The Presence of East Asia in Some Modern Portuguese Poets
2001; Modern Humanities Research Association; Volume: 17; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/port.2001.0004
ISSN2222-4270
Autores Tópico(s)Galician and Iberian cultural studies
ResumoThePresence ofEastAsiainSomeModern Portuguese Poets STEPHEN RECKERT In a fineobituaryin The Independent,ProfessorRussell-Woodspoke of 'a typical Boxerletter'beginning 'I am justback fromIndia and leave forAmericanextweek', and goingon to giveadviceabout research.My wifeand I havebothhad suchletters: in 1958,stillan undergraduate, Didia had justgotherfirst translating job; and as the book,FidalgosintheFarEast,had passagestranslated fromPortuguese, shewroteto ask fortheoriginaltexts,to avoid a counterproductive attemptat retro-translation. The unknownstudentwas astonishedto get back fromthe famous scholar an immediatetwelve-page answer.This was apparently standardpractice:in mycase, I had justtakenmyPhD in1950and was castingaboutfora research subjectcombining Iberianstudieswithmywartime experience as a Japanesetranslator at Bletchley Park. I too gotthestatutory twelve-page handwritten letter, withapologies foritsbrevity: thewriter was off, nottoAmericaina weekbuttoMalaysia inhalfan hour.That was our first contact,buthe had beena legendto me since1943,whenfrequent rumours reachedBletchley: he had escaped (orbeenreleased);no,he had beenexecuted;no,he had justbeen transferred to anotherPOW camp. Duringhispre-warsecondment to theJapanesearmyas a languageofficer it was said thatat jollydrinking partieshis Japanesecolleagues would sing 'Japaneseplanes will bomb Hong Kong and make Boxercry!'('Bókusa o ákase! Bókusa o ákase!'). My sourceofsuchearlyinformation was hisand myfriend thesinologist Arthur Cooper,aboutwhomCharles'swifeEmily Hahn wroteamusingly inherbook China toMe. Itwas a greatsatisfaction to methat whenI succeededhimintheCamoens chairat King'sCollegeLondon he wentfirst to theuniversity ofmynativestateofIndianaandthentomyalma mater ,Yale,as Master of myown old collegethere.And it was a greatreliefthat,not beinga historian, I wasn't expectedto live up to the impossiblejob of steppinginto his shoes. What followsis insteada sampleofwhatI had inmindwhenI first solicitedhisadvicemore thanfifty yearsago. * * * Of thethreecanonicalPortuguese poetssinceCamões,CesárioVerdeis above all thepoetofthevisual,FernandoPessoathepoetofideas,and CamiloPessanha thepoetofverbalmusic. Assuchheisbynature themost difficult totranslate (andPessoa,bythesametoken, theleastdifficult). For PaulValéry, whatdefined a poemwasan'hésitation prolongée entre leson etlesens';andofthethree, itisPessanha whohesitates thelongest. Comparedtothemultinational Pessoaindustry, criticism ofPessanha's exiguousœuvre,at leastin Portugal(though notin Italyor Brazil)has remained, perhapsfortunately, morelike a cottageindustry. It is not necessarily totheadvantage ofthegreattodeprive them oftheir context, implying thattheyemerged fromnowhere;and Pessoa's successin the exportmarket carries theriskthat,as happenedwithLorca- deified at theexpenseofprecursors and contemporaries ofthestature ofAntonio EAST ASIA IN SOME MODERN PORTUGUESE POETS 2OI MachadoorJorge Guillen - theworldwillbe persuaded thatinthepast hundred yearsPortugal has had onlyone poet.It is nonetoo soon fora reminder that'vixerunt fortes anteAgamemnona'; andifthefirst ofthem intime(andthesubtlest poetofthePortuguese language inthenineteenth century) is Cesário Verde,the second is Pessanha.Incomparably less prolific (likeVerde)thanPessoa,heisnotinferior tohiminhiscapacity to evoke,withothermeans,themystery ofexistence. Lessrichinideas,less various intheexploitation ofthesemantic potential oflanguage, heismore ingenious inhismastery ofsyntax andofphonological micro-signifiers.1 Pessanha isalsothefirst majorpoetsinceCamões(whomayormaynot havevisited Macao, and whosealmagentil'Dinamene'mayor maynot havebeenChinese)2 tohavehadintimate contact withtheEast:a contact whichin Pessanha'scase, despite(or perhapsbecauseof) his constant homesickness, involved theacquisition ofthosenotuncommon appurtenancesof lifein Macao, a Chineseconcubineand an opiumhabit.The poems that most obviouslyevoke that contact- 'Viola chinesa', 'Violoncelo', andtheVerlainian-Debussyan rondel'AoLongeos Barcosde Flores'(a euphemism forthefloating brothels ofthePearlRiver)- areall ostensibly concerned withmusic, especially withmonotonous andrepetitive melodieshinting at an inexplicable, inexpressible unhappiness for which'Na orgia,ao longe[...], | Só, incessante, umsomde flauta chora [...]. I Quem sabe a dor que sem razão deplora?'.3The rondelform, together withnofewer thanforty nasalsoundsinthirteen decasyllables, is remarkably effective inevoking theplaintive minor-key notesoftheflute as they windinlanguid serpentines through thelength ofthepoem. Boatsandriver bothreappear in'Violoncelo',inwhichthedisquieting hallucinatory effect ofan opiumdreamis createdbysynaesthesia arising from theambiguity ofthewordsarcada,arco,and ponte,whichat first meanthediscordant soundofthebow beingdrawnacrossthestrings of thecello,thebow itself, and thebridgesupporting thestrings, butthen modulateinto imagesof sinisterruinedarcades,archesand bridges 1Due inpartto hisknowledgeofChinese,accordingto theconjecture ofEstherde Lemos inA Clepsidrade Camilo Pessanha(Oporto:TavaresMartins,1956),pp. 71 and 89. Pessanhahimself laysno claimto morethana modestcommandofthelanguage,givingfullcredittohisSinologist friend JoséVicenteJorgeforcollaborationintranslating theMing'elegies'transcribed below. In viewofthecommonpractice, inthetranslation ofexoticlanguages,ofcollaborationbetweenthe poet and a nativespeaker,thisdoes not exclude the hypothesis - even in a pure dilettante endowedwithPessanha'sacutelinguistic sensibility - ofa possible'osmotic'influence. The nameDi Na-Men would be at leastphonetically possibleinstandardChinese,butnotin Cantonese,thevernacular ofMacao. Camilo Pessanha, 'Ao Longe os Barcos de Flores', in Clepsidra e Outros Poemas, ed. by Barbara Spaggiari(Oporto: Lello, 1997), p. 130. Spaggiari'scriticaleditionis of a rigourand thoroughness withfewequals incontemporary studiesofPortuguese literature. 2O2 STEPHEN RECKERT spanning a river ofweeping, withdisintegrating boatspassing through and under them:4 Chorai arcadas Trémulos astros. . . Do violoncelo! Soidõeslacustres. . . Convulsionadas, - Lemes e mastros. . . Pontes aladas E osalabastros. . . De pesadelo. . . Dos balaústres! De queesvoaçam, Urnas quebradas! Brancos, osarcos.. . Blocosdegelo.. . Porbaixopassam, - Chorai arcadas, Sedespeda...
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