The Person And The Personal
World Literature Today|March – April 1018

The Person And The Personal

Matthew Landrum
The Person And The Personal

Who is Aleksandur Kristiansen?The question was simple on the face of it. My co-translator had sent me a biopic note explaining that he was a Faroese poet a generation older than Jóanes Nielsen.

We were working on Nielsen’s “I Brushed the Dust off an Intoxicated Poet,” in which wiping “the dance-floor dust” off a drunken Kristiansen’s jacket serves as a sort of laying on of hands for Nielsen when he is a fledgling young poet. It’s an intensely personal poem.

For me, translating is about entering into the poem and inhabiting its space. It wasn’t enough to know the facts. I wanted the feeling, but without a connection to or experience with Aleksandur Kristiansen, my translation felt wooden.

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