The novel “Alma Lolloon” opens with two epigraphs, both of which serve the ordinary purpose of the epigraph but are also part of the fiction being created. In each, the original is given, followed by an “interpretive translation” by the narrator of “Alma Lolloon,” who is Alma Lolloon:
Experience, though noon auctoritee
Were in this world, is right ynogh for me
To speke of wo that is in marriage…
But yet I praye to al this compaignye,
If that I speke after my fantasye,
As taketh not agrief of that I seye,
For myn entente nys but for to pleye.
from Chaucer’s The Prologe
of the Wyves Tale of Bathe
What atrocity this insult of experience
As if somehow right for me and all
Wode talk woe of the marriage camp.
But complain not in present company,
For all tales told in pitiful woe
Tell not a whole story
If want is not to please.
from interpretive translation of Chaucer,
by Alma Lolloon, 1966
Die Erste Elegie
Wer, wenn ich schriee, hörte mich denn aus der Engel Ordnungen? und gesetzt selbst, es nähme einer mich plötzlich ans Herz: ich verginge von seinem stärkeren Dasein.
from Duineser Elegien by Rainer Maria Rilke
The First Elegy
Who, if I cracked my little mouth, would listen to me in the din of rules of angels? And quickly so near his heart home of pounding hammers, sparkling nails, and gargantuan waves, I would fade in the muscle of his gaze, or in the back seat of his dark ride.
from Duino Elegies, interpretive translation of Rilke,
by Alma Lolloon, 1996.
I’m still working on editing and proofing and design.
The Coming of the Toads 