Cavafy in Poland

Abstract

Despite the diversity of Modern Greek poetry available in Polish translation, Cavafy's work has eclipsed the achievements of other poets, just as the shadow of his lifelong translator, Zygmunt Kubiak, has inhibited other attempts only starting to surface in the twenty-first century. While external factors have determined Modern Greek anthologies in Poland, Cavafy translation has been mostly driven by personal passion. Apart from translation, this article reflects on various reasons why the Alexandrian's work should be so attractive to the Polish literary scene. Cavafy's seminal place within Polish literature stimulates further reflection on rewriting Cavafy in Poland.

Notes

1 The exception to this historical perspective is closely related to politics: the Greek diaspora in Poland consists of Greek Civil War refugees (now mainly their descendants) who arrived in Poland in 1949‒51. At that time, about 13,000 adults and children were admitted to the country, including the translator Nikos Chadzinikolau. Many went back to Greece in the 1980s. The diaspora has constantly contributed to Polish cultural life.

2 Cavafy was preceded, for comprehensible political reasons, by Yannis Ritsos, whose Moonlight Sonata appeared in the press in 1957 (trans. Jan Zych, Zebra 4, 8‒9). The first translations of Cavafy's single poems by Janusz Strasburger, Zygmunt Kubiak and Czesław Miłosz appeared in journals: ‘Che fece…’, ‘Voices’ and ‘On Board Ship’, trans. J. Strasburger (1960); ‘A Byzantine nobleman in exile composing verses’, ‘The god abandons Antony’, ‘The first step’ and ‘In a township of Asia Minor’, trans. Kubiak (1961); ‘Ithaca’, ‘Dareios’, ‘Myris’ and ‘Waiting for the Barbarians’, trans. Miłosz (Paris 1961). See bibliography in A. Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia na antyk’, in Być (albo nie być) Środkowoeuropejczykiem (Krakow 1999) 112. Other Modern Greek poets appeared in Polish translation in three anthologies of 1970-2 and one of 2004, and in individual volumes.

3 Respectively Z. Kubiak, Antologia poezji nowogreckiej (Warsaw 1970); Z. Kubiak, Kawafis Aleksandryjczyk (Warsaw 1995): a two-volume publication with Cavafy's Collected Poems.

4 Throughout this article, if not marked otherwise by references to sources, I am basing my remarks on my own observations as a reader of Polish literature over a period of 30 years, with the benefit of knowledge of both political systems, including the time of transition.

5 A. Lefevere, Translation, Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame (London and New York 1992).

6 M. Yourcenar, ‘Présentation critique de Constantin Cavafy’, in Sous bénéfice d'inventaire (Paris 1978) 232. Emphasis added.

7 Miłosz's translations of Cavafy's single poems (1961), more influential than Kubiak's or Strasburger's (1960‒1) because of his own noted position in Polish literature, may have formed a horizon of expectations for Cavafy; to a certain extent, however, these expectations were satisfied by Herbert's poetry from the 1950s onwards, before Miłosz published his translations.

8 C. Miłosz, Wypisy z ksiąg użytecznych (Krakow 1994) 6‒7. Passages from Polish criticism in this article are provided in my own translation, except for The Witness of Poetry.

9 C. Milosz, The Witness of Poetry (Cambridge, MA 1983) 111.

10 Milosz, The Witness, 112. Emphasis added.

11 C. Miłosz, Prywatne obowiązki (Paris 1972) 41; Skibiński in Z. Kubiak, Zwierciadło Śródziemnomorza (Warsaw 2002) 97.

12 I provide the last two names (now Vilnius and Lviv) in the Polish pre-war spelling; parts of Lithuania and Ukraine remained within Polish borders until 1939.

