The Sensual Crayon

After last Sunday’s German-English dual lingo reading in the Meeting House, some of us were in the mood for more – translating, that is. Maria Esdovin and several other poets came back to the flat and sank a few Guiness Exports – a good place to start. Maria agreed to give an interview and reading of her own and I switched on my reel-to-reel.

Lucas: Am I right, Maria, in saying that you have been translating your own Perovian these days?
Maria: You are really right.
Lucas: Er.. do you mean that I’m 100 per cent right?
Maria: I mean I have my reservations.
Lucas: You mean I am not really right or I am only rarely right?
Maria: Yes, Yes. You are. (uncontrollable laughter from around the room).
Perovian is very…. Is very hard language to translate, especially as there are so few speakers in this country, apart from the small Perovian community in Kentish Town. Perovian poetry works by resonance and association –
Helen: Yeah,so does all poetry!
Lucas: Look – this is Maria’s interview. O.K.
Maria: No, Helen is quite right. It is just that the resonances and associations are very hard to grasp outside of original Perovian, especially in the dialect of the province I am from.
Helen: O.K. cool .(Sighs all round).
Lucas: So what are you going to read, Maria?
Maria: I’m going to read from my long poem The Road – only short extract.!
Lucas: Is it O.K. if I get this on tape? You know I’m recording this.
Maria: It is really alright.
Lucas: Um… yeh.

N.B. Anyone interested in reading a transcript of Maria’s poem and other extracts please go to:
http://sensualcrayon.blogspot.com

or click on my profile and click on the link for The Sensual Crayon

The Sensual Crayon

After last Sunday’s German-English dual lingo reading in the Meeting House, some of us were in the mood for more – translating, that is. Maria Esdovin and several other poets came back to the flat and sank a few Guiness Exports – a good place to start. Maria agreed to give an interview and reading of her own and I switched on my reel-to-reel.

Lucas: Am I right, Maria, in saying that you have been translating your own Perovian these days?
Maria: You are really right.
Lucas: Er.. do you mean that I’m 100 per cent right?
Maria: I mean I have my reservations.
Lucas: You mean I am not really right or I am only rarely right?
Maria: Yes, Yes. You are. (uncontrollable laughter from around the room).
Perovian is very…. Is very hard language to translate, especially as there are so few speakers in this country, apart from the small Perovian community in Kentish Town. Perovian poetry works by resonance and association –
Helen: Yeah,so does all poetry!
Lucas: Look – this is Maria’s interview. O.K.
Maria: No, Helen is quite right. It is just that the resonances and associations are very hard to grasp outside of original Perovian, especially in the dialect of the province I am from.
Helen: O.K. cool .(Sighs all round).
Lucas: So what are you going to read, Maria?
Maria: I’m going to read from my long poem The Road – only short extract.!
Lucas: Is it O.K. if I get this on tape? You know I’m recording this.
Maria: It is really alright.
Lucas: Um… yeh.

N.B. Anyone interested in reading a transcript of Maria’s poem and other extracts please go to:
http://sensualcrayon.blogspot.com

or click on my profile and click on the link for The Sensual Crayon

Bricks and Mortal

Robert is now back from his adventures in Italy. We have come to an arangement.
He has a very unusual - even for Robert - story and instead of telling it on my blog he has agreed to have one of his own.
He says he thinks the internet has de-poeticised poetry and refuses to type anything except onto his ancient i-book which he then prints out as if it was just a typewriter. Yet, in spite of this high moral stance he asks me to blog his poems when he feels like it. O.K. Rob, I'll do it gladly 'cos I believe in yr talent.
For those who want to follow Rob's meanderings, then, click on my profile and click on the blog called "bricks and mortal."

Bricks and Mortal

Robert is now back from his adventures in Italy. We have come to an arangement.
He has a very unusual - even for Robert - story and instead of telling it on my blog he has agreed to have one of his own.
He says he thinks the internet has de-poeticised poetry and refuses to type anything except onto his ancient i-book which he then prints out as if it was just a typewriter. Yet, in spite of this high moral stance he asks me to blog his poems when he feels like it. O.K. Rob, I'll do it gladly 'cos I believe in yr talent.
For those who want to follow Rob's meanderings, then, click on my profile and click on the blog called "bricks and mortal."

