Travel
Movement
Colourful and sophisticated, detailed descriptions
The different value we place on objects, gold vs silver vs bronze, family jewels, wedding rings, gold necklaces, eyes vs ears (would you rather be blind or deaf?)
Is she literally gauging out her eyes?! No – it was a dream.
Taking the nail out of Jesus’ feet on the crucifix?! Is she going crazy? How are they portraying Catholicism?
Fireworks/firecrackers, burning your money, burning the gold to make the bell
The bell makers are pirates??? No – they’re Christians, but they’ve already been hanged and the bell has been buried
Wait so the nun DID pluck out her eyes?? And the bell just stops ringing??
This was, word for word, my thought process as I read through Miguel Angel Asturias’ “Legend of the Silent Bell.” I was so confused throughout almost the entire reading. From what I’ve seen of others’ blog posts so far, I wasn’t the only one who experienced this, so I wanted to dive into it a little bit. Plus, it seems like “The Pongo’s Dream” is getting plenty of coverage, as it very much deserves.
When I first started reading the legend, I was trying to figure out some kind of theme or tone. There was a lot of talk about travelling and movement, discussions and descriptions of the “Spanish people” coming to the “Indians,” and the compelling image of the processions of different buildings. Then, later on, I thought maybe they were trying to focus on jewels and the idea of what it is exactly that we value in our lives. However, I couldn’t land on any one thing and I wasn’t sure exactly where this story was headed.
I did notice that the language used was very complex and detailed. It seemed so specifically chosen, but I believe (if I’m not wrong) that this is a translation of the text that was originally written in Spanish, so I wonder how accurate the wording is in its deliberateness. Perhaps that contributes to the confusion. I recently read about a man who prefers to read online fiction in languages he doesn’t understand that haven’t been translated into English, because he likes the suspense that goes along with the disorientation provided by having to google translate and constantly guess at what’s going on. Normal fiction is too predictable, apparently. However, that’s exactly what I felt like I was doing while reading, even though it was almost entirely in English.
As you can tell from the majority of my notes, there were buckets and buckets of suspense throughout this legend, at least from my perspective. From the nun gouging out her eyes in her dream (which I only realized was a dream after the fact), to her going to confession and then taking a nail out of a crucifix to do who knows what with, to the bellmakers being pirates, to them not being pirates, and then the nun showing up at the end apparently (metaphorically?) having sacrificed her eyes. I’m not sure if it was lost in translation, or if it’s meant to be confusing, or maybe differences in popular culture make it confusing.
My question to the class is this: have you ever had something get “lost in translation,” literally between languages, or potentially, between cultures (something makes sense in one culture but not another)?
Ana Laura
January 27, 2021 — 6:24 PM
Hi Coral!
I completely understand your confusion with this text, it definitely wasn’t an easy one to wrap your head around. I also think that things getting lost in translate could have added to this. I remember having to translate multiple texts for my A-Level Spanish exams and that was a lot harder than I had anticipated. Spanish and English are two very different languages, so simply capturing the ‘essence’ of a word or a sentence is difficult. Besides, there are always words that can’t be translated, like “saudades” in Portuguese or “sobremesa” in Spanish. Plus, some idioms don’t make sense in other languages; for example, “cair a ficha” in Portuguese means to finally understand something (but taken literally and out of context, it means to drop a token).
Maiya
January 27, 2021 — 11:20 PM
Hi!
Great post.
I also agree that much of this story is lost in the translation between languages. However, (and you briefly mention this in the discussion question) the translation between cultures can be equally confusing. What is common knowledge in one culture may be unheard of in another, therefore readers may miss key references within a story.
emilia heilakka
January 28, 2021 — 1:59 AM
Hey!
Your post literally summarized my feelings when reading this text, haha 😀 I had to read twice in order to make some sense out of it, however, I still feel like I’m not getting what it is really trying to convey. The language was definitely my biggest problem because of it’s wordiness. However, I am not sure if that is due to the translation or just a choice of style? I’m sure that perhaps some culturally significant aspects might have gotten lost, especially if there have been a third language from which it has been initially translated from to Spanish.
Jon
January 28, 2021 — 12:55 PM
I liked the fact that you chose to comment on the Asturias story despite (because of?) the fact that it is undoubtedly the more difficult and complex of the two.
Moreover, as I said in class yesterday, there are still more issues of translation affecting the story and our reception of it. First, presumably it was initially composed in Quiché rather than Spanish, then to be subsequently translated into English. Second, there is also the effect of a “translation” from oral to written discourse. Remember that in oral delivery, a listener can always interrupt a speaker, ask for clarification, and so initiate a dialogue that can aid understanding. Third and finally (?), there’s the “translation” from a Guatemalan to a (here) Canadian context.
I would add also the fact that, as I mention in my video discussion, Asturias was very much influenced by the French surrealist tradition, which was part of the filter through which he no doubt understood the story and retold it. Surrealism, of course, delights in what may at first sight seem to be nonsense, even as it seeks hidden, perhaps unconscious, connections between what at first sight seem to be unrelated details.
All this is part of what we have to work through as we read the story!