Ravens galore --- Poe, Elder, Bennett, Gratulls...

Poe, Elder, Bennett... Ravens for all.





Janet Maslin in The New York Times, June 5th 2006. Talking about Matthew Pearl’s The Poe Shadow (2006)...


She says:



–Its main character Quentin Clark is a Poe admirer with a groupie’s ardor. Quentin has nitpicked Poe texts: “If the raven sits at the top of the chamber door, though, what lamplight would be behind him in such a way ass to cast a shadow to the floor...?”



In fact...



From the start, many people noticed that false quandary.


Already John Bennett, in A parody anthology (1904,) ed. Carolyn Wells, wrote that little jewel.



What troubled Poe’s raven




Could Poe walk again to-morrow, heavy with dyspeptic sorrow,

While the darkness seemed to borrow darkness from the night before,

From the hollow gloom abysmal, floating downward, grimly dismal,

Like a pagan curse baptismal from the burst above the door,

He would hear the raven croaking from the dusk above the door,

“Never, never, nevermore!”



And, too angry to be civil, “Raven,” Poe would cry, “or devil,

Tell me why you will persist in haunting death’s plutonian shore?”

Then would croak the raven gladly, “I will tell you why so sadly,

I so mournfully and madly, haunt you, taunt you, o’er and o’er,

Why eternally I haunt you, daunt you, taunt you, o’er and o’er -

Only this and nothing more.



“Forty-eight long years I’ve pondered, forty-eight long years I’ve wondered,

How a poet ever blundered into a mistake so sore.

How could lamplight from your table ever in the world we able,

From below, to throw my sable shadow ‘streaming on the floor,’

When I perched up here on Pallas, high above your chamber door?

Tell me that - if nothing more!”



Then, like some wan, weeping willow, Poe would bend above his pillow,

Seeking surcease in the billow where mad recollections drown,

And in tearful tones replying, he would groan “There’s no denying

Either I was blindly lying, or the world was upside down -

Say, by Joe! - it was just midnight - so the world was upside down -

Aye, the world was upside down!”




–--------------------------------------




But of course nowhere says Poe that the light had to come from his table. Could have come from the transom... As the great Bill Elder showed in “Mad” it could’ve come from a light hanging on the ceiling. Etc.



–--------------------------------------




Here are the bits in Poe’s poem where the light has anything to “say.”



1. On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er,

But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er

She shall press, ah, nevermore!




[Damunt la coixinera de vellut que embolica el coixí la llum s’enfureix,

Vellut de coixinera on la llum del llum amb ulls ardents es posa

I que ella no tocarà mai pus!]





2. Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!

Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”



Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”



[Cap ploma negra no em deixis de penyora de la mentida que em dius!

Jaqueix el meu entotsolament en pau - i fuig del bust de damunt la porta!

Treu-me el bec que m’enfonses al cor, i fot el camp de la porta!



Digué el corb: “A la merda, noi!”]





3. And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted,-nevermore!



[I la llum del llum damunt el corb llença la seua ombra damunt terra;

La meua ànima alhora d’aqueixa ombra que sura per terra

No l’aixecarà mai més ni déu!]





-----------------------------------------------





A whiff (above) of a Catalonian translation as a bonus. And (next,) for an overbonus yet, a translation of Bennett’s poem too.




Allò que desficiava el corb d’en Poe





Ves que en Poe això pogués, tornar, per vils torçons pres,

A aquest món fosc i despès, a aquesta nit que devers

Mitjanit és fosca i mitja, plena de densa calitja,

Com mal xerric de politja, aquella veu que s’enferritja,

Sentiria que de la tarja baixa com xarxa que enxarxa

“Mai més, mai més!” - s’escridassa.



“-Tu, corb de caldéu, bagassa! Maleita negra carcassa!

Què tornes a fer per ci...?!” Fa en Poe, qui el veié morir.

I el corb llavors el burxava, i li deia amb mala bava:

“-Capdecony ara t’ho dic, perquè amb mala bava i nic,

T’entrevinc els teguments; fora vans arguments,

Ho faig perquè em fots ja massa!



“Quaranta-vuit anys ja fa, i pas puc no hi consirar...

Com es fa que cap poeta s’escossi tan tort de veta...?

Com pot el llum de la taula, vejats condemnada faula,

A quina carbassa cap, des de baix enviar l’ombrassa

Cap a terra, com sóc dalt, assegut al cap del bust

A l’alta tarja de fusta...!”



Pobre d’en Poe, mig malalt, cloc-piu, somort pel disgust,

Veuríem potser que es tusta el clatell, i que s’ajusta

El coixí on jeu i somica, i més tard que al corb explica:

“Tifejava com un gall, o era el món cap per avall;

Cagarel·la rai haguérem, mes, sent que a mitjanit érem,

Cap per avall, i prou férem.”




---------------------------------------







So...?