英译习作：罗伯特·潘·沃伦《变迁世界里的鸟类》

Ornithology in a World of Flux.
《变迁世界里的鸟类》

By Robert Penn Warren
作者：罗伯特·潘·沃伦

Translated by Tweeting Green （忒绿）


It was only a bird call at evening, unidentified,
那只是傍晚的一声鸣叫，听不出是来自什么鸟，

As I came from the spring with water, across the rocky back-pasture;
我正汲泉水回来，穿过满是石头的后院草甸；

But so still I stood sky above was not stiller than sky in pail-water.
我却是稳稳地伫立着以至于水桶里的天与头上的天一样平静。


Years pass, all places and faces fade, some people have died,
多年后，那些地方和面孔都从记忆中退去，一些人已身亡魂消，

And I stand in a far land, the evening still, and am at last sure
而我站立在一个遥远的地方，夜色沉静，终于洞见

That I miss more that stillness at bird-call than some things that were to fail later.
比起那些慢慢消散的事物，那份鸟鸣时的宁静多么地让我魂牵梦萦。

 

[忒忒绿]

变迁世界里鸟类的作用

[忒忒绿]

诗人当时应该怀着一种强烈的情感。一前一后，都是在傍晚，都是站立着，一个是鸟鸣、泉水、家乡，一个却是离别家乡岁月多、近来人事半消磨…诗人以那一声远去的鸟鸣，倾诉内心的不可名状的nostalgia。

[忒忒绿]

Lingyang,I appreciate your elaborate explanations. They added so much to understanding of the poem. It is really a discovery about the poem that you pointed out “eureka and wake-up call”, which hit the mark and was dead on the target, birds and their therapeutical functions to human being. Your comment means and is worth a lot. My heartfelt thanks to you. I honor you sincerely. Tweeting Green

[忒忒绿]

A man’s house is his castle and you are asking a guest of yours to re-arrange your home furniture. I would think twice before I chime in, and I did think twice and I am chiming in.Personally, I care less about the title than the content. The title may be the head(line), but the content is where we are supposed to find the poet's heart, and his heart matters most. Let the head take care of science. The heart always owns poetry and therefore also the poet's voice.The poet's voice that I heard was all about this: Eureka!Suddenly, the poet stumbled upon something when he caught a bird call, which let his imagination fly, no pun intended. There he was, realizing that all the flux he bothered so much about was wholly and solely his own making. The bird call was a wake-up call, period. No wonder he fixed on the sky which came across as what stillness looked like and felt like. Eureka! It's the Archimedes moment. It's a science moment, of course.Here we are. Thanks to the poet, we found a moment of science and poetry coming together, which was a union (or reunion) of heart and mind (head). Still wonder why ornithology is part and parcel of the title?My "comment" is worth two cents, I know. (From e-pal Lingyang Jiang)

[忒忒绿]

Robert Penn Warren (April 24, 1905 – September 15, 1989) was an American poet, novelist, and literary critic and was one of the founders of New Criticism. He was also a charter member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He founded the literary journal The Southern Review with Cleanth Brooks in 1935. He received the 1947 Pulitzer Prize for the Novel for All the King's Men (1946) and the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1958 and 1979. He is the only person to have won Pulitzer Prizes for both fiction and poetry.这首诗作于他五十多岁的时候。

[忒忒绿]

有贺知章 回乡偶书 其二 的味道：离别家乡岁月多，近来人事半消磨。惟有门前镜湖水，春风不改旧时波。