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  #1  
Unread 01-01-2025, 06:57 PM
Glenn Wright Glenn Wright is offline
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Default Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, “On the Death of That Most Excellent Lady”

On the Death of the Most Excellent Lady
by Sister Juana Inés of the Cross

Let them die with you, Laura, since you died:
the affections which so hopelessly have wanted
you, the eyes from which you deprive the sight
of the lovely light that at one time you granted.

My hapless lyre, which you inspired, let die;
let echoes (with what regret they call to you!)
be heard until these ill-formed marks are dry,
the black tears that my pen in misery drew.

Let that same Death himself be moved to pity,
unable, by his law, to pardon you.
Lamenting his bitter luck, let Love admit he

was eager, as before, to please you, and knew
he needed eyes to have the power to see
your face; now weeping is all that they may do.
————————
Edits:
S2L1: Let my hapless lyre, which you inspired, die; > My hapless lyre, which you inspired, let die;
S3L3: And let Love, with his bitter luck, admit me > Let Love lament his bitter luck and admit he > Lamenting his bitter luck, let Love admit he
S4L1: is eager, as before, for pleasure, to > was eager, as before to please you, and knew
S4L2: have eyes in order to be able to see > he needed eyes to have the power to see


Original Spanish (from Poem Hunter)

A la muerte de la Excelentísima Señora
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

Mueran contigo, Laura, pues moriste,
los afectos que en vano te desean,
los ojos a quien privas de que vean
hermosa luz que a un tiempo concediste.

Muera mi lira infausta en que influiste
ecos, que lamentables te vocean,
y hasta estos rasgos mal formados sean
lágrimas negras de mi pluma triste.

Muévase a compasión la misma muerte
que, precisa, no pudo perdonarte;
y lamente el amor su amarga suerte,

pues si antes, ambicioso de gozarte,
deseó tener ojos para verte,
ya le sirvieran sólo de llorarte.


Crib:
On the Death of the Most Excellent Lady
by Sister Juana Inés of the Cross

Let them die with you, Laura, well, you died,
the affections which in vain desire you,
the eyes, whom you deprive of seeing
the beautiful light that you granted at one time.

Let my unfortunate lyre, in which you inspired echoes, die,
what regrettable things call to you,
even until these badly formed traits/characters may come to be,
black tears from my sad pen.

Let the same death be moved to compassion
who, meticulous, was not able to pardon you;
and let love lament his bitter lot,

well, if before, ambitious to please you,
he desired to have eyes in order to see you,
now they serve him only to weep for you.
————————
Correction:
S4L1: well, if before, ambitious to enjoy himself, > well, if before, ambitious to please you,

Last edited by Glenn Wright; 01-13-2025 at 01:46 PM.
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  #2  
Unread 01-04-2025, 12:05 PM
Clive Watkins Clive Watkins is offline
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Dear Glenn

This seems to have been overlooked for a few days now, which is a shame. Let me offer you some comments, which I hope are helpful, though they are, I am afraid, not positive ones. I should begin by saying that I have no Spanish, and so my remarks are largely confined to your verse as a rhymed, metrical poem in English and do not address it as a reflection of the original. I confess that I am having difficulties here with both metre and rhyme. Since some of your lines seem to be regular IP, I am inclined to take this as the paradigm throughout. (I apologize if I am mistaken.)

My difficulties begin with the very first line, whose pattern of accents strikes me as ambiguous. I had to re-read it repeatedly – without reaching a settled feel for its patterning. Here are the possibilities I think I detect (capitals mark accents): “LEt them die wIth you, LAUra, sInce you dIEd” [five accents]; “Let thEm die wIth you, LAUra, sInce you dIEd” [five accents]; “Let them dIE with you, LAUra, sInce you dIEd” [four accents]; “Let them dIE with you, LAUra, since you dIEd” [three accents].

The run-over from line 2 to line 3 strikes me as clumsy, stranding “you” at the start of the next line. Splitting the verb from its object in this way breaks the natural phrasing, which to my ear goes like this: “the affEctions / which so hOpelessly / have wAnted you”. In this phrasing “you” carries no accent, but your presumed metrical scheme requires line 3 to begin with a definite accented syllable. So, does line 3 go like this: “yOU, the EYes from whIch you deprIve the sIGHt”? The point may perhaps be that it is “you” and no one else whom the “affections” have wanted” though I am not sure I sense this from the Spanish. Nonetheless, the rhythmic and metrical effect is awkward.

Line 4 is also rhythmically ambiguous: “of the lOvely lIGHt that At one tIme you grAnted” [five accents]; “of the lOvely lIGHt that at One tIme you grAnted” [five accents]; “of the lOvely lIGHt that at One time you grAnted” [four accents]. In a stable metrical environment the first of these would be fine as a five-beat line; so, perhaps, might the second; in context, however, the line wobbles and caused me to hesitate about how to read it.

I have trouble with line 6, too. It begins with the same verb as line 1. On one reading of the first line “Let” is accented. Symmetry might suggest that this verb should be accented here, too, but that throws up new problems. Metre and rhythm are once again unstable, for there is more than one way of taking the line. Here are two, the first with an accent on the first word: “LEt my hApless lYre, which yOU inspIred, dIE” [six accents]; “Let my hApless lYre, which yOU inspIred, dIE”[five accents].

