Tarjei Vesaas, one of Scandinavia's greatest fiction writers, has been less well known as a poet. Now Roger Greenwald, an award-winning translator of Scandinavian poetry, presents forty-six poems drawn from Vesaas's six volumes of poetry. This selection is intended to reveal the distinctive sensibility and voice of Vesaas the poet. The Norwegian texts appear facing the English versions, which won the American-Scandinavian Foundation Translation Prize. The translator's groundbreaking introduction explores why Vesaas's poetry has often resisted critical analysis and how it challenges received notions of modernism. Excerpts from Vesaas's writings about himself and his work supply helpful background and give some sense of the man behind the work. Vesaas emerges as a lyric and meditative poet of uncommon depth, who renders states of being beyond the reach not only of discourse, but of most poetry as well. From "The Boat on Land": Your still boat hasn't got a name. Your still boat hasn't got a port. Your secret boat on land. From "Shadows on the Point" We stand here in your deep night, Night, and wait for something new from beyond the point. The current runs black and silent.
And what we feel through it we don't tell each other.
Rezensionen / Stimmen
Finalist for the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation "Superb poetry ... a poetry of place, specifically the farmland of southwestern Norway in which Vesaas lived. Its central concern is the seamless fabric of the life of a place and its people."--Booklist "Greenwald has given the English-speaking world a sampling of the distinctive voice of a major 20th-century writer who has won many prizes. .. . The unornamented translations deliver a strong sense of the Norwegian."--Choice
Reihe
Sprache
Verlagsort
Zielgruppe
Für höhere Schule und Studium
Für Beruf und Forschung
Produkt-Hinweis
Maße
Höhe: 229 mm
Breite: 152 mm
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-0-691-00896-7 (9780691008967)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Tarjei Vesaas (1897-1970), eldest son of a farming family in Telemark, Norway, is among the giants of twentieth-century Scandinavian literature. He won the Venice Prize in 1952 for a volume of stories and the Nordic Council Prize in 1963 for his novel Is-slottet (The Ice Palace). In addition to over twenty-five volumes of fiction, he published five collections of poetry during his lifetime; a sixth appeared posthumously.
Roger Greenwald is Senior Lecturer and Director of the Writing Centre at Innis College in the University of Toronto. His translation The Silence Afterwards:Selected Poems of Rolf Jacobsen (Princeton) won the F. R. Scott Translation Prize.
Autor*in
Herausgegeben und übersetzt von
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix INTRODUCTION xi FROM THE SOURCES / KJELDENE (1946) Snow and Spruce Forest / Sno og granskog 5 Snow in a Face / Sno i eit andlet 9 March 1945 / Mars 1945 11 Dark Ships Coming / Morke skip innover 13 The Horse / Hesten 15 FROM THE GAME AND THE LIGHTNING / LEIKEN OG LYNET (1947) The Loon Heads North / Lomen gar mot nord 21 The Smell of Spring / Varlukten 23 A Word in the Fall / Eit ord om hausten 25 Late, in the Yard / Seint i tunet 27 Between Blue Shadows / Mellom bla skuggar 29 You and I Completely Still / Du og eg heilt stille 31 Dead Lake / Dod sjo 33 Outside the Wind Whispers / Ute susar vinden 35 Farther and Farther Away (To a Writer) / Lenger og lenger bort (Til ein diktar) 39 The Logger / Koyrekaren 41 The Lightning / Lynet 43 Rain in Hiroshima / Regn i Hiroshima 45 FROM THE WANDERER?S REWARD / LYKKA FOR FERDESMENN (1949) Where the Fire Burned / Der logen brann 49 The Serpent?s Way / Ormens veg over berget 51 Booming under Ice / Dunder under is 53 The Glass Wall / Glasveggen 55 And Then There Was the Dream / Slik var den draumen 57 Endlessly Rowing / Det ror og ror 59 FROM LAND OF HIDDEN FIRES / LOYNDE ELDARS LAND (1953) The Boat on Land / Baten ved land 65 The Footprints / Sporet 67 The Skewed House / Huset pa tvers 69 We Fill the Widest Nights / Vi fyller dei vidaste nettene 73 Shadows on the Point / Skuggane pa neset 75 Heat / Hete 79 FROM BE NEW, DREAM OF OURS / VER NY, VAR DRAUM (1956) The Boat / Baten 89 A Nameless Ring in the Wood / Ein namnlaus ring i veden 91 FROM LIFE AT THE STREAM / LIV VED STRAUMEN (1970) The Small Rodents / Dei sma gnagarane 97 Sun-corner / Sol-kra 99 The Boat and the Fish / Baten og fisken 101 Life at the Stream / Liv ved straumen 103 Through Naked Branches / Gjennom nakne greiner 109 From the Stoop / Fra stogetrammen 111 Journey / Reisa 113 The Bird / Fuglen 115 A Little Disturbance / Ei lita uro 117 The Boats on the Sand / Batane pa sanden 119 The Dark Eye / Det morke auget 121 Shy Word / Sky ord 125 Underworld / I underjorda 127 In Thrall: on The Great Sinking / MARE om Det Store Sog 129 The Mountain That Wept (A Picture Painted by Sigmund Lystrup) / Berget som gret (Eit bilete mala av Sigmund Lystrup) 133 NOTES 135 APPENDIX: A TARJEI VESAAS COLLAGE 137 INDEX TO NORWEGIAN TITLES 145
