic structure. Since an act of translation is a linguistic operation (even if this an operation within the context of a much broader cultural transfer), it is an object of interest not only for literary criticism but also for linguistics. The aim of this paper is to compare translation strategies adopted by two Polish translators Jerzy S. Sito (Krzeczkowski et al., 1974: 123-125) and Stanisław Barańczak (1998: 122-123), who both rendered John Donne’s Elegy XIX, To His Mistress Going to Bed into Polish. Applying the methods of language analysis worked out by cognitive linguistics, we will try to answer the question what differs these strategies and what are the consequences of the choices made by each translator. First, the most important concepts of cognitive linguistics useful in an analysis of the translation process are briefly discussed and then their practical application in a translation analysis is presented. Some concepts of cognitive linguistics useful in an analysis of translation Cognitive linguistics, stressing a holistic nature of language and rejecting a rigid separation of syntax and semantics, may be very helpful in the assessment of the quality of translation and explaining why some translations are better than the others. Out of various concepts of cognitive linguistics that have developed in the last forty years, we will concentrate on those that may be useful in a linguistic analysis of an act of translation. We wish to prove that a success or a failure of a particular translation is related to the linguistic phenomena these concepts refer to. 1. 1 Prototypes in language and cognition. One of the cornerstones of cognitive linguistics is a prototype theory that tries to account for the interaction between language and cognition (Geeraerts, 2006: 145). According to it, speakers, categorizing the world, have in their minds a prototypical member of a given category that stands in its centre while less prototypical members are more peripheral. Thus a term “table” will evoke in the minds of Western speakers a prototypical table with four not three or five legs, rather rectangular than square or round, be made of wood, rather than of stone or metal. As a result, words in language have different salience with regard to their senses, depending on their referents and the more prototypical the referent is, the stronger is the salience of a word (Dirven, Verspoor, de Caluwé, 2004: 30-31). 1. 2 Image schemas Image schemas are most basic mental frameworks organizing our cognition. They are the direct result of our embodiment, as we cannot describe the reality not using such terms as “up”/“down” or “within”/“without” (Johnson, 2003: 20). Among various image schemas underlying various linguistic constructions, especially conceptual metaphors, the most common ones seem to be UP/DOWN schema (when you are happy you are in high spirits, when you are sad you are in low spirits); CONTAINER schema (sometimes you are in trouble because you cannot get out of debt) or CENTRE/PERIPHERY schema (when you regard some issues as central ones and others as marginal). 1. 3 Hierarchical taxonomy Terms in language (especially nouns) that belong to the same conceptual domain form very often a hierarchical structure or taxonomy, with most general of them at the top and most specific ones at the bottom of the hierarchy (Dirven, Verspoor, de Caluwé, 2004: 39-43). For example, within the conceptual domain of „animals”, we can distinguish the following hierarchy: “animal”, “dog”, “Yorkshire terrier”. (The hierarchical structure is at the same time a hypernymy – hyponymy relation). The hierarchical taxonomies may be different in different languages with lacunas (lexical gaps) concerning equivalents of some elements, which is one of the most common problems in translation. Elegy XIX and its translations. 2.1 Undressing a lover. Donne’s poem, regarded by many as one of the best examples of love poetry in English language, is an ironic reinterpretation of Petrarchan poetry and the blazon tradition as well as a challenge to neo-Platonic ideas of love popular in Renaissance (Corns, 1993: 134). In our analysis we will concentrate on its first part, in which Donne undresses his lover in a series of self contained couplets juxtaposing parts of her garments and her body. As Donne stresses physical attractiveness of his lover, a translator’s task is to create, by means of a target language, a mental image of a woman as attractive as the one praised by the poet himself. 2. 