Reuven Tsur

Occasional Comments on Two Hungarian Translations

Of Kipling’s “If”

Rudyard Kipling : If...

If ......

If you can keep your head when all about you,

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good or talk too wise:

If you can dream and not make dreams your master;

If you can think and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the words you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And—which is more—you'll be a man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling: Ha

Ha ......

Ha józanul tudod megóvni fődet,

midőn a részegültek vádja mar,

ha tudsz magadban bízni, s mégis: őket

hogy kételkednek, megérted hamar;

ha várni tudsz, türelmed nem veszett el,

s csalárdok közt sem Iéssz hazug magad

s nem csapsz a gyűlöletre gyűlölettel,

de túl szelíd s túl bölcsszavú se vagy;

ha álmodol — s nem Iéssz az álmok rabja,

gondolkodol — s ezt célul nem veszed,

ha nyugton pillantsz Győzelemre, Bajra,

s e két garázdát egyként megveted;

ha elbirod, hogy igaz szódat álnok

torz csapdává csavarja a hamis,

s miért küzdöttél, mind ledőlve Iátod,

de felépíted nyűtt tagokkal is;

ha tudod mindazt, amit megszereztél,

kockára tenni egyetlen napon,

s veszítve új kezdetbe fogni, egy fél

sóhajtás nélkül némán és vakon;

ha tudsz a szívnek, ínnak és idegnek

parancsot adni, bár a kéz, a Iáb

kidőlt, de te kitartasz, mert tebenned

csak elszánás van, ám az szól: "Tovább!";

ha tudsz tömeggel szólni, s él erényed

királlyal is — és nem fog el zavar,

ha ellenség se, hű barát se sérthet,

ha szíved mástól sokat nem akar;

ha bánni tudsz a könyörtelen perccel:

megtöltöd s mindig méltó sodra van,

tiéd a föld, a száraz és a tenger,

és — ami még több — ember léssz, fiam!

(Devecseri Gábor fordítása)

Rudyard Kipling: Ha...

Ha nem veszted fejed, mikor zavar van,

s fejvesztve téged gáncsol vak, süket,

ha kétkednek benned, s bizol magadban,

de érted az ő kétkedésüket,

ha várni tudsz és várni sose fáradsz,

és hazugok közt se hazug a szád,

ha gyűlölnek, s gyűlölségtől nem áradsz,

s mégsem papolsz, mint bölcs — kegyes galád,

ha álmodol — s nem zsarnokod az álmod,

gondolkodol — s becsülöd a valót,

ha a Sikert, Kudarcot bátran állod,

s úgy nézed őket, mint két rongy csalót,

ha elbirod, hogy igazad örökre

maszlag gyanánt használják a gazok,

s életműved, mi ott van összetörve,

silány anyagból épitsék azok,

ha mind, amit csak nyertél, egy halomban,

van merszed egy kártyára tenni föl,

s ha vesztesz és elkezded újra, nyomban,

nem is beszélsz a veszteség felől,

ha paskolod izmod, inad a célhoz,

és szíved is, mely nem a hajdani,

mégis kitartasz, bár mi sem acéloz,

csak Akaratod int: "Kitartani",

ha szólsz a néphez, s tisztesség a vérted,

királyokkal jársz, s józan az eszed,

ha ellenség, de jóbarát se sérthet,

s mindenki számol egy kicsit veled,

ha a komor perc hatvan pillanatja

egy távfutás neked s te futsz vigan,

tied a Fö1d és minden, ami rajta,

és — ami több — ember leszel, fiam.

(Kosztolányi Dezső fordítása)

All art, including poetry, is an elegant solution to a problem. On the verbal level, semantic accuracy or figurative language may demand one word, metre another, and rhyme yet another; syntax may require one word order, metre another, and rhyme yet another, and so forth. The poet must choose the best words in the best order so as to comply with all these demands. While the original poet has considerable freedom in shaping these problems, in poetry translation there is an additional constraint: the words chosen must comply with the figurative language, syntactic structure, metre and rhyme pattern of the original.

