Ever since Tagore himself translated his poems into prose to form the English Gitanjali, it has been generally assumed that fully rendering the poetic form of his lyrics into English, making a consistent attempt to repeat their rhymes, metre and music, is a Himalayan task. Even translators who are themselves published poets, such as William Radice, have abandoned rhyme in a fairly large proportion of their English versions, adducing supplementary arguments such as that the original rhymes and rhythms of a song's text will not be heard when the song is sung. With the greatest respect for their pioneering efforts on behalf of Tagore, I am not quite convinced. The effect of Tagore's songs does rely partly on the concordance of their phrases, both in the music and in the poetry, and when the two reinforce each other the effect is palpable. There is no getting away from it: the majority of Tagore's poetry uses rhyme and metre, and is written in a heightened, musical diction. It may not help his popularity to say so, but what I have read of Gitanjali in the original reminds me more of Tennyson's In Memoriam, say, than any work of a twentieth-century poet. If few of us read Tennyson today, maybe that is our loss! Among middle-class Bengalis his popularity, like that of Matthew Arnold and other nineteenth-century poets, still rides high. Together with Tagore himself, who read and wrote criticism on them, they form the basis of a community of taste with an ear and values different from our own - something worth respect rather than dismissal.
Another factor militating against poetic translations is the present desire for semantic exactitude, already commented on in this blog. The original meaning must be preserved: a vina remains a vina, even if Tagore himself translated it (out of cultural consideration) as a harp or a lute. If one considers the emotional tone and the poetic rhythm to be more important, however, such anxieties recede into the background. The following translations follow these priorities more than those of the present. They are free with the original imagery, keeping to what I consider poetically important but changing or introducing details elsewhere. (In no. 26, to me it is important that the speaker is a woman - hotobhagini - but the question in the final line, for instance, is entirely my composition: it rhymes and is I hope in keeping with the mood of the poem.) Even if they cannot capture Tagore's mastery, I hope they convey some of his music. Read them less as the work of a poet or scholar and more as you would (if you are a musician) the anonymous, rhymed translations in old Victorian editions of German Lieder:
No. 26 ("She je pashe eshe bosechhilo")
He came beside my bed and sat
But I was sleeping late.
Woman! What tiredness was that
Which seized you, oh unfortunate!
He entered at the still of night,
Lute in hand; and when touched right,
Its soft, deep-sounding melody
My dreaming mind would sate.
I wake, and see the south wind blow
Past the doorway madly rushing,
And still his scent floats in the air,
My senses in the darkness brushing.
Thus does night upon night pass by -
His body ever passing near - oh why
Can I never feel his garland's touch?
Must this be my fate?
No. 72 ("Ke go antarataro she")
O, this inwardness is his -
With what hidden touch he frees
The pain and knowledge of what is.
Into my eyes he puts his spells,
With his music my heart swells,
And his pulsing rhythm tells
Of happiness, sorrow, ecstasies.
In gold and silver, blues and greens
Life's cloth is woven with his sheens;
Some day that veil will part which screens
Him from my heart's entreaties.
The days and years are onward rolled,
Yet secretly my mind's consoled:
In new shapes and guises old
He sends his eternal rain of bliss.
No. 74 ("Aar nai re bela, namlo chhaya")
Evening falls; across the earth its shade
Is cast -
And pitcher in hand to the stream I hurry
At the last.
To watery music the clouds move
In uneasy courses up above
And onto strange paths I must rove
Following echoes past.
Along the lonely road at this late hour
No travellers go;
Restless is the river of desire
When new winds blow.
I cannot say, shall I return or not?
Whom to meet it may still be my lot -
From the farther bank I know not what
Melody drifts low.
No. 84 ("Heri aharaho tomari biroho")
Always your longing I see - its pain unceasingly
Reaches across the spaces it can find;
From hills to flowering wood, from sky to ocean's flood
In every form and place to be outlined.
In star upon star, waiting through the night,
Gazing down unblinking, distant, bright,
In branches bowing before the monsoon's might
Through all your melody of longing wind.
In home after home tonight the unending pain
Of this deep longing new strength will attain
And in new loves and wishes, alas, remain,
Through ecstasy and suffering, still blind.
All my own life's trouble spurning
In new melodies flowing, turning
This longing of yours rises, burning
Through the centre of my mind.
