Lost In Translation

On this website there recently appeared a remarkably peevishreview by KhushwantSingh of a two-volume work by Mehr Afshan Farooqi called The Oxford India Anthology of Modern Urdu Literature(OUP Delhi,2008). I want to talk about a few of that review's particular complaints, andthen move on to a project actually invited by the review itself: a comparativeexamination of two poems by Iqbal that have been translated in significantlydifferent ways.

At the start of his review, Khushwant Singh makes a greatshow of believing that it's an extraordinary honour to be published by OUP, likebeing "married to a duchess"; he claims to be "green withenvy." But since OUP India has also published several of his own books,these protestations of envy make little sense. (They're obviously some kind of rhetorical device, but what are they designed to achieve?)

He then proceeds to complain that Prof. Farooqi's view ofthe history of Urdu literature is one that he's never heard of. His own view isthat it was "the mixing of Turkish, Farsi and Arabic speaking soldiers inthe armies of Muslim invaders with Braj and Daccani speaking Hindu soldiers inmilitary cantonments that evolved into a new language called Urdu, meaning Camp.It was also known as Rekhtaba [sic]." This recipe-like view (take one cupof Persian, one cup of Turkish, one cup of Braj, pour them into an army camp,and stir) was the classic British colonial prescription, going straight back toFort William and Gilchrist, and is no longer (if it ever was) anything like thescholarly consensus. In Prof. Farooqi's view, Urdu began in fifteenth-centuryGujarat, flourished in the Deccan, and then moved north. Any reader of anotherwell-researched and amply documented OUP work, Early Urdu Literary Cultureand History by Shamsur Rahman Faruqi (OUP 2001), will know that theevidence supports Prof. Farooqi's view.

Khushwant Singh's second major objection is that Prof.Farooqi hasn't included -- in a volume explicitly devoted to "modern"poetry -- Ghalib, Zauq, and Zafar. He declares this omission"mystifying." His reason? "All three were alive in 1850,"the year from which Farooqi takes her departure. Such a criticism is itselfpretty mystifying, and there really doesn't seem much need to discuss it.

The rest of Khushwant Singh's review is devoted mostly tocomplaints that Prof. Farooqi has used unsatisfactory translations (many bySouth Asians, including her own). To chastise her, he endorses the work of anoddly assorted group of westerners: Edwin Arnold, John Brough, EdwardFitzgerald, Victor Kiernan, William Radice, Gordon Roadarmel, Gillian Wright.Why them? "The point I make," he says, "is that one has to beemotionally involved with English to convey the original's essence."

There are at least two problems with this assertion. First,the claim that a good translator has to be a westerner, or at least"emotionally involved with English," gets us nowhere. A translator'spersonal "emotional involvement" with English is both unknowable andirrelevant; and what with so many South Asians living abroad, these days it'seven hard to define "westerner." A translator needs to know Urdu welland English very well, and to know something about English poetry, and to havesome kind of effective word-sense -- conditions that are not ethnic oremotional, but literary and craftsmanlike.

Second, the idea that any translation can "convey theoriginal's essence" is even more unhelpful. Translations always requiresacrifices -- the question always is, what can be sacrificed, and what must bepreserved? Are we willing to accept at least some paraphrase and padding, tohave English meter and rhyme? Are we willing to accept at least someawkwardness, to have close fidelity to the text? Are we willing to acceptradical "transcreation," in order to have (someone's version of)"the poem Iqbal would have written, if he'd been writing in English"?To such questions there can be as many answers as there are translators (andaudiences). The only moral obligation properly borne by a translator is"truth in labeling": translators should tell the reader clearly andaccurately what they're doing.

Finally, with truly enjoyable candour Khushwant Singh wrapsup his critique: "To this litany of negatives I add my personal grievanceat being totally ignored. My translation of Iqbal's 'Shikwa and Jawab-e-Shikwa'(OUP) is now in its 14th reprint." In case we haven't sufficiently takenthe point, he mentions several other works of translation by him that are notrepresented in the current anthology, and concludes, "I have reason to feelaggrieved." I'd like to believe that he's writing with a wonderfullyself-mocking sense of humour, but the whole peevish tone of the review suggeststhat when he says he feels "aggrieved," he means it.