2 What image schemas? The clarity of image. In one of the initial couplets of his poem Donne compares his lover’s girdle to the Zodiac belt: Off with that girdle, like heaven’s zone glistering, But a far fairer world encompassing. The lover’s girdle is compared to the Zodiac belt because it shines (like stars do) and as a part of garment it forms a circle enclosing her body in all its beauty. Similarly, the Zodiac belt encompasses the Earth along with the Sun, the Moon and other planets. Donne’s simile presupposes the pre-Copernican vision of the universe with the Sun moving along the twelve Zodiac constellations in its yearly cycle and is based on both CONTAINER and CENTRE/PERIPHERY schemas. The first image schema underlies the idea of enclosing and encompassing while the other directs the reader’s attention to the lover’s body, as the centre, much more important than the girdle (periphery). CENTRE/PERIPHERY schema is even more visible, given the fact that the pre-Copernican model of the universe is geocentric. What image schemas appear in Polish versions of the couplet and how do they affect the quality of translation? Barańczak renders the couplet in the following way: Precz z tym paskiem, co skrzy się jak Zodiaku sfera, (Off with that girdle that shines like the Zodiac’s sphere) A przecie świat piękniejszy w swym kręgu zawiera (Yet it encompasses a more beautiful world). Barańczak’s translation renders Donne’s simile very precisely using the same image schemas that we have identified in the original. The weak point of his version is the conceptualization of the Zodiac not as a belt but as a sphere. On the other hand, although the Zodiac may be conceptualized only as a belt, not as a sphere as it would collide with astronomical observations, a sphere is definitely a model container, ideal to represent a CONTAINER schema. Sito’s translation may appear at first sight to be faithful to the original, yet its closer linguistic analysis reveals different image schemas underlying his version. Zrzuć pasek, Pani, jak noc gwiezdna lśniący (Take off your girdle that shines like the night) Piękniejszy przecie świat zamykający (Although it encloses a more beautiful world). Sito’s translation is a weak echo of the original as the translator ignores the Zodiac belt altogether. As a result, we get a faulty simile in which the girdle is compared to a starry night that “encloses” the world. Such poetic image is hardly acceptable for two reasons. Firstly, “night” is a temporal not a spatial concept. Thus “night” must be understood here as a metaphorical (metonymic?) representation of the starry night sky. Can the sky enclose anything? Rather not, as it is located above the earth not around it and the sky and the Earth constitute two poles of UP/DOWN image schema not used by Donne. Let us notice also that the change of the schema affects the meaning of Polish “świat” as an equivalent of English “world”. While in Barańczak’s translation “świat” means”, like in the original, the Earth, the Moon and the planets, “świat” in Sito’s translation means “the world” in a narrower sense, as the Earth contrasted with the sky. 2. 3 A category without a prototype. Is the lover really a beautiful woman? Donne’s trademark is the easiness with which he creates his conceits, taking a common object, usually ignored or despised by other poets and combining it with a chosen concept to turn both into an impressive metaphor. Thus even a parasite may become a marriage temple and a marriage bed or, like in our poem, a lawn may become a symbol of his lover’s beauty: Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals, As when from flowery meads th’ hill’s shadow steals. “Flowery mead” does not mean here simply a meadow covered with flowers but a leveled lawn with flowers sown into it and not forming regular beds. As such, it was an important element of medieval and Renaissance gardens (MacDougall 1986: 168). In poetry, from antiquity to Romanticism, a flowery mead was very often locus amoenus (“a pleasant place”) that appears in works of many authors including Ovid, Chaucer, Shakespeare and Wordsworth(Aben, De Wit, 1999: 42). To strengthen the metaphor, Donne adds the adjective “beauteous” corresponding with “flowery”. Translating the couplet into Polish is not an easy task as Polish language does not have a term that might be an exact equivalent of a “flowery mead” with its rich literary and cultural connotations. Both translators do not even try to look for it and interpreting “mead” simply as a poetic term for “meadow” render it into Polish as “łąka” (“meadow”). Yet their translations are very different regarding their quality. In Sito’s translation Donne’s lover is compared just to a meadow. Suknia, gdy spada, widok ukazuje (When the gown is taken off, a view you see Jak kiedy z łąki cień się ześlizguje (resembles a meadow no longer in