
│ WELCOME│ INTRODUCTION │ HOW TO JOIN │RULES │

previous seasons
-------spring --------------summer ------------ autumn ----------- winter -----

│2006 2007 2008 2009 │ 2006 2007 2008 │ 2006 2007 2008 │ 2006 2007 2008 │

succeeding season
│ Autumn 2009 @ our new website The Four Seasons of Haiku │

Saturday, August 22, 2009

like tinnitus
in sunny afternoon garden
grasshoppers

* * *

kuin tinnitus
puutarhan iltapäivässä
heinäsirkat
at
Author Archive

5 comments:

Area 17 said...

Love it!

I do wonder if in the English-language version you might consider shifting the lines and words around a bit?

You can still keep the simile, but without needing "like".

e.g.

from

like tinnitus
in sunny afternoon garden
grasshoppers

to

tinnitus
a sunny afternoon garden
of grasshoppers

all my best,
Alan
With Words Online Haiku Competition Results
.

August 22, 2009
Möme said...

Thanks, Alan! A good suggestion, but I'm determined to keep 'like' because the English version is a translation of the Finnish, which requires the equivalent 'kuin' for rhytm and overall feel. :-)

August 23, 2009
Area 17 said...

Hi Möme! ;-)

You're the boss. ;-)

But this is one of the common issues with translations, and that is they can never be a direct translation only a version.

The 'like' is there, it's inferred, but it's in the negative space i.e. it's text that doesn't show up in the white space but is there nonetheless. ;-)

I don't think 'like' adds to the musicality of the haiku sufficiently enough to warrent its direct appearance.

You are possibly correct about the Finnish, as I only knew a bit of Finno-Ugrian while studying Byzantine Empire history 15 years ago. ;-)

all my best,
Alan
With Words Online Haiku Competition Results
.

August 23, 2009
Möme said...

Alan, how fascinating that you should have a history with Finno-Ugrian languages! :-)

I'm fully aware that a translation is always just one reading of a given text (I did, in fact, do my thesis on this), equal with any other. And since my translation is my reading, and the Finnish takes precedence for me in this poem, the 'like' will stay - although you are right in that it does not add to the English version and that the use of negative space would probably be better in the English version. Stubborn as I am, I have this Finno-Ugrian viewpoint, which the English now must follow! ;-)

August 25, 2009
Area 17 said...

No worries. ;-)

But can you consider something about that second line?

in sunny afternoon garden

It doesn't flow naturally yet.

Something like:

(like) tinnitus
a sunny afternoon garden
of grasshoppers

or

(like) tinnitus
in a sunny afternoon garden
of grasshoppers

?

all my best,
Alan
With Words Online Haiku Competition Results
.

August 25, 2009

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)