13 Milosz, The Witness, 4, 111‒12.

14 Miłosz, Prywatne, 41‒2.

15 M. Yourcenar, ‘L‘art de traduire’, in Les yeux ouverts. Entretiens avec Matthieu Galey (Paris 1980) 205.

16 I. Brodsky, ‘On Cavafy's side’, The New York Review of Books, 17 Feb. 1977.

17 S. Heaney, ‘Foreword’, in C. P. Cavafy, The Canon, trans. S. Haviaras (Athens 2004) vi.

18 G. Seferis, On the Greek Style: Selected Essays in Poetry and Hellenism, trans. Rex Warner (London 1966) 146. Emphasis added. Warner translated the phrase in italics as ‘breathe emotion through a vacuum’; the original, however, reads ‘τραβούν τη συγκίνηση διά του κενού’ (G. Seferis, Δοκιμές, I (Athens 1974) 348). This passage in Peter Mackridge's English translation is provided in italics.

19 Heaney, ‘Foreword’, vi. Out of thirteen existing English versions of Cavafy's canon, a recent one by Daniel Mendelsohn (2009) seems more representative of the prosodic trend.

20 A. Libera, ‘Od tłumacza’, in K. Kawafis, Jeżeli do Itaki… (Krakow 2011) 5‒10. P. Matywiecki, T. Burek and I. Smolka in L. Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie ma znaczenie’, Polish Radio 2, 29 March 2011.

21 Libera ‘Od tłumacza’.

22 K. Lisowski, ‘Aleksandryjczyk i jego tłumacz’, Nowe Książki 10 (1995) 53.

23 Op. cit., 54; ‘Noty o Kawafisie’, in Greckie lustro (Sejny 2011) 102. I am grateful to one of the referees of this article, Prof. Irena Grudzinska-Gross, for the following observation: ‘A very important side of Cavafy's influence is the use of Classical culture in a “quotidian” style’.

24 ‘Polish culture is based on Catholicism, with elements of martyr worship; the poets who were influenced by Cavafy looked for ways of distancing themselves from history without abandoning it’ (Irena Grudzinska-Gross, ibid.). Alhough the first sentence holds true about a limited number of post-war poets, this opinion insightfully situates Cavafy as a counterbalance to moralist-patriotic interpretations of Herbert's poetry.

25 K. Lisowski, ‘O najsłynniejszym wierszu Konstandinosa Kawafisa’, Kwartalnik Artystyczny 78 (2013) 23‒4.

26 Lisowski, ‘Noty’, 92.

27 Miłosz, Wypisy, 3.

28 C. Miłosz, ‘Przygody poezji nowoczesnej’, Kultura 7–8 (1961), reprinted in Prywatne obowiązki, 37‒45; Wypisy, 324‒6.

29 Miłosz, Wypisy, 324.

30 J. M. Rymkiewicz, Czym jest klasycyzm. Manifesty poetyckie (Warsaw 1967) 65.

31 J. Lichocka, ‘Libera tłumaczy Kawafisa, Kawafis tłumaczy rzeczywistość’, interview with A. Libera, Polish Radio 2, 15 Sep 2010.

32 P. Sommer, Po stykach (Gdansk 2005) 169.

33 Op. cit., 73, 155; ‘Tkać i pruć’, interview by B. N. Łopieńska, Tygodnik Powszechny 16 (21 Apr. 2002). Web.

34 Sommer, Po stykach, 169; Smak detalu (Lublin 1995) 116.

35 Sommer's train of thought revolving around Cavafy reveals a paradoxical itinerary: as a translator of Brecht and Anglophone poets including D. J. Enright, Derek Mahon and Seamus Heaney, and a poet of the cited pre-bruLion generations influenced by Cavafy, Sommer makes all these translations intertwine around Cavafy.

36 Sommer, Po stykach, 155.

37 W. Szymborska, Lektury nadobowiązkowe, I (Krakow 1973) 147.

38 Kubiak observed such qualities also in Seferis’ work (Zwierciadło, 46), contrary to Szymborska, who believed that Seferis ‘remains a lyrical poet drawing on the native tradition with changeable luck. In his poetry, literary allusion does not always succeed in intensifying expression; sometimes it makes it weaker and banal’ (Szymborska, Lektury 147‒8).