shadow). Sito omits two crucial terms from the original, “beauteous” and “flowery”, which has a disastrous effect on his translation. The reader is informed that a view of the lover with her gown taken off resembles a view of a meadow, probably in the sunlight. Yet ”łąka” (“meadow”) in Polish denotes a category that comprises all possible types of grassy areas, a place for picnic as well as a pasture. Or to put it differently, “łąka” denotes a category without a well established prototype in Polish which means that what to Sito may be a beautiful, flowery, alpine meadow to some of his readers may be a pasture with grazing cattle. Barańczak in his translation seems to be aware of the vagueness of Polish “łąka” and gives equivalents for “beauteous” and “flowery” in his translation: Niech spłyną suknie, spod nich piękno się wynurza (Let the gown float down; the beauty that surfaces) Jak kiedy z kwietnej łąki odpływa cień wzgórza (resembles a flowery meadow no longer in hill’s shadow). By adding “kwietnej” (“flowery”) to “łąka” (“meadow”) Barańczak not only renders the original more faithfully but avoids a potential danger of misinterpretation of “łąka”. An adjective “kwietnej” narrows a scope of interpretation and helps to evoke a mental image similar to that intended by Donne. As a result both Donne and Barańczak tell us that the lover is a beautiful woman. Sito, on the other hand, compares her to a meadow, whatever it may mean. 2. 4 Hierarchical taxonomy. What is the social status of Donne’s lover? Donne, in accordance with blason tradition, devotes a separate distich to his lover’s hair, writing: Off with that wiry coronet and show The hairy diadem which on you doth grow. Like the girdle enclosing the waist, or the garment covering the lover’s body, also the wiry coronet must be taken off so that the beauty of her hair might be seen. The juxtaposition of the lover’s “wiry coronet” and her “hairy diadem” is not only a poetic figure but also reveals us her social status, as a coronet “was the small crown worn by men and women of the nobility” (Stringer, 2000: 702). Although it seems possible to find a Polish equivalent of „coronet”, neither translator does so. Instead Barańczak decides to use a more general term, while Sito uses a term that has very little to do with “coronet”. Barańczak translates the distich in the following way: Zdejmij przybranie głowy, niech bujnym bezładem (Take off your headwear, let your exuberant hair) Ozdobi ją królewski włosów twoich diadem (adorn your head like a royal diadem). Attractiveness of Donne’s original lies in the fact that it is linguistically convincing, as the poet juxtaposes the terms that are on the same level in a hierarchical taxonomy of terms referring to headwear. Barańczak juxtaposes terms from two different levels; “przybranie głowy” (“headwear”) represents the superordinate level and is a hypernym of “diadem” representing the subordinate level. As a result, much of the attractiveness of the original is lost because users of language do not compare hypernyms with their hyponyms as it is logically impossible. Sito uses the terms from the same level in his translation, but it is not without consequences: Odepnij czepek, niech włosy splecione (Unbutton the bonnet, let the threads of your hair) Płyną swobodną kształtując koronę (turn into a crown). Although “czepek” (“bonnet”) and “koronę” (“crown”) represent the same level of a hierarchical taxonomy, the semantic distance between them is much bigger than the distance between a “coronet” and a “diadem”. The distance distorts the original as the social status of Donne’s lover is changed. She is no longer a member of nobility, but somebody of a lower social rank, maybe a cook or a maid. When we adopt the view that our knowledge of language is encyclopedic rather than semantic (Taylor, 1995: 81-96), we must agree that a woman wearing a bonnet will be a part of a conceptual domain of household activities and chores rather than that of sexual intimacy. Thus the image of the original is ruined and Donne’s lover shown to us by Sito is not only unattractive physically but also very distant from a poetic ideal of femininity. 2. 