I know of one way. In Umberto Eco's novel "Foucault's Pendulum", the main characters work at an Italian vanity press, and their lines are heavy with allusions to (mostly!) Italian literature. Translators handle this by swapping out the original allusions for allusions to comparable works in the target language - see Eco's essay "Experiences in Translation" for some worked examples. But we're very much into "I wrote a similar poem, but in German" territory there.
That's pretty much always a good thing, so thank you for the heads up. I didn't know about this essay.
I've thought about using equivalent references, and I'm not against it in principle. Rhythmically and formally, I'm trying to use equivalent references all the time. (E.g. in my version of Du Fu's Vision of Springtime (https://tangpoetry.substack.com/p/du-fu-mourns-the-end-of-the-world), I use a sonnet form to convey the connotation that this is great and important poetry.) But there's something about a transplanted allusion that can easily seem false or jarring in a short poem. I think I'm trying to create the impression of direct, mind-to-mind communication with these people from 1,000+ years ago, and the additional artifice of an anachronistic allusion... would create too many words beginning with A.
Meh. I'm going to finish actually reading the book, and see if my thoughts become any clearer. Thanks!
I know of one way. In Umberto Eco's novel "Foucault's Pendulum", the main characters work at an Italian vanity press, and their lines are heavy with allusions to (mostly!) Italian literature. Translators handle this by swapping out the original allusions for allusions to comparable works in the target language - see Eco's essay "Experiences in Translation" for some worked examples. But we're very much into "I wrote a similar poem, but in German" territory there.
...and now I'm spending my evening reading Eco!
That's pretty much always a good thing, so thank you for the heads up. I didn't know about this essay.
I've thought about using equivalent references, and I'm not against it in principle. Rhythmically and formally, I'm trying to use equivalent references all the time. (E.g. in my version of Du Fu's Vision of Springtime (https://tangpoetry.substack.com/p/du-fu-mourns-the-end-of-the-world), I use a sonnet form to convey the connotation that this is great and important poetry.) But there's something about a transplanted allusion that can easily seem false or jarring in a short poem. I think I'm trying to create the impression of direct, mind-to-mind communication with these people from 1,000+ years ago, and the additional artifice of an anachronistic allusion... would create too many words beginning with A.
Meh. I'm going to finish actually reading the book, and see if my thoughts become any clearer. Thanks!