Accordingly, no translation on earth can survive a criticism which merely points out the elements that occur in the original but not in the translation, or vice versa. Rather, a translation must be judged according to the solution offered to the problems, and its elegance.

The translator must have his hierachy of preferences as to which dimensions are more essential to preserve, and in which dimensions he can afford greater flexibility. This hierarchy changes from poem to poem (and from translatior to translator). According to my scale of values, the translator must try to preserve the general movement of the poem: the prosodic and syntactic structures and their interaction; semantic strategies rather than the precise words.

Aristotle defined virtues in the middle between two (undesirable) extremes. Courage, for instance, is the middle point between cowardice and foolishly getting into danger. Kipling in “If” defines (nameless) virtues by two antithetical expressions — but with a twist. Sometimes there is a third expression which somehow contrasts to both earlier opposing terms, refining the definition of the virtue.

These antitheses are expressed in short, straightforward, parsimonious, epigrammatic clauses or phrases. These clauses or phrases are strung together in a way that involves no syntactic expectation. At the end of each such unit one may stop without expecting continuation. The ends of such units usually occur at the end of a verse line or at the caesura (in the middle of the verse line). Such structures amplify their epigrammatic, straightforward character. Only in the minority of the cases clauses are run on from one line to another. These run-on clauses are constructed such that they arouse least tension. The shorter a syntactic unit, the more it resists stretching over a metric boundary. Consequently, the nearer the beginning of a run-on clause to the line ending (or its end to the beginning of the next line), the greater the tension it arouses. Such run-on clauses may weaken the straihgtforward quality, but may heighten the integration of two consecutive lines.

Feminine rhymes are difficult to achieve in English. So, the systematic alternation of feminine and masculine rhymes in English is perceived as virtuoso rhymes. In Hungarian, feminine rhymes are easier to achieve, so the virtuoso effect must be achieved by other means. The virtuoso effect can be amplified by rhyming words that belong to different parts of speech, e.g., “about you” (preposition + you) and “doubt you” (verb + you).

The poem “If” has a peculiar syntactic structure: it consists of a single sentence. The main clause occurs only in the last two lines; what precedes it consists of a long series of parallel subordinated (conditional) clauses. The syntacic-metric structure of the subordinate clauses produces, as I suggested, a straightforward effect; the expectation for the main clause produces tension and suspense.

Both Kosztolányi and Devecseri are considered in Hungarian literature as being of the best Hungarian translators. But, in the present instance, by the above criteria, Kosztolányi’s translation of “If” is far superior to Devecseri’s. (If, however, you compare Kosztolányi’s translation of Blake’s “The Tyger” or Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” to Szabó Lörinc’s or Arany János’s respective translations, Kosztolányi’s are the inferior ones).

The first four lines and their two Hungarian translations may illustrate most of my points. Consider lines 3–4, omitting the subordinating “If”.

If you can trust yourself / when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

At the end of each syntactic unit one can stop, without expecting continuation. In Kosztolányi’s translation it runs as follows:

ha kétkednek benned, s bizol magadban,

de érted az ő kétkedésüket,

The first line of this excerpt contains a pair of antithetic clauses; the second line contains a third clause that somehow opposes the preceding two. The two lines are literal translations of the English original (with the necessary changes for Hungarian). Word order here is the most natural possible. The only significant change is that the order of the two clauses is reversed. But this does not disturb the principle that the virtues enumerated in this poem are suggested by two antithetical expressions. Now consider Devecseri’s translation of the same lines:

ha tudsz magadban bízni, s mégis: őket

hogy kételkednek, megérted hamar;