Postcard from Perovia

It seems one of the last things Robert did before he departed Pero Airport for Rome was to send me a postcard. Sent almost a month ago, it has just arrived. It is a large format card with a typical Esdovian landscape, masses of ripening wheat - undulating not flat - disappearing to hilly grey horizon.
On the card Rob boasts of his visit to the controversial poet Noise Astute who is living again in Esdovia, his native province. The remarkable landmark house which he designed for himself has been "borrowed" by the authorities who say that its pear-shaped dome is ideal for the hush hush work that is going on there. Rob's journalist contacts say it is the government-backed Centre for Psychic Research. Noise's pear-shaped dome - entirely aesthetically concerved - is thought to possess remarkable properties for sending and receiving in paranormal experimentation - telepathy to you and me!
Noise is currently apparently housed in a local farmhouse where he enjoys views of his beloved pigs and geese from his two room apartment on the top floor.
According to Rob, Noise is planning to break his nine-year silence this spring. This has been partly triggered by reading the Mezzanine Esportu that Plautus posted to this blog a little while back. As pointed out this is a highly complex form, which takes years of practice to master. Noise was very moved to see it flourish from England and has replied with an Esportu of his own:
Yestremi testremi manu
clostroti whorly epran
Giggs Manchester United!
Acumentec tootie chestrud.

Robert has not bothered to translate and my schoolboy Perovian really isn't subtle enough. Nonetheless I have decided to blog it, as no doubt it is worth archiving.

Postcard from Perovia

It seems one of the last things Robert did before he departed Pero Airport for Rome was to send me a postcard. Sent almost a month ago, it has just arrived. It is a large format card with a typical Esdovian landscape, masses of ripening wheat - undulating not flat - disappearing to hilly grey horizon.
On the card Rob boasts of his visit to the controversial poet Noise Astute who is living again in Esdovia, his native province. The remarkable landmark house which he designed for himself has been "borrowed" by the authorities who say that its pear-shaped dome is ideal for the hush hush work that is going on there. Rob's journalist contacts say it is the government-backed Centre for Psychic Research. Noise's pear-shaped dome - entirely aesthetically concerved - is thought to possess remarkable properties for sending and receiving in paranormal experimentation - telepathy to you and me!
Noise is currently apparently housed in a local farmhouse where he enjoys views of his beloved pigs and geese from his two room apartment on the top floor.
According to Rob, Noise is planning to break his nine-year silence this spring. This has been partly triggered by reading the Mezzanine Esportu that Plautus posted to this blog a little while back. As pointed out this is a highly complex form, which takes years of practice to master. Noise was very moved to see it flourish from England and has replied with an Esportu of his own:
Yestremi testremi manu
clostroti whorly epran
Giggs Manchester United!
Acumentec tootie chestrud.

Robert has not bothered to translate and my schoolboy Perovian really isn't subtle enough. Nonetheless I have decided to blog it, as no doubt it is worth archiving.

More From Latin Rob

At least this time he's had the sense to email me, so I can paste it straight into the blog.
I've edited out the first bit where he berates me for accuately transcribing his spelling mistakes on that napkin (some folks are never satisfied). Suffice to say that he's recalled some more of his day in ancient Rome (from now on, AR).
He was walking through the market in AR, when a messenger ran up to him - suspiciously not out of breath, no dust on his sandles - and thrust this into his hand proclaiming, "Ab amico tuo: ecce haec epistulae" or some such doggerel.
Sounds to me as if the waiter has slipped some grappa into his tamarindo!


Bright Sun In The Square

I wish I could remember more - the whole letter:
some fragments come, no photographic memory.
I recall hanging on each Latin word and phrase
with goatskin vino, hunk of bread and cheese
seated at ease in oleander shade,
it seemed penned by th'exiled Roman bard,
no need translate - my brain was latin-wired.

Can still see my Chaucer notes 'bout Ars Amoris,
which crops up in the Canterbuty tales:
"A lovers handbook by the poet Ovidius,
literary giant of the ancient world."
And I, reading this key letter just yesterday
can now mostly see shadows on a page
of freshly folded parchment, bright sun in the square -
I shoulda done that Dale Carnegie course...
Two things are even odder: as I write these notes
now in Amato with a rum and coke
that messenger just rode by on a Ducati;
second is doubt - the doubt within my mind -
not that I was there reading that mint papyrus
my doubt was whether Ovid was the author
......sorry protocol at the Amato says my time is up with this computer - to be continued.