"When the evil of a snowflake in June / could still be a source of relief"

[larryhammer]

On to the next recommended epic, this one an actual epic poem: the Shahmenah by late-10th/early-11th century Persian poet Ferdowsi, best known in English as the source of Matthew Arnold's "Sohrab and Rustum". Well, sort of epic -- it's a chronicle of fifty-odd monarchs of Persia down to the Muslim conquest. I'm still in the mytholegendary strata of stories about the first kings of the world, the ones who invented agriculture, fire, the class system, China, and so on. So, epic in sweep and manner, if not in scope.

He reached Feraydun's castle, which towered above him like a mountain, its battlements hidden among the clouds. Courtiers sat in the throne room, and beyond a curtain were the nobility; on one side lions and leopards were tethered, and on the other raging war elephants. The assembled warriors gave a roar like a lion's; it seemed to the messenger as though this were a celestial court, and that the warriors standing there were angelic beings.

Because every king worth his salt keeps elephants in his audience chamber.

Yes, it's a largely prose translation, but this detracts a only little from the epic feel. That "largely" is because in naqqal storyteller manner, translator Dick Davis renders moments of heightened action or emotion in verse:

He said, "Is it good or ill these signs portend?
When will my earthly life come to an end?
Who will come after me? Say who will own
This royal diadem, and belt, and throne.
Reveal this mystery, and do not lie—
Tell me this secret or prepare to die.

Given he's a much better prosist than prosodist, I can't really fault his decision. Maybe one day someone with the chops will take up the challenge of a verse translation -- and have the stamina to make through all 50,000 lines.

Till then, though, I'll happily settle for this. Hat tip to rushthatspeaks for the rec.

Since I'm still in mytholegendary parts, where it's hard to survive the folk process without having the narrative awesomeness of a ninja, I'm surprised that I've already met a character needs to be replaced by one: a king of the Yemen who sets up a piss-poor challenge to weed out the three sons of Feraydun come a-suitoring for his three daughters' hands: shuffling the daughters' order. And then he can't think of anything else. Srsly, as a standalone folktale, it should be laughed out of the folkcanon. A ninja would set up MUCH better challenges, like death-traps or darts in the darkness. Which the youngest son would evade, because, yanno, youngest of three sons in a folktale.

---L.

Comments

[tiangun.livejournal.com]

Hello. I am Russian translator. Google have lead me to your post containing "Shahnameh" quotation. I've sought English sources related to this quotation 'cause I'm translating fiction book that contains it, so I don't want to translate it from English translation and prefer to find congruent verse translation from Farsi to Russian in Russian sources. Would You tell me the precise location of this quotation in "Shahname" English translation?
Thanking You in anticipation, Michael.

[larryhammer]

I'll have to find my copy, which has gotten buried by successive cleanings. Tomorrow okay?

---L.

[tiangun.livejournal.com]

"Successive cleanings"... familiar :-) Okay :-)

[larryhammer]

The quotation is from Shahnameh: The Persian Book of Kings translated by Dick Davis, published by Penguin Books in 2007. The passage in question is on page 38, in the fourth unnumbered section titled "The Story of Iraj". Unfortunately, this is an abridged translation and possibly is not the actual fourth chapter/book/section.

I hope that helps.

---L.

[tiangun.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much, anyway. I'll try to find it in Russian translation by title, 'cause the title don't undergo verse translation :-) so I can translate English title directly.
Michael.