The start of line 8 throws up another instance of the problem affecting “Let”. Surely it must be unaccented, the next word, “echoes”, necessarily being accented on the first syllable. The extra syllable here strikes me as fine, though it, too, might create a small stumble at first reading. Is it “let Echoes (wIth what regrEt they cAll to yOU)” or “let Echoes (with whAt regrEt they cAll to yOU)?

Line 9 – “be heard until these ill-formed marks are dry” – is the first metrically unambiguous line so far: a regular iambic pentameter. Line 10 – “the black tears that my pen in misery drew” – also has five clear accents.

Line 11 is spoiled by the awkwardness of rhyming “admit he” with “pity” two lines before. It’s the kind of ingenious rhyming Cole Porter might have employed but is wrong here, a false note. Here “he” belongs with “is” at the start of the next line, where, in many readings, it would in any case perhaps be lightly elided.

Line 12 is faulty, though arguably it has five accents: “is EAger, As befOre, for plEAsure, tO”. The problem is the weight its metrical position throws on that little connective, “to”.

Line 13 is another metrically unstable line. I’ll spare myself the trouble of spelling it out.

Another way of thinking about these closing lines is to consider how their natural phrasing sits within the intended pattern of metrical verse-lines. I hear the phrasing of these lines like this, though I admit other patterns are possible (line-ends marked with a vertical bar, phrasal boundaries marked by relineation):

Let Love lament his bitter luck
and admit he | is eager,
as before,
for pleasure,
to | have eyes in order to be able to see | your face;
now weeping is all that they may do.

These words in this order do not strike me as obviously metrical. If this were a passage of non-metrical verse, it might be relineated (and repunctuated and rephrased more crisply: isn’t “in order to be able to” a bit clunky, a piece of metrical padding?) perhaps like this:

Let Love lament his bitter luck,
admit he is eager
as before
for pleasure:
to have eyes to see your face
now that weeping is all they can do.

Finally, despite my lack of Spanish, in comparing the original and your crib, I do wonder if the crib is inaccurate in places, though I have nothing to say about how far it might have influenced your version. (I come at this from my familiarity with Italian and French.) I know there are contributors here who have good Spanish. Perhaps they might offer you some useful thoughts.

I am sorry if this seems harsh, Glenn. It is intended to be helpful inasmuch it may offer a few things to ponder even if, on reflection, you disagree with them. Good luck with whatever further work you do on this!

Clive
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  #3  
Unread 01-04-2025, 05:58 PM
Glenn Wright Glenn Wright is offline
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Hi, Clive

Thank you for taking the time and investing the effort to analyze my translation in such detail. I appreciate the care you took in making your observations and suggestions clear, and they are very helpful to me. I am still something of an apprentice at the craft. I did intend it to be in IP.

My first line begins with a headless iamb (which, I’m told, is not approved practice) and an anapest for its third foot:
Let / them die/ with you, Lau/ ra, since/ you died:///
The N is wishing that his or her affections and vision, which had hoped to love and see Laura, may now die with her. Your scansion of L3 was as I intended.

L4 was anapest, iamb, double iamb, amphibrach:
of the love/ly light/that at / one time/ you grant ed.////

L5, as you point out, is a mess. I made a change that, I think, improves it somewhat:
My hap/less lyre, / which you/ in spired, / let die;///

I rather liked the rhyme “pity” and “admit he,” but am not pleased with the rhyme of the particle “to” with “you” and “do.” Nor do I like all the “to’s” in the infinitives in the last three lines:
. . .to/ have eyes in order to be able to see
That will require a major overhaul, I fear, to fix.

I will continue working on it, and thank you again for your contributions.

Glenn

Last edited by Glenn Wright; 01-04-2025 at 07:09 PM.
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  #4  
Unread 01-04-2025, 06:13 PM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is offline
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It's fine to start with a headless iamb, Glenn, but the problem here is that the reader doesn't know that's what you intended and is just as likely to think you're starting with an anapest.

Your original poems generally don't have this many metrical issues. I think you let the meter go by the wayside because you didn't give yourself enough liberty to change up what you saw as the "crib" or literal translation on a phrase by phrase basis. I think if you make the meter, flow, tone, and syntax your priority, and change what you have to change to give us a sense of the music of the original, the translation would be more successful.

I took a stab at translating the first quatrain myself, just to see if I could do it, and found it nearly impossible to get right. I think this is a hard one to render.
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  #5  
Unread 01-04-2025, 08:26 PM
Glenn Wright Glenn Wright is offline
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Hi, Roger

Yes, this poem looked much easier than it turned out to be. The subjunctives and infinitives (Four in the last three lines!) are tricky to render into English without piling up a lot of repeated modal/auxiliary verbs (“let, “ “may,” “should”) and the particle, “to.” I made a few changes which I hope make he rhythm smoother and clarify what belongs to whom. Good advice to keep the music a priority. Thanks for your guidance.

Glenn

Last edited by Glenn Wright; 01-04-2025 at 08:35 PM.
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