Let's take a look then at what obviously seems to him to bean example of good translation: his own version of Iqbal's famous"Complaint" to God. Here is the first stanza of Iqbal's"Complaint" (1911) in two versions: first in an utterly, clumsilyliteral translation by me, then in Khushwant Singh's translation:

[FWP]:

Why would I incur loss, would I remain forgetful ofprofit?
[Why] would I not think of tomorrow, would I remainabsorbed in the grief of yesterday?
[Why] would I listen to the lament of the nightingale, andremain nothing but a hearer?
Fellow-singer! Am I too some rose, that I would remainsilent?
Ihave my courage-instructed power of speech/poetry
Ihave -- dust be in my mouth! -- a complaint against God.

And this is how Khushwant Singh translates it:

Why must I forever lose, forever forgo profit that ismy due,
Sunk in the gloom of evenings past, no plans for the morrowpursue.
Why must I all attentive be to the nightingale's lament?
Friend, am I as dumb as a flower? Must I remain silent?
Mytheme makes me bold, makes my tongue more eloquent.
Dustbe in my mouth, against Allah I make complaint. (Singh 1981, p.28) [1]

This is a very fair sample of Singh's translation stylethroughout the poem; for one more instance, let's consider the last stanza of"Complaint":

[FWP:]

May hearts be torn by the song of this solitarynightingale
May hearts be awakening through the sound of this very bell
That is, may hearts be alive again, through a new promiseof faithfulness
May hearts again be thirsty for that same ancient wine
Ifthere's a Persian cask, so what? My wine is Hijazi
Ifthe song is Indian, so what? My melody is Hijazi.

This is how Khushwant Singh translates it:

Let the lament of this lonely bulbul pierce thehearts of all,
Arouse the hearts of the sleeping, with this my clarioncall.
Transfused with fresh blood, a new compact of faith we'llsign.
Let our hearts thirst again for a sip of the vintage wine.
Whatif the pitcher be Persian, from Hejaz is the wine I serve.
Whatif the song be Indian, it is Hejazi in its verve. (Singh 1981, p.58)

Compared to the literal one, what have we as readers lostin Khushwant Singh's translation? Among other things, we've lost"fellow-singer" (addressed to the nightingale); we've lost the"courage-instructed" power of speech ("my theme makes me bold" is an invention); we've lost the wish forhearts to become alive again ("transfused with fresh blood" is acomplete invention); we've lost a "promise of faithfulness" ("anew compact of faith we'll sign" is an invented legalism); we've lost the ambiguity of "my wine" (does he drink it, or pourit out for others, or both?) in favor of an imposed one-dimensionality("the wine I serve" is an invention); we've lost the subtlety of theIndian song and the Hijazi melody, in favor of an invented quality of Hijazi"verve."

And compared to the literal translation, what have wegained? We've gained English meter and rhyme (sometimes awkward, sometimesagreeable), and a few nice touches ("clarion call" is not bad, and Ilike "vintage" wine, even though it's not literal). We've also"gained" several new poetic elements invented by the translator andinterwoven with Iqbal's own imagery in such a way that no English-speakingreader could detect the intrusions.

Now let's look at Khushwant Singh's chief example of what he considers to be the anthology's bad translations: a ghazal byIqbal that Prof. Farooqi herself translates, called "Wild Poppy" [Lalah-esahra], published in 1935. He complains that rather than choosing the "bestor the best known" of Iqbal's poems (and it's easy to imagine his "Shikwa"passing before his mind's eye), Prof. Farooqi has, in a "baffling"way, "opted for the obscure and the short." But in fact this is abrilliant ghazal, and I'm surprised that Khushwant Singh finds it an unsuitablechoice. Here is the whole ghazal, first in a flatly literal version by me thateven retains Iqbal’s own punctuation, then in Prof. Farooqi's version:

[FWP:]

Desert Tulip

this azure dome! this world of solitude!
it frightens me, the expanse of this desert!