39 Miłosz, Prywatne, 41.

40 Ibid.

41 Ibid.

42 Heaney summons Miłosz also in his ‘Homage to Seferis’.

43 T. Venclova, ‘Dwa księstwa’, Tygodnik Powszechny 34 (2004).

44 A. Franaszek, Miłosz. Biografia (Krakow 2011) 260.

45 A. Boniecki, ‘To nic, że czasem nie wie’, in Franaszek, op. cit., 723.

46 Miłosz, Wypisy, 5.

47 Sommer, ‘Tkać’.

48 Detected e.g. by S. Barańczak, ‘Ironie’, in Poznawanie Herberta (Krakow 1998) 393.

49 I explore this relationship in detail in a separate article in progress.

50 Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia’; A. Van Nieukerken, Ironiczny konceptyzm. Nowoczesna polska poezja metafizyczna (Krakow 1998).

51 Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia’, 271.

52 C. Miłosz, Czesława Miłosza autoportret przekorny. Rozmowy przeprowadził Aleksander Fiut (Krakow 1994) 410.

53 Libera, ‘Od tłumacza’, 6.

54 I express my gratitude to Henryk Citko, the Director of the Manuscript Section at the National Library in Warsaw, in charge of the Herbert Archive, for the information on Herbert's languages and his home library. Herbert's library also included an Italian rendition by F. M. Pontani (1972) acquired in 1980.

55 Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia’, 112.

56 Z. Herbert, Notatniki [Notebooks], 17955, vol. 33, Inventory of the Herbert Archive, National Library in Warsaw 2008. All subsequent dates of the creation of Herbert's poems come from the Inventory.

57 In the 1950s Herbert spent much time at university libraries, striving to obtain French publications on art and literature (Henryk Citko, after Herbert's unpublished correspondence). I have no idea whether Herbert knew Valassopoulo's translations, published in the 1920-30s in literary journals.

58 Z. Herbert, ‘Arion’, trans. C. Milosz and P. D. Scott, in Z. Herbert, Collected Poems 1956–1998 (London 2007) 55.

59 Herbert, ‘Curatia Dionisia’, trans. A. Valles, in Collected Poems, 254. I have corrected capital letters and removed ‘are’ from line 5. Also, Polish ‘proceder’ in line 9, translated as ‘practice’, should rather read ‘dealings’.

60 Because of the two poets’ prominence in Polish and world poetry, the affinities between Cavafy and Herbert merit a separate article. Here I refer only to these two poems which can elucidate the issue of Herbert's acquaintance with Cavafy and are not discussed by critics.

61 Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia’, 113‒14.

62 Rymkiewicz, Czym jest klasycyzm, 62.

63 Herbert, ‘The return of the proconsul’, trans. C. Miłosz and P. D. Scott, in Collected Poems, 184‒5. Written between 1950 and 1961, published in Studium przedmiotu [Study of an Object] 1961. Fiut omits to analyse it in the context of stoicism. In Studium the proconsul's soliloquy precedes ‘Elegy of Fortinbras’, Herbert's most famous dramatic monologue, the genre also favoured by Cavafy. ‘The Return’ is the only Polish poem included by Nasos Vayenas in his Synomilontas me ton Kavafi (Thessaloniki 2000); however, the reference to the source of the Greek translation (p. 372) sends us to The Faber Book of Modern European Poetry, ed. A. Alvarez (London 1992), illustrating the labyrinthine ways of translation and reception of European poetry.

64 Van Nieukerken, Ironiczny, 202.

65 Fiut, ‘Dwa spojrzenia’, 136.

66 Op. cit., 116‒17.

67 Herbert, ‘Journey’, trans. A. Valles, in Collected Poems, 437. The poem was written between 1954 and 1956, published in the press in 1975 and eventually in Elegia na odejście [Elegy for the departure] (1990).

68 Van Nieukerken, Ironiczny, 222.

69 Kubiak, ‘O tłumaczeniu wierszy Kawafisa’, Literatura na Świecie 1‒2 (1996) 391.

70 Another task exceeding the scope of this article is the critical discussion of ‘Journey’ from the perspective of Herbert's other poems and in dialogue with Van Nieukerken's reading.

71 Z. Kubiak, ‘O tłumaczeniu’, 391.

72 1967, 1978, 1979, 1981, 1992, 1995 (with the monograph), 2001. After the first two editions of Selected Poems, Kubiak follows the order of Greek publications of Cavafy's poems.

