Quality and quantity in poetry; Tomas Transtr�mer
October 12, 2011
Among all the stuff (and nonsense, some of it) written about Tomas Transtr�mer�s Nobel Prize win was a reference to his fairly modest output. New Collected Poems translated by Robin Fulton (1997) contains around 150 pages of poetry. But that�s over a lifetime. The index shows that the poems appeared in a dozen or so collections, each containing 10-20 mostly short poems. And we�re told that these were all the poems Transtr�mer had published in book form by then, when he was nearly 70.
That�s pamphlet size, according to British norms anyway� One small collection every few years for TT�s Swedish-speaking followers. Never any risk of a disloyal moment of dismay at a new 70-page book. I�m not getting at anyone here - just to stay with Nobel Prize winners, Walcott, Heaney and Szymborska have all been more prolific, and are all wonderful. But scarcity gives an edge of hunger� Marie Howe, Jo Shapcott and John Glenday are all examples.
A separate but related point is that I find poetry most rewarding when I�m reading it in small amounts. What�s the ideal length of a poetry book? Assuming that it contains short poems, I�d say 15-25 pages. Or maybe 30. So, a pamphlet rather than what�s known as a full collection. The reader needs enough to be able to make connections - of tone, style and content. It�s also good to be able to get a little bit lost, not to know how much one hasn�t yet read, though I suppose that depends on how one reads (I hardly ever start at the front and work through). But then once the whole pamphlet�s been read one can spend time on each page, reading poems in different combinations. And a small book doesn�t weigh heavily on pocket or handbag, either physically or financially.
Sometimes, even shorter collections can work, for example Elizabeth Burns� pamphlet the shortest days which won the Michael Marks pamphlet prize a couple of years ago: 11 poems, in two short sequences of elegies. The unity of theme makes this work; the plainness and purity of the poems makes them stand out.
Back to Transtr�mer. There has been some small-island and trans-Atlantic harrumphing about his Nobel victory, along the lines of �I�ve no idea who he is / have never bothered to read him, so why did he win it?�, and �He�s a Swede, so it�s all a set-up�. These commentators must spend little time thinking or talking about contemporary poetry, let alone reading it, otherwise they�d have a sense of how much he�s revered. English speakers are well-catered for. There�s the Bloodaxe New Collected (see above) and Robin Robertson�s translations of around 15 poems (with parallel Swedish text - well done Enitharmon!) in The Deleted World. There are also two American Selecteds, one edited by Robert Hass and the other, The Half-Finished Heaven, translated by Robert Bly.
Bly talks here about translating TT. �He's so unbelievably fast! He's like some runner, you know, he enters the forest and suddenly he's way gone, he's ahead of you, I don't know where he is.�
I�ve just been looking at the translations by the two Robins (don�t have the Roberts). What a luxury to have two translations to compare, plus the Swedish which can be half-followed, in step with the translation, at least if one has German. Plus the memory of Transtr�mer�s appearance, with piano, at the South Bank a couple of years ago. He has been described as a buzzard poet, because he sees tiny details from a great height. This may make him easier to translate. I suspect that Fulton has reproduced the original as exactly as he could, and Robertson has gone for his own best poem. In some places I prefer one, in others the other.
Here is the first verse plus a later pair of lines from �A Winter Night�: Transtr�mer, then Fulton (the earlier translator), then Robertson.
Stormen s�tter sin mun till huset
och bl�ser f�r att f� ton.
Jag sover oroligt, v�nder mig, l�ser
blundande stormens text.
�
Och huset k�nner sin stj�rnbild av spikar
som h�ller v�ggarna samman.
The storm puts its mouth to the house
and blows to produce a note.
I sleep uneasily, turn, with shut eyes
read the storm�s text.
�
And the house feels its own constellation of nails
holding the walls together.
The storm puts its mouth to the house
and blows to get a tone.
I toss and turn, my closed eyes
reading the storm�s text.
�
The house feels its own constellation of nails
holding the walls together.
What wonderful images. Has Robertson, a non-Swedish speaker, reproduced Fulton�s lines where he thinks they are the best solution, or did he arrive at the same wording by chance, the original being precise enough to allow for little else? I�ve just found that the TLS has reproduced a debate on its letters page from 2007, after publication of The Deleted World. Fulton was not happy either with the similarities, or with Robertson�s lack of Swedish and making of �arbitrary changes�; others defended Robertson, who apparently did not comment. Imitation (if that�s what it was; none was acknowledged in the book) would be the sincerest form of flattery.
To end, here�s a Transtr�mer quote that was reproduced in one of the Guardian�s pieces over the last week. A manifesto in two sentences.
The language marches in step with the executioners.
Therefore we must get a new language.
Therefore we must get a new language.
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