I'm a traveler who's strayed from the road, you're atraveler who's strayed from the road!
where is your destination, oh desert tulip?

this mountain and foothills are devoid of speakers --otherwise
you are a flame of Sinai, I am a flame of Sinai!

why did you burst into bloom from the branch? why did Ibreak from the branch?
a single feeling of creation; a single relish ofuniqueness!

may God be the protector of the diver of love
in every drop of the ocean is the depth of the ocean!

the eye of the whirlpool weeps in grief for that wave
that rose from the ocean but didn't crash into the shore!

from the heat/fervor of Adam, the life of the world ishot/fervent
the sun too is a spectator, the stars too are spectators!

oh desert wind, may there be vouchsafed to me too
silence and heart-burningness, intoxication andgracefulness!

This is how Mehr Afshan Farooqi translates it:

Wild Poppy

This lacquered dome, this world of loneliness,
the vastness of this arid plain
makes me afraid

A traveller who lost his way
that's me

A traveller who lost his way
that's you

Poppy of the desert
where are you going?

These mountains and these valleys
have no Moses. Otherwise
both I and you
are the fire of Sinai

Why did you blossom forth?
Why did I break away from my roots?

It was nothing but
the urge for self-revelation,
nothing but the delight of peerlessness

God protect him
who dives into the ocean of love,

For every drop
is as deep as the ocean itself

The eye of the whirlpool
weeps for the wave
that rose from the ocean
but did not break against the shore

Man's fevered actions
keep the world alive and warm
suns and stars,
watching in absorption

Wind of wilderness
bestow upon me too
silence, heartache, intoxication,
and grace. (Farooqi, pp. 6-7) [2]

What have we, as readers, lost in Prof. Farooqi'stranslation, as compared to the literal one? (Ignore the tulip/poppy question --both are permissible, and the choice is not in this case poeticallysignificant.) The main problem I see is with the fourth verse, in which theflower's "bursting into bloom" from the branch, and the speaker'sbreaking off from the branch, are in the original entirely parallel (with the twoverbs even rhyming). Thus the second line of the verse invites us to link thefeeling of birth or creativity ("self-revelation" doesn't seem quiteideal) to the flower (to explain its blooming), and the relish of uniqueness tothe speaker (to explain his quest for solitude). These linkages become obscuredby the way the basic two-line verses have been broken up and also pushedtogether. But this is a small problem, and could easily be fixed.

And compared to the literal translation, what have wegained? Some graceful phrasing in individual lines (especially the last few). Anattempt to break the strict two-line verse form and reshape the poem intoirregular stanzas that feel much more natural in modern English poetry. A free,flexible shape to the lines that enables their rhythm to be felt with morespontaneity. And a major gain is what might be called non-intrusiveness: weremain very close to Iqbal's actual words, and we don't have to worry about anyextraneous padding, or about distinguishing the translator's invented imageryfrom Iqbal's own.

About this translation Khushwant Singh complains that"one is left asking, 'What is so great about this poetry that lovers ofUrdu keep raving about?'" He even reiterates the query: "One may wellask where is the poetry? Where is Iqbal's magical music of words?" Theobvious answer, of course, is that Iqbal's own "poetry" is in Urdu,and his "magical music of words" is to be found there alone. Notranslator can achieve in English all the effects that Iqbal so elegantly andsuggestively commanded in Urdu. The only choice is among different ways to makea gallant failure.

Apparently Khushwant Singh thinks that his own thumpingrhythms and rhyme-at-all-costs line endings, his resort to padding the originalwith imagery "transfused with fresh blood" or artificially full of"verve," can best capture Iqbal's poetry. His ideal of English poetryappears to be drawn from an older, more Kiplingesque model than Prof. Farooqi's.This is perhaps one reason he's so petulant about her starker, simpler, unrhymedtranslations. It's a problem that plenty of other readers won't have. Those witha post-Kiplingesque view of English poetry will find Prof. Farooqi'swell-balanced, well-designed anthology to be a truly valuable new resource.

Dr. Frances W.Pritchett is Professor of Modern IndicLanguages, Department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures atColumbia University, New York. She is currently engaged in the mostcomprehensive project ever undertaken on Ghalib (ADesertful of Roses) and Mir's (AGarden of Kashmir) Urdu poetry. She is also the authorof Nets of Awareness and translator of Muhammad Husain Azad's Ab-eHayat.