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The original version I wrote was written in Swedish. I have translated it now to English. I would like to hear opinions!
Quote:Dazzled by the sun light,
waked up by may-month's drizzle,
the spring wind breezed softly.
And then came autumn,
the days went and memories faded.
Close and love ones passed away quickly,
myself cradled to the deathbed.
No farewell tears fell,
my funeral was alone.
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(03-17-2013, 12:31 AM)SonOfAlbania Wrote: The original version I wrote was written in Swedish. I have translated it now to English. I would like to hear opinions!
Quote:Dazzled by the sun light,
waked up by may-month's drizzle, Woken by May's drizzle
the spring wind breezed softly. breeze is a soft wind, you could try and show us this with something else
And then came autumn,
the days went and memories faded.
Close and love ones passed away quickly,
myself cradled to the deathbed.
No farewell tears fell,
my funeral was alone. this sounds wrong but it works on another level
Hi SonOfAlbania
I have put up some small changes and suggestions that you can decide how they fit or not. I enjoyed your poem and I think it is great that you can post in english, please keep going. TOMH
If your undies fer you've been smoking through em, don't peg em out
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I find it very brave of you to translate poetry, but again, why would you want to if it's already good in the original language?
Maybe there's a swedish forum for better critique
I'll be there in a minute.
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There are always conflicts in syntax when translating. Language is a nuanced medium. May I offer a few suggestions? These I offer with all due respect and admiration for a wonderful poem and a courageous decision to translate it.
Line 2 waked up by may-month's drizzle (you are dazzled by sunlight in line one, this is a non-sequitur. But if you wish to leave this, "waked" is incorrect, as is "woken"...use awakened
line 3 the spring wind breezed softly. (I am not accustomed to breeze as a verb, and there are so many alternatives that could be excellent here...breathed, blew, whispered..etc
line 6 Close and love ones passed away quickly, Awkward use of adjectives...I would suggest something like "deeply loved ones"
line 7 myself cradled to the deathbed. "Myself" is reflexive pronoun and cannot be used like this as the subject... you can say "And me cradled to the deathbed"
line 8 No farewell tears fell, good grammar, but if you simply say "no farewell tears" it will have more impact
line 9 my funeral was alone. Frankly, i love this, but strictly speaking, "my funeral was spent alone" or "my funeral was lonely" would be more technically correct.
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I re-edited the poem thanks to the advise given. I hope this version is better. Give yours opinions!
Quote:Dazzled by the sunlight,
woken by May's drizzle,
the spring wind blows softly.
And then came autumn,
the days went by and the memories faded away.
Nearest and dearest passed away quickly,
and me cradled to the deathbed.
No farewell tears,
my funeral was lonely.
Posts: 100
Threads: 26
Joined: Mar 2013
Good edit, your poem is stronger and more precise by far
but one more edit would be perfect...try to eliminate the articles, "the" "and" etc....they are unnecessary and diminish the impact.
Would you consider this kind of edit?
Dazzled by sunlight,
woken by May drizzle, (I HATE woken, but I admit it really is grammatically acceptable...sigh)
spring winds blew softly.
then came autumn,
days went by and memory faded.
Nearest and dearest passed away quickly,
with me, cradled to the deathbed.
No farewell tears,
my funeral was lonely.
Posts: 204
Threads: 57
Joined: Jan 2013
maybe instead of woken he can just substitute it with "dizzied"
Dazzled by sunlight,
dizzied by May drizzle,
so many z's!
makes me giddy with joy
I'll be there in a minute.
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(03-17-2013, 09:20 AM)newsclippings Wrote: I find it very brave of you to translate poetry, but again, why would you want to if it's already good in the original language?
Maybe there's a swedish forum for better critique
Because sometimes you find out you love more than one language ?... And because it's an exciting experience. Although I've never translated my own poems, I'm glad to see someone else chose the bilingual adventure.
