Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Soares

Opening sentences of The Book of Disquiet

Installed on the upper floors of certain respectable taverns in Lisbon can be found a small number of restaurants or eating places, which have the stolid, homely look of those restaurants you see in towns that lack even a train station. Amongst the clientele of such places, which are rarely busy except on Sundays, one is as likely to encounter the eccentric as the nondescript, to find people who are but a series of parentheses in the book of life.
There was a period of my life when a combination of economic necessity and a desire for peace and quiet led me to frequent just such a restaurant. I would dine at around seven each night and, as chance would have it, I was almost always there at the same time as one particular man. (translated by Margaret Jull Costa & William Boyd)

Lisbon has a certain number of eating establishments in which, on top of a respectable-looking tavern, there’s a regular dining room with the solid and homey air of a restaurant in a small trainless town. In these first-floor dining rooms, fairly empty except on Sundays, one often comes across odd sorts, unremarkable faces, a series of asides in life.
There was a time in my life when a limited budget and the desire for quiet made me a regular patron of one of these first-floor restaurants. And it happened that whenever I ate dinner there around seven o’clock, I nearly always saw a certain man who didn’t interest me at first, but then began to. (translated by Richard Zenith)

Há em Lisboa um pequeno número de restaurantes ou casas de pasto [em] que, sobre uma loja com feitio de taberna decente se ergue uma sobreloja com uma feição pesada e caseira de restaurante de vila sem comboios. Nessas sobrelojas, salvo ao domingo pouco freqüentadas, é freqüente encontrarem-se tipos curiosos, caras sem interesse, uma série de apartes na vida.
O desejo de sossego e a conveniência de preços levaramme, em um período da minha vida, a ser freqüente em uma sobreloja dessas. Sucedia que quando calhava jantar pelas sete horas quase sempre encontrava um indivíduo cujo aspecto, não me interessando a princípio, pouco a pouco passou a interessar-me. (Fernando Pessoa)

8 comments:

Kathleen said...

Couldn't resist:

"Installed on the upper floors of certain respectable taverns in Lisbon can be found a small number of restaurants or eating places, which have the stolid, homely look of those restaurants you see in towns that lack even a train station. Amongst the clientele of such places, which are rarely busy except on Sundays, one is as likely to encounter the eccentric as the nondescript, to find people who are but a series of parentheses in the book of life.

"There was a period in my life when a combination of economic necessity and a desire for peace and quiet led me to frequent just such a restaurant. I would dine at around seven each night and, as chance would have it, I was almost always there at the same time as one particular man. At first I took little notice of him but as time passed he came to interest me."

(translated by Philip Pullman, the edition I am reading...)

Kathleen said...

Oh, I am wrong. Margaret Jull Costa is the translator. Philip Pullman is himself; he commented on the cover! I think it is exactly the same as what you have. So you needn't post to compare! (Sorry!)

Kathleen said...

Which do you like better, parentheses or asides?

SarahJane said...

Hi Kathleen,
It was only this morning, after remembering your post about BoD, that I realized you were reading a different translation. I love comparing translations. (sorry, I pushed the button on your first post before I realized it was the same one.)
I must admit that I prefer the "asides" in the case of that sentence, which also seems truer to the original. But I also like things about the other translation.

Kathleen said...

The comparisons are fascinating. I like the sentence ending "he came to interest me" (which seems closer to the original, by looking at it) than the one ending with "to." Except maybe for the precariousness of that! Also "pouco a pouco" looks like it might be "little by little." (I told you about that assignment to translate a poem without knowing the language. I realize now it's like a Viola Spolin acting game to speak in reasonable-sounding gibberish. Comedy skits abound....)

SarahJane said...

It's interesting that neither translation says "little by little."

Anonymous said...

Hello
I am reading The Book of Disquiet, the edition translated by Richard Zenith
Because I am not an English native speaker so this is quite confusing to me,
in Richard's translation, the restaurant where Pessoa oftens come to is called "first floor restaurant" and as described above this kind of restaurants are "on top of" respectable looking tavern. This really confuses me, like why is it called first floor restaurant if they are on top of the tavernt? Could you mind explain this part for me?

I'm really sorry if this little thing bothers you but... I just dont know anyone else to ask and I just googled your blog which also has mentioned different edition and I'm really interested in it.
Thank you~

SarahJane said...

Hi -
It's because in Europe, the first floor is what Americans call the second floor. In Europe, what Americans call the first floor is called the ground floor.
hope that helps!

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