La plej granda verkaĵo

ORANGES ALWAYS ARE LOST

(Writing tails off into an annoyed illegibility.) What, then, about speech?

"Finnegans Wake estas por ni hodiaŭ la plej granda verkaĵo, la kolosa defio al tradukado." ("La Orelo De L'Alia", p. 98)

        "Sufiĉe dirite?"

        Nuffing doing.

"The daleks will take over the downstairs of the world! The doctor is raving mad! He must be put under erasure!"

"By translating everything into French, at best one would translate all of the virtual or actual content, but one could not translate the event which consists in grafting several tongues onto a single body." (The Ear of the Other p. 99)

"Per traduko de ĉio en la francan, oni plej bone tradukus ĉiom el la virtuala aŭ reala enhavoj, sed oni ne povus traduki la eventon, kiu konsistas en la greftado de pluraj langoj sur unuopan korpon." [Tre sin-aluda.]

[Simon]: "There's a hundred thousand wildebeest at the bottom of Lake Windermere. And some water."

The major corpus

HARD TO READ:

"... is an excrescence to civilised humanity and but a wart on Europe; wanamade singsigns to soundsense an yit he wanna git all his flesch nuemaid motts truly prural and plusible..." ("Finnegans Wake" p. 138)

"Finnegans Wake is for us today the major corpus, the great challenge to translation..." ("The Ear of the Other" p. 98)

"... hwilum word be worde, hwilum andgit of andgiete..." (Alfred the Great: Preface to Gregory's Pastoral Care)

        "Nuff said?" said Fairy Nuff.

HARD TO PRONOUNCE:
"Вщзжплмёдтрящ!" expleted Yeltsin.

"Елцин!" expleted the Self.

The selfsame shelfsame pardon my dripping brain – I've just been out in the rhyme. Doesn't scan, doesn't plan, doesn't blibber, doesn't gibber...

Further note on the "Ŝerco"

Further note on the "Ŝerco"

The form may have "originated" with a "mistranslation" of the "Wisdom of Confucius or Mencius" and a subsequent misconstrual of its tendency, e.g. "Wisdom of Confused and Mendacious" or "Wisdom of the Confuted and Mendicant" (see esp. ll. 3-4 and l. 6) or even, ironically, "Conflated and Mended". Ultimately the "ŝerco" remains an enigma, which may indeed be as "close" to the "truth" as anything.

"What, in sum, is it all about?" (Glas, p. 1186)

"Very self-referential (Ed.)" said Ed.

"Tre sin-aluda (Red.)" diris Red. "Pri kio, entute, ĝi ĉiom temas?"

"Tradukado kanonigas propran version pli ol la originalaĵo kanonis." – Paul de Man-o

Never Esperanto the dead.

"Tree, a ludic sign. (Readit!)" already read.

Esperanta ŝerco

ESPERANTA ŜERCO

Kokino eniris bibliotekon kaj diris, "Buk! Buk!" Sed la bibliotekisto devis respondi, "Bedaŭrinde, bukojn vi trovos ne ĉe ni sed ĉe la vestovendejo apude!" Do la kokino mortis.

"Ĉuv kompren'?" {Jes, Red.}

Tro da fatraso, ni timas.

"Translation canonizes its own version more than the original was canonical." – Paul de Man

Esperanto "Ŝerco"¹

[1] A kitchen went into a bookphone in order to
[2] conduct "Cluck! Cluck" [Gluck?]. Said the
[3] librarian, responding devisively [derisively?] "Idiot!
[4] Book your holiday not here, nor did I say here is
[5] the vest-shop down the road."
[6]     And the kitchen died.
[7] "How much did it cost?" {Jesus, Commie!}
[8]     My themes are too fantastic.

¹ Untranslatable. Idiomatic, roughly equivalent to "Long recitation of indeterminable fictionality, apparently cognate with the 'shaggy dog story' but lacking perceptible absence of punchline."

Esperanglo joko

Esperanglo Joko

Uno chickeno wentj in librario et sedj "Libro! Libro!" so el librariano presentaj con libro him. Et chickeno sortj.
    El nexto dayo (dajo?) chickeno returnj et librariano him presentaj dos moro (moron?, Ed.) libroos. Et chickeno sortj.
    El thirdo dayo chickeno returnj et librariano him presentaj threeo libros. But el librariano estoj curioso et followj chickeno. Et chickeno sortj al librario, et librariano him followj. Et chicken arrivj al pondo, ouj froggo estas on lilyo paddo et sedj "Ribbit, ribbit" en throwj libroos en pondo!!

Geddito?! {Noo. Ed.}

Too much gibber, I'm afraid.

Right – he's gone now, so:

    BRING OUT YOUR GIBBER!
    BRING OUT YOUR GIBBER!
    WRING OUT YOUR GIBBON!

"Ford gibbered at him." (Douglas Adams)

Coffee trays

"Dear brainy – gone! Dear, dear brainy." Yes, indeed, poor Liz's brain had gone. "Coffee!" – only that could restore her battered cells. Quickly a bookcaseful was brought to her and an intravenous coffee supply was installed.

There once was a lass called Lizzy
Who was rather partial to coffee
She used to drink it all day
Preferably from a tray
And now she's got no brainy.

Just me and a few turnips. Never mind, I make up for the brain with discourse.

A chap who telephoned in Esperanto
Just in order to be obscuranto
Put in lots of expression
But still gave the impression
Of what or indeed if it meanto.

Tarragon, tarragon, tarragon

"Tarragon," said Theodora.
"No, Tennyson!" said Tennyson.

The courgette falls on oval walls
And orange pelmets far and few
The video bakes more than five cakes
And pickles them in glue.

"Tarragon," said Tennyson. "Tarragon, tarragon, tarragon.

    Catharine of Arragon,
    Tarra! Gone?"

"What, is she dead, then?" said Jolly Manleyish, luvvie. "What, Gone-y, Gone?"

"This is silly!" said Silly, but I'm not so sure. How does he know? And what does that mean? Does he (is she?) have an identity in any sense?

That's all, Critics!!

YOU'RE MAD