- and the opening poem of the Bengali Gitanjali, "Amar matha noto kore dao":
Bring me, Lord, in the dust to kneel
At thy feet,
Sink all my pride, and make me feel
With tears' relief replete.
For me to pay my pride's expense
Is to myself mere insolence;
If round my soul I'll set a fence,
Then thee I'll never meet.
Let me not seek my name to publish
Through works of my own;
Rather fulfil, oh Lord, thy wish
In my life alone -
I yearn only for thy peace
In my heart; thy greatest grace
Shall stay with me, shadowing my face
And lead me before thy seat.
Another factor militating against poetic translations is the present desire for semantic exactitude, already commented on in this blog. The original meaning must be preserved: a vina remains a vina, even if Tagore himself translated it (out of cultural consideration) as a harp or a lute. If one considers the emotional tone and the poetic rhythm to be more important, however, such anxieties recede into the background. The following translations follow these priorities more than those of the present. They are free with the original imagery, keeping to what I consider poetically important but changing or introducing details elsewhere. (In no. 26, to me it is important that the speaker is a woman - hotobhagini - but the question in the final line, for instance, is entirely my composition: it rhymes and is I hope in keeping with the mood of the poem.) Even if they cannot capture Tagore's mastery, I hope they convey some of his music. Read them less as the work of a poet or scholar and more as you would (if you are a musician) the anonymous, rhymed translations in old Victorian editions of German Lieder:
No. 26 ("She je pashe eshe bosechhilo")
He came beside my bed and sat
But I was sleeping late.
Woman! What tiredness was that
Which seized you, oh unfortunate!
He entered at the still of night,
Lute in hand; and when touched right,
Its soft, deep-sounding melody
My dreaming mind would sate.
I wake, and see the south wind blow
Past the doorway madly rushing,
And still his scent floats in the air,
My senses in the darkness brushing.
Thus does night upon night pass by -
His body ever passing near - oh why
Can I never feel his garland's touch?
Must this be my fate?
No. 72 ("Ke go antarataro she")
O, this inwardness is his -
With what hidden touch he frees
The pain and knowledge of what is.
Into my eyes he puts his spells,
With his music my heart swells,
And his pulsing rhythm tells
Of happiness, sorrow, ecstasies.
In gold and silver, blues and greens
Life's cloth is woven with his sheens;
Some day that veil will part which screens
Him from my heart's entreaties.
The days and years are onward rolled,
Yet secretly my mind's consoled:
In new shapes and guises old
He sends his eternal rain of bliss.
No. 74 ("Aar nai re bela, namlo chhaya")
Evening falls; across the earth its shade
Is cast -
And pitcher in hand to the stream I hurry
At the last.
To watery music the clouds move
In uneasy courses up above
And onto strange paths I must rove
Following echoes past.
Along the lonely road at this late hour
No travellers go;
Restless is the river of desire
When new winds blow.
I cannot say, shall I return or not?
Whom to meet it may still be my lot -
From the farther bank I know not what
Melody drifts low.
No. 84 ("Heri aharaho tomari biroho")
Always your longing I see - its pain unceasingly
Reaches across the spaces it can find;
From hills to flowering wood, from sky to ocean's flood
In every form and place to be outlined.
In star upon star, waiting through the night,
Gazing down unblinking, distant, bright,
In branches bowing before the monsoon's might
Through all your melody of longing wind.
In home after home tonight the unending pain
Of this deep longing new strength will attain
And in new loves and wishes, alas, remain,
Through ecstasy and suffering, still blind.
All my own life's trouble spurning
In new melodies flowing, turning
This longing of yours rises, burning
Through the centre of my mind.
- and the opening poem of the Bengali Gitanjali, "Amar matha noto kore dao":
Bring me, Lord, in the dust to kneel
At thy feet,
Sink all my pride, and make me feel
With tears' relief replete.
For me to pay my pride's expense
Is to myself mere insolence;
If round my soul I'll set a fence,
Then thee I'll never meet.
Let me not seek my name to publish
Through works of my own;
Rather fulfil, oh Lord, thy wish
In my life alone -
I yearn only for thy peace
In my heart; thy greatest grace
Shall stay with me, shadowing my face
And lead me before thy seat.
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