Earl Livings tells a very personal tale of self discovery and explains the idea of transcreating
When I was a child, I discovered my Welsh heritage. My father’s mother was born and
raised in Shire Newton. One side of her family was Welsh through and through, while
the other side had come to Wales from Scotland two generations before. When she was
seven years old, her family moved to Australia. Twelve years later, she married a man
who had come to Australia from Hertfordshire with his family.
Even though my mother was Belgian and my father had English roots, I identified with
my Welsh ones. I don’t know why. It was something sensed rather than intellectually
considered. When I told my father about this feeling, he announced I couldn’t be Welsh
because I couldn’t roll my r’s. I was too young to question this.
Over the years, but especially when I began to write fiction and poetry, all things Celtic
and Celtic-inspired continued to call to me. Mythology and folklore. Merlin and Arthur.
Writers and poets like J R R Tolkien, David Jones, Robert Graves, Dylan Thomas, Vernon Watkins, and W B Yeats. I visited Wales, Cornwall, Ireland, and Scotland several times and felt always at home. I suffered hiraeth when I wasn’t walking the Celtic landscapes, especially Wales, which I began to call my ‘soul country’.
In my higher education teaching career, I predominantly taught poetry and myths &
symbols, always with a Celtic slant. I also started researching cynghanedd (‘harmony’),
the Welsh system of word music using alliteration, stress and consonant structures, and
tried to apply similar principles to my poetry. Then one day, I heard about a group in
Melbourne teaching Welsh. Who cares if I couldn’t roll my r’s? I wanted to learn the
language of my chosen heritage. (It had chosen me, not the other way around.)
I have been learning for over a decade now, though I still am not fluent, yn rhugl. I
squeeze my lessons in between other obligations and commitments. Also, as any
second-language learner knows, immersion aids fluency, but my not living in Wales
means my opportunities for practice are limited. Still, I forge ahead and have improved
my reading, writing, and speaking of Welsh. Then came the point I wondered if I could
try my hand at writing poems in Welsh or at least translating to Welsh.
I had previously attempted to write English versions of some Welsh traditional forms
such as the Englyn Milwr and the Englyn Penfyr. These poems used alliteration,
consonance and rhyme but not in strict cynghanedd patterns. I realised my skill level in
both cynghanedd and Welsh would not be enough to write or translate (yet) such
traditional poems, or even free verse poems (pryddest) in Welsh, but I could tackle
something shorter.
I had been writing English haiku for many years and I felt it might be easier to work
with that form’s predominate use of short, crisp verbs, nouns and noun phrases. This
turned out to be more difficult than I imagined, which I will describe below with the
example of my first attempt.
The day after my decision, I wrote a haiku inspired by the contrast between the torrents
of rain outside my house and the warmth inside.
pouring rain…
silence and warmth
on the couch
Sometimes when I write a haiku or senryu, the first version, because I am in the right
frame of mind, zen-mind, is the best. Other times, I haven’t quite captured the
experience of the moment and I need to redraft the piece, usually quickly. This was one
such occasion:
heavy rain…
quiet warmth
on the couch
Even though I know Google Translate is not always accurate, I put this version into it to
see what would come up. I thought that a crude Welsh version might give me some
direction, especially when I immediately reversed the translation to see what changes in meaning would appear, which I could check using my Welsh dictionaries.
glaw trwm…
cynhesrwydd tawel
ar y soffa
I spent the next few days fiddling with words and nuances of meaning. I used the
translation service, back and forth, dug into my Welsh dictionaries for confirmations of
meanings, and wrote new Welsh versions directly. I discarded English and Welsh words
or phrases because they were too clunky, because their contributions to the soundscape were discordant, or because the meaning still wasn’t right.
I also wanted to introduce the sense of the warmth being shared with my wife, which
led me to remember similar moments. Sometimes, a new English version would cause
me to finetune the Welsh and sometimes it was the reverse:
glaw trwm…
tawel clyd
ar ein soffa
heavy rain…
cosy quiet
on our couch
The next stage was the realisation that, because I am not a native Welsh speaker and
have not spent long periods in Wales, I may be using terms for rain that aren’t colloquial
enough. I researched various Welsh articles and forums while also trying to find the
precise English description of the rain I had experienced.
Even though my mother was Belgian and my father had English roots, I identified with my Welsh ones.
I don’t know why. It was something sensed rather than intellectually considered.
drumming rain…
we claim
the cozy sofa
glaw drymio…
dyn ni’n hawlio
y soffa glyd
pelting rain…
we claim
the cosy couch
curlaw…
dyn ni’n hawlio
y soffa glyd
I finally struck on an English expression that perfectly fitted my memory of the initial
experience of the rain (‘pelting’) and a Welsh word for that expression (‘curlaw’). Now, I
needed to find the best construction of word, line and sound that gave the sense of the
contrast I wanted and the intimacy of the moment enjoyed by my wife and me.
pelting rain…
the cosy couch
for old bones
curlaw…
y soffa glyd
am hen esgyrn
curlaw…
yr hen soffa
ein nyth glyd
pelting rain…
the old couch
our cosy nest
pelting rain…
giggling and giddy
on our couch
curlaw…
giglan a dryslyd
ar ein soffa
After a total of 22 pairs of English and Welsh drafts, I settled on versions that were as
evocative of, and as truthful to, the original experience as I could make it, while adding
hints of other intimate moments:
pelting rain…
always cosy
in our creaky bed
curlaw…
yn glyd bob amser
yn ein gwely gwichlyd
Both versions have alliteration, consonance and assonance and the Welsh one also has
repetition. The English haiku is 12 syllables, which is generally considered the
equivalent of the 17 mora of Japanese haiku. I haven’t seen any consideration given to a Welsh equivalence, but from this example and others I have written (see below), I
suspect it would generally need more syllables.
As a final check on my translation, I sent it to my Welsh tutors. One of them hadn’t
known of the ‘curlaw’ word but thought its use was perfect. She also enjoyed the
alliteration. The other tutor was a little unsure of the undertones of ‘clyd’ but was happy
with the piece. (The dictionary meanings of ‘clyd’ are warm, sheltered, snug and cosy,
which I feel offered the right resonances for the experienced moment.)
The process I developed during this first translation attempt I have now used for a
number of other haiku. I’m thrilled one pair (12 and 19 syllables respectively) was
recently published in the Wales Haiku Journal:
back to normal
after lockdowns…
hazy night sky
yn ôl i normal
ar ôl y cyfnodau clo…
awyr niwlog y nos
I plan to continue my experimentation. I like the turning of the English to Welsh and
vice versa as it helps me rethink word choices for both languages in a type of
continuous drafting and translation dynamic, a sort of hermeneutic loop.
I also like the ongoing exposure to the nuances and colloquialisms of Welsh usage. This may be my best way of gaining deeper familiarity with the language until I am able to return to Wales and immerse myself in its speech, landscape and culture.
What I didn’t realise until part way through this experiment with Welsh haiku
translation is that the process had a name. I came across an article by John Rowland on
the Wales Haiku Journal website. In it he says, ‘I translate some [haiku and senryu] back
and forth between languages and the fracturing process can sometimes be revealing’.
For this fracturing technique he prefers Gabriel Rosenstock’s term, transcreating. My
translation experience certainly echoes Rowland’s and I hope he doesn’t mind me
adopting his term.
I have come a long way from that childhood epiphany about my heritage. I still may not be able to roll my r’s too well, but I am steadily gaining confidence in my use of Welsh to communicate and to creatively express myself.