Hailed by President Jacques Chirac as “the greatest French poet of the 20th century,” René Char (1907-1988) enjoyed a literary career of over sixty years. He was influenced by the Surrealists, his love of his native Provence, and social activism. He was an active participant in the French Resistance movement, as well as an outspoken critic of nuclear missile silos in France. Known for his economy of style, including his aphorisms and short bursts of prose, Char’s poems are thick with imagery, mysterious, and infused with music.
Nancy Naomi Carlson's work has appeared in a multitude of literary journals, including Agni, Poetry, Prairie Schooner, and The Southern Review. Work is forthcoming in The Georgia Review. Stone Lyre: Poems of René Char, her book of translations, was recently released from Tupelo Press. In addition, she is an award-winning author of one poetry collection and two chapbooks. Awarded a grant from the Maryland Arts Commission, she is an instructor at the Bethesda Writer’s Center, the translation editor for Blue Lyra Review, and an editor for Tupelo Press. She holds two Ph.D. degrees --one in foreign language methodology and one in school counseling.
Summer 2012
Table of Contents - Vol. VIII, No. 2
Poetry Fiction Translations Reviews
René Char
The following three poems come from Stone Lyre: Poems of René Char (Tupelo Press, 2010, bilingual edition), a selection of poems gleaned from all stages of Char’s literary career. These particular poems were first published in 1934 in Le Marteau sans maitre (Hammer Without Master), considered by critics to be Char’s most important pre-World War II collection. Fred Chappell stated that most readers would probably agree that with the publication of Le Marteau sans maître, Char’s “essential poetic” was formed and was “consistently affirmed and applied ever after.”
Three fictional speakers of proven banality greet each other with varied poetic
devices (please, got a light, how many leagues to the closest town, what’s the
time?). In an average locale they engage in chitchat whose echoes will never come
close to our ears. Before you, the metered field of ten hectares. I am its plowman,
its secret blood, its calamitous stone. I leave you nothing to fill your mind.
First appeared in Circumference.
~ Translated from the French by Nancy Naomi Carlson
L’Instituteur revoqué
Trois personnages d’une banalité éprouvée s’abordent à des titres poétiques divers (du feu, je vous prie, quelle heure avez-vous, à combien de lieues la prochaine ville?), dans un paysage indifférent et engagent une conversation dont les échos ne nous parviendront jamais. Devant vous, le champ de dix hectares dont je suis le laboureur, le sang secret et la pierre catastrophique. Je ne vous laisse rien à penser.
You open your eyes to an ocher quarry that cannot be mined. ~ Translated from the French by Nancy Naomi Carlson
You drink in speared underground streams.
You are under the spell of the hanging leaf,
Stirred by the snake’s muted approach.
O my translucent foxglove!
Tu ouvres les yeux...
Tu ouvres les yeux sur la carrière d’ocre inexploitable
Tu bois dans un épieu l’eau souterraine
Tu es pour la feuille hypnotisée dans l’espace
A l’approche de l’invisible serpent
O ma diaphane digitale!
The great wood pyre of leagues First appeared in Crazyhorse.
Under the spiral sky of defeat
It is winter’s rotted skiff
From solid comrades to liquid lovers
Deathbeds beneath the trees
In the vacant depths of the earth
Arches forge a fresh supply of wings
Tilled fields radiate, worship sweat-drenched healers
On the straw of those who believe in fate
Flows the foam of ignited stars
There is no absence that cannot be replaced.
~ Translated from the French by Nancy Naomi Carlson
Chaine
Le grand bûcher des alliances
Sous le spiral ciel d’échec
C’est l’hiver en barque pourrie
Des compagnons solides aux compagnes liquides
Des lits de mort sous les écorces
Dans les profondeurs vacantes de la terre
Les arcs forgent un nouveau nombre d’ailes
Les labours rayonnants adorent les guérisseurs détrempés
Sur la paille des fatalistes
L’écume d’astre coule tout allumée
Il n’y a pas d’absence irremplaçable.