5 Diminutives in Polish. What is the lover’s shoe size? The series of couplets describing various parts of lover’s garments ends with the one urging her to take off her shoes: Now off with those shoes and then safely tread In this love’s hallowed temple, this soft bed. This seemingly unproblematic couplet, when rendered into Polish tells us something more about the lover than what we learn from the original and this additional knowledge is the result of the use of a diminutive. Polish and English differ significantly with regard to the use of diminutives and their role in language (Tabakowska, 1993: 100-102), here however a diminutive is used in its most basic function, to suggest a smaller size of an object, a strategy adopted by Barańczak: Zrzuć ciżemki; już twoja stopa wstąpić może (Take off your little shoes; now your foot can enter Do miłosnej świątyni, w nasze miękkie łoże (the love temple, our soft bed). Sito begins the translation of the couplet in the same way, but he does not use a diminutive: Zrzuć ciżmy, śmiało, po czym stopą bosą (Take off your shoes and barefoot) Wstąp w miękkie łoże, w świątynię miłosną (Enter the soft bed, the love temple). Polish term “ciżemki” (“little shoes”) is a diminutive of “ciżmy” (“shoes”). Both terms are archaic and no longer used in Polish language and their presence in the text, intended by translators are marks of a linguistic patina. Yet both terms suggest also something else, namely the shoe size of Donne’s lover. The term “ciżemki” as a diminutive form of “ciżmy” tells us that she has got petite feet, which strengthens her femininity. The term “ciżmy” although morphologically not marked, sounds to a Polish ear, that likes diminutives, like an augmentative suggesting that Donne’ lover has got big feet. Conclusions We have analyzed the first part of Donne’s Elegy XIX, consisting of a series of images in which he encourages his lover to take off her clothes and at the same time stressing her beauty. Readers of the original do not learn any details concerning her appearance such as eye colour, hair colour, the height, etc. and therefore creating the mental image of hers they have to resort to a prototype of a conceptual domain that may be termed as “a physically attractive woman”. A translator’s task is first of all to help his/her readers to create a similar prototypical image of a beautiful woman. As we have seen, a woman Donne goes to bed with in Barańczak’s version is physically attractive. She is beautiful (“piękno się wynurza”) like a flowery meadow (“kwietnej łąki”) and has got petite feet (“ciżemki”). A woman Donne goes to bed with in Sito’s version is much less attractive. She has got big feet (“ciżmy”), may not be very pretty as it is compared to a meadow (“łąka”) and may be a cook or a maid as she wears a bonnet (“czepek”). The differences in both translations affecting their quality may be explained by linguistic differences concerning such aspects of language as image schemas, hierarchical taxonomy, a prototype or the use of diminutives. Neither English nor Polish readers know exactly with whom Donne went to bed that night, yet while English readers are sure that she must have been a very attractive woman, Polish readers may have differing opinions on what she really looked like depending on the translation they have read. John Donne, Elegy XIX. To His Mistress Going to Bed Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy, Until I labour, I in labour lie. The foe oft-times having the foe in sight, Is tired with standing though they never fight. Off with that girdle, like heaven’s zone glistering, But a far fairer world encompassing. Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear, That th’ eyes of busy fools may be stopped there. Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime Tells me from you, that now ‘tis your bed time. Off with that happy busk, which I envy, That still can be, and still can stand so nigh. Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals, As when from flowery meads th’ hill’s shadow steals. Off with that wiry coronet and show The hairy diadem which on you doth grow; Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread In this love’s hallowed temple, this soft bed. In such white robes heaven’s angels used to be Received by men; thou angel bring’st with thee A heaven like Mahomet’s paradise; and though Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know By this these angels from an evil sprite, Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright. License my roving hands, and let them go Before, behind, between, above, below. O my America, my new found land, My kingdom, safeliest when with one man manned, My mine of precious stones, my empery, How blessed am I in this discovering thee! To enter in these bonds, is to be free; Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be. Full nakedness, all joys are due to thee. As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be, To taste whole joys. Gems, which you women use Are like Atlanta’s balls, cast I men’s views, That when a fool’s eye lighteth on a gem His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them. 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