post-colonial_translation

170
Vanamala Viswanatha and Sherry Simon
All of these strategies are deployed in the English Geethagalu as
well. Of the sixty-three poems published in that collection, three
were original compositions and the rest translations of English
Romantic and Victorian poets, the largest numbers being by Shelley
(nine), Wordsworth (five), Burns (seven), Tennyson (three), Byron
(two). Many of the poems were love poems; others dealt with
patriotism, nature and philosophical issues. Aside from the patriotic
poems, which are translated completely literally (place-names, titles,
etc. simply transcribed into Kannada), the other poems all show some
kind of adaptation. The naturalization is of several kinds: proper
names are changed to Kannada names (‘Rose Aylmer’ becomes
‘Paduma’; ‘Bonnie Leslie’ becomes ‘Sundari Kamale’); natural
phenomena are also adapted (‘summer’ becomes ‘vasantha’,
meaning spring; ‘greenwood tree’ becomes ‘adavimara’, ‘tree in the
woods’). The most important changes, however, have to do with
the introduction of folk expressions and traditional ballad forms,
as well as rhythms of spoken Kannada which had not previously
been considered part of the high poetic tradition. One of the most
interesting changes occurs in the poem ‘The Bridge of Sighs’, where
Christianity is equated with the ideals of the Aryan tradition with
which the Kannada reader is familiar:
Alas for the rarity
Of Christian charity
Under the sun
(original)
O, where is it hiding
The kindness of Aryan Dharma
The compassion of the Aryan people
Only the burning one knows!
(back-translation of BMS’s version)
My Love is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June
(original)
The girl I love is the red in the lotus
The radiant red in the newly blossomed lotus
(back-translation of BMS’s version)