In these two lines there are only two opposing units. The sense “when all men doubt you” is missing, and can be, at best, inferred from what is explicitly stated. This disturbs the straightforwardness of the expression. The two clauses “őket / hogy kételkednek, megérted hamar” form a rather meandering sequence, far away from the directness of expression characteristical of this poem. Such a construction as “őket hogy” could be idiomatic in English (e.g., “They that have power to hurt, yet will do none”, etc.). But it is perfectly alien here, in Hungarian. The word “hamar” too is superfluous here, required only by a virtuoso rhyme, but is quite alien to the message in the original. Directness of expression is further disturbed by the strained run-on clause. As I said above, the shorter a syntactic unit, the more it resists stretching over a metric boundary: “őket” is an esceptionally short chunk, and therefore highly resistant to direct expression. One can compare the effect of this to that of the run-on clause from the first to the second line in the English original:

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you

“when all about you” is much longer, begins, in fact, at the caesura, and the effect is musch softer, less strained. In spite of the run-on clause, the three-part structure is preserved here too, but with a different distribution of the focus of the units.

Kosztolányi creates here end-stopped lines, very much in the vein of the second pair of lines.

Ha nem veszted fejed, mikor zavar van,

s fejvesztve téged gáncsol vak, süket,

Losing one’s head suggests confusion. Accordingly, Kosztolányi writes “If you don’t lose your head when there is confusion”; again a pair of clauses that form an end-stopped line, conveying a straightforward opposition. The phrase “zavar van” enables a virtuoso rhyme with “magadban”, but at the price of relying on the same metaphoric expression in the antithesis. But the translation compensates for this in the next line: “nem veszted fejed” — “fejvesztve”. Devecseri, again, offers a two-part rather than three-part construct:

Ha józanul tudod megóvni fődet,

midőn a részegültek vádja mar,

Even the little that this translation conveys from the original meaning is in the wrong tone. The two words “megóvni fődet” not only belong to an inappropriately high style register. But they are inappropriate in other respects as well. While “megóvni” can be regarded as a more or less adequate translation of the isolated verb “to keep”, and “fődet” is an exact translation of “your head”, but the two together do not have the idiomatic meaning that “nem veszted fejed” (in Kosztolányi’s translation) has. Thus, one can make out the appropriate meaning only by a complicated process of inference, whereas “nem veszted fejed” conveys it in a straightforward manner. The opposition between the two lines makes no use of the same idiomatic expression, and the very identification of the opposition depends on a much more complex process. “Részegültek” does have an ingredient of “confusion”, but its main meaning is “the intoxicated ones”, literally or metaphorically. This has an element of “intensely excited” which is quite alien to the mood of the poem. The same happens with “vádja mar”. “Vád” may be regarded as a straightforward translation of “blame”. But the phrase (including the verb “mar”) adds two inappropriate connotations: grave accusation and pangs of affect. Thus, the virtuoso rhyme “vádja mar … hamar” relies on terms both of which is out of keeping with its context. “Blaming it on you” has more moderate implications, rather something like “placing responsibility for some fault”. Kosztolányi could easily use the verb “vádol”, by writing, e.g., “s fejvesztve téged vádol vak, süket”, In this way he even could gain, without effort, an impressive alliteration: “vesztve… vádol… vak”. But he preferred a more moderate if less accurate meaning.

Kosztolányi’s second line is, then, far from being an exact translation of the original verse. Still, as we have seen, it attempts to preserve the “general movement” of the original. The last too words are the most problematic. The word “süket” is conspicuously needed for an exceptionally virtuoso rhyme “süket… kétkedésüket”. “süket” means “deaf”. It is hardly appropriate hear. To increase its requiredness in this context, the translator inserted before it “vak”, that is “blind”. Thus, the occurrence of this word becomes more motivated by the parallel adjectives, less arbitrary. It becomes something like the modern use of the Talmudic phrase “חירש שוטה וקטן” (deaf, fool, and small). By the same token, the reader may abstract from the two some common abstraction, such as “defect, deficiency”. Admittedly, this is not a very convincing solution to the problem. But the line supports, at least, in several respect an environment that abounds in other elegant and adequate solutions.