Robert Gernhardt, who died of cancer on Friday at the age of 68, wrote ‘light’ or ‘nonsense’ and also more serious poetry. I have sometimes tried, not very successfully, to translate some into English. I think it could be translated, but it would take a lot of labour to achieve the lightness, and some of the wordplay would have to be substituted by other wordplay. But from the Süddeutsche obituary I discover that he had a translator, Ursula Runde, and not only that, but fifteen poems ‘were translated’ at Warwick:

bq. Seine letzte Dienstreise unternahm er Anfang Mai nach Warwick in Großbritannien, um eine Woche lang an der dortigen Universität zu lehren. Als er heimkam, erzählte er stolz, es sei dort gelungen, fünfzehn seiner Gedichte ins Englische zu übersetzen, und die Studenten hätten heftig lachen müssen – man stelle sich vor: Briten, deutsche Verse, freudiges Lachen.

Well, I don’t see why he should not be well received in Britain, apart from the translation problem.
Warwick University has a page on Gernhardt.

He went to Warwick on its German Writer in Residence programme, which has entered the work of Kunert (Englisches Tagebuch), Rühmkorf and Martin Walser. They’ve also had Herta Müller there, among others.

I’m sure the Warwick programme is a bit ahead of its time in its selection of writers. Although Gernhardt’s books have had very good reviews, and his reputation has been growing, I am not sure if he’s regarded as an ‘important’ poet, or rather, if his lighter poems are given the credit they deserve.

At Warwick, and at the Poetry site, there is in fact one poem by Gernhardt published together with a translation. The poem is about death. I imagine that since Gernhardt knew he was dying, he deliberately authorized this one poem to appear. In Poetry vol. 173, in October 1998, 4 poems were published, but only this one is online.

I have tried this poem myself and post it here. I am not quite satisfied with my version. I like Ursula Runde’s (I love ‘the scythe is for grim reaping’), but the tone is not quite what I associate with the German. Of course, I haven’t got the rights to translate the poem, but I’ll put my version in the extended entry for comparison.

Oh

I will keep my pleasant manners
Even at my final breath
When I hear that doorbell ringing
I’ll call out: Do come in, Death! Continue reading →

Wer einen im Juni veröffentlichten Blog-Beitrag in irgendeine oder aus irgendeiner Sprache übersetzen will, kann dies tun, im eigenen Blog veröffentlichen und Chris davon in Kenntnis setzen (sie kann auch sehr gut deutsch!). Details auf Englisch und Französisch hier.

Chris reminds me of Blog Translation Carnival, which I mentioned in February but have shamefully not been following since. Post a translation of anyone’s blog entry in any direction on your own blog and notify Chris. I’m not sure what happens then.

Apparently this carnival is hosted by a different weblog each month. I have now discovered that you have to look on the blog in question on the given day (what day is that, Chris?). So the first one, on February 28, is here at Altalk Blog. The second is at Em Duas Línguas. The Bitter Scroll had the April one, and sauvage noble the one for May.

A hint is that the Carnival takes place at the end of a month, so you can look for May in June, and today’s invitation is to participate in the June carnival.

Apparently the German TV station ARD broadcast an interview with an ‘uncle’ of Wayne Rooney’s. To quote the Independent:

bq. Mr Rooney describes himself as a freelance author and interpreter. He says he moved from Manchester to Germany in 1973, apparently completing a PhD at the University of Bremen, after learning German by reading the works of Heinrich Heine and Gotthold Lessing and the German football magazine Kicker.

German report in Spiegel Online.

It seemed odd that the man has the surname Rooney but claims to be a brother of Wayne’s mother. Perhaps the complexity of German names law confused the reporter.

bq. “He is a fantastic footballer. I always told him that he could be one of the greats if he could keep injury-free.” Asked how he reacted to news of Wayne Rooney’s broken metatarsal, he said: “I thought, it’s happened again. Oh shit!”

I wonder what he’s saying now. Nailbiting times at Wheeler’s Pub in Erlangen:

And recovering outside with fish and chips after the game:

There’s a thread in the non-English sections of ProZ, in non-English, about translators’ weblogs (Blogs van vertalers). This has some links.

Jonathan Faydi has started Batavisme, which is French and Dutch.

Wouter van den Berg has Over vertalen en wat de vertaler verder hoog zit.

Anjo Sterringa has lost in translation. He is in Spain, with dogs, a cat, and donkeys, and translates between Spanish and Dutch and English and Dutch.

Bartvb (English) is by Bart B. Van Bockstaele, who is Flemish and lives in Toronto. So is Wondere Wereld (Dutch). Bart also writes on De Standaard Online.

Saskia Steur writes Wording.

Fürth once had three rulers: the Domprobst of Bamberg, the Markgraf of Ansbach (Ansbach is not exactly a march, but there is some connection with Brandenburg) and the Nuremberg city council. That is a simplified account.
Wikipedia deutsch.
Wikipedia English

Bamberg seems to have divided loyalties, so has Nuremberg, and Ansbach has abandoned Germany completely:

The Talking Tombstone speaks to passers-by. I feel it would be cheaper to get a number of those toy parrots with the voice mechanism and sit them on top of the stone. Of course, they might say the wrong thing.

Gizmodo (German / Deutsch, which has further links) suggests using it for insults:

bq. Noch in der Grube kann man mit diesem sprechenden Grabstein seine Nachwelt beleidigen, Verwandtschaftsstreitigkeiten bis zum Ehrenmord schüren und generell das letzte Wort behalten.

I don’t think one could get away with that in Germany, although it might be hard to pin down a defendant.