73 J. Strasburger, ‘Z warsztatu tłumacza’, Literatura na Świecie 1 (1971) 149.

74 E.g., the PIW [Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy] publishing house, an off-Communist-mainstream though not independent publisher, ‘while “luring the despot” [i.e., seemingly satisfying censorship demands], provided a protective umbrella for those who could not publish anywhere else’ (Kubiak, Zwierciadło, 94).

75 Kubiak, Kawafis Aleksandryjczyk, 5. Cavafy's family came from Constantinople.

76 M. Borowska, ‘Kawafis Kubiaka, czyli pochwała niemożliwości’, Literatura na Świecie 10 (1995) 318‒36.

77 Kubiak, ‘O tłumaczeniu’, 387.

78 Z. Kubiak, Nowy brewiarz Europejczyka (Warsaw 2001) 75‒6.

79 E.g., in ‘In the Month of Athyr’ Kubiak strips the text of square brackets which in the original denote the hypothetical deciphering of an ancient inscription. The translator observes those brackets with horror in foreign renditions and opts for a full and certain version of the Classical inscription (Kubiak, ‘O tłumaczeniu’, 390).

80 Ibid.

81 She enumerates koine, Byzantine Greek, katharevousa, demotic, dialectal forms, quotations from various periods, and the influence of foreign languages, all constituting Cavafy's ‘private koine’, called by Kubiak πολυγλωσσία in response to her review (‘O tłumaczeniu’, 388).

82 Borowska, ‘Kawafis Kubiaka’, 325‒9.

83 Z. Kubiak, ‘O tłumaczeniu’, 388.

84 K. Kawafis, Jeżeli do Itaki wybierasz się w podróż…, trans. A. Libera (Krakow 2011).

85 K. Kawafis, Czekając na barbarzyńców i inne wiersze. Περιμένοντας τους βαρβάρους και άλλα ποιήματα, transl. I. Kania (Krakow and Budapest 2013).

86 Libera, ‘Od tłumacza’, 10.

87 Ibid.

88 Tomasz Burek, in Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’.

89 Libera, ‘Od tłumacza’, 9–10; ‘O Kawafisie, antyku i chrześcijaństwie’, interview by M. Matyszkowicz, Teologia Polityczna, 15 Sep 2010. Web.

90 A. Chadzinikolau, Literatura nowogrecka w przekładach polskich (Poznań 2003) 109.

91 Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’.

92 Kubiak also translated English Romantics and opens his Modern Greek anthology with John Keats’ ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’.

93 Libera, ‘O Kawafisie, antyku’.

94 Ibid., and Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’.

95 Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’; J. Dehnel, ‘Kawafis – Reaktywacja’, Znak 674 (Jul‒Aug 2011). Web.

96 Lichocka, ‘Libera tłumaczy’.

97 Critics in Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’.

98 Matywiecki, in Mastalerz, ‘Tłumaczenie’.

99 E. Hirsch, ‘Zbigniew Herbert: the fidelity of things’, in Responsive Reading (Ann Arbor 1999) 75.

100 S. Bassnett and A. Lefevere, Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation (Clevedon 1998) 10.

101 From Romance, Germanic, and Slavic languages, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Tibetan, and Pali.

102 Kania, in D. Gacek, ‘Z dalekiego czasu. Kania tłumaczy Kawafisa’, interview with I. Kania, Polish Radio 2, 29 Aug 2013, 17‒19.

103 Compare e.g., ‘Tomb of the grammarian Lysias’ in Kania 138; Libera 52; Kubiak (K. Kawafis, Wiersze zebrane Warsaw 1981) 104.

104 All three translators provide an ample selection of openly homoerotic poems (Polish is a gender-specific language).

105 Gacek, ‘Z dalekiego’, 15‒17.

106 Kania, ‘Εισαγωγή του μεταφραστή’, in Czekając, 26‒7.

107 Ibid.

108 A worthy match for Kubiak's edition of Cavafy's Collected Poems and the monograph (1995), books of sophisticated design from a private publisher.

109 C. P. Cavafy, Selected Prose Works, trans. Peter Jeffreys (Ann Arbor 2010).