Summer Reads: ‘The Crime of Translation’
“But in a broader sense, crime as transgression takes in a spate of ideas, images, and conceits from Arabic literature.”
Arabic Translation Challenge
‘Avarice and Fury’
spotted lion, tense/
tired of lockdown/
take the cheetah hunting?/
wait and pine/
‘Their Beauty is Absolute’
“’Tis God’s good vines / our world entwines / o’erlapping sunned & / ashen lines / [yet all be wines.]”
‘Heal Me with Disease’
“I’m wrong? Please. / I’m ill? Heal me with disease.”
Arabic Translation Challenge #2: ‘Do Not Scold Me!’
“Cure me rather with the cause of my ill…”
‘Every Father Kills his Son’
“A life of pain / For that, dad, thanks! /No son had I / To say, Life stanks!” – Results from our first challenge.
Weekly Arabic Translation Challenge: The Crime of al-Ma’arri’s Father
هذا جَنَاهُ أبي عليَّ وَمَا جَنَيتُ عَلَى أَحَدِ