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PIööcku Thuɔŋjäŋ has been conceived as a comprehensive and elementary course for beginners, in which particular attention is given to the acquisition of vocabularies, pronunciation and written-focused training. The course is designed on the idea that the most effective language learning is based on the four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing. It is little wonder that the book’s principle is hearing—speaking (pronunciation)—reading—writing. In this way the prototypes of the Dinka characters (alooŋke Thuɔŋjäŋ) and Dinka phonology and morphology (alooŋke wël), among others, will impress themselves on the student’s mind both when being read and written. The book consists of three parts, all of which are further divided into a total of sixteen chapters. Part One introduces kït/cït, akeer and alooŋke Thuɔŋjäŋ, while Part Two deals with alooŋke wël and the final part, Part Three, provides a brief overview of abeerpiny de wël and kɛ̈ŋ ke juurkɔ̈k.

Law Enforcement Offi cer’s evaluati on comments relati ng to Gary L. Ermoian and Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman: Gary is one of the bett er instructors. His material is well organized and he has an excellent presentati on... I progressed from no understanding of Spanish to being able to understand enough to answer simple questi ons. It was directed at the language a police offi cer needs. I learned a great deal...more than I thought I would about Spanish, and can now communicate eff ecti vely with Hispanics in the fi eld situati ons. I frequently encounter non-English speaking Hispanics and I will fi nd this course helpful. I have seen a general increase in Spanish-speaking people in Concord. It taught me language I can use at work... Gives a strong start...very up to date and practi cal. [Gary] has an excellent teaching mannerism... perfect for cops... I feel that I learned a lot ...I’m inspired to try to learn more Spanish. ...Good phrases that are appropriate in law enforcement. I now feel that I can communicate on a basic level in Spanish. It is very helpful today to speak some Spanish in law enforcement. I had two semesters of Spanish and I got more out of this than both semesters. Content and vocabulary very appropriate for a police offi cer’s needs. More and more I fi nd the need for understanding and speaking Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] Very practi cal use of the language and should assist in doing the job bett er. My comprehension of Spanish has augmented considerably since the completi on of this course. It was designed for the specifi cs of our occupati on. This instructor was very good...he was understanding, considerate and easy to learn from. Provides a necessary background in Spanish for the use on the street. It provides assistance with a language that offi cers run into more and more...The book and tape are organized very well and fl ow together very well... I learned practi cal phrases for everyday use on the street. It will help me to communicate more effi ciently with people who speak Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] very well presented. Organized and covered the necessary basics to start us speaking Spanish. Well organized and easy to understand. I feel I have a good basic understanding now, so that I can work further on it [Spanish] myself.

Law Enforcement Offi cer’s evaluati on comments relati ng to Gary L. Ermoian and Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman: Gary is one of the bett er instructors. His material is well organized and he has an excellent presentati on... I progressed from no understanding of Spanish to being able to understand enough to answer simple questi ons. It was directed at the language a police offi cer needs. I learned a great deal...more than I thought I would about Spanish, and can now communicate eff ecti vely with Hispanics in the fi eld situati ons. I frequently encounter non-English speaking Hispanics and I will fi nd this course helpful. I have seen a general increase in Spanish-speaking people in Concord. It taught me language I can use at work... Gives a strong start...very up to date and practi cal. [Gary] has an excellent teaching mannerism... perfect for cops... I feel that I learned a lot ...I’m inspired to try to learn more Spanish. ...Good phrases that are appropriate in law enforcement. I now feel that I can communicate on a basic level in Spanish. It is very helpful today to speak some Spanish in law enforcement. I had two semesters of Spanish and I got more out of this than both semesters. Content and vocabulary very appropriate for a police offi cer’s needs. More and more I fi nd the need for understanding and speaking Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] Very practi cal use of the language and should assist in doing the job bett er. My comprehension of Spanish has augmented considerably since the completi on of this course. It was designed for the specifi cs of our occupati on. This instructor was very good...he was understanding, considerate and easy to learn from. Provides a necessary background in Spanish for the use on the street. It provides assistance with a language that offi cers run into more and more...The book and tape are organized very well and fl ow together very well... I learned practi cal phrases for everyday use on the street. It will help me to communicate more effi ciently with people who speak Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] very well presented. Organized and covered the necessary basics to start us speaking Spanish. Well organized and easy to understand. I feel I have a good basic understanding now, so that I can work further on it [Spanish] myself.

Law Enforcement Offi cer’s evaluati on comments relati ng to Gary L. Ermoian and Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman: Gary is one of the bett er instructors. His material is well organized and he has an excellent presentati on... I progressed from no understanding of Spanish to being able to understand enough to answer simple questi ons. It was directed at the language a police offi cer needs. I learned a great deal...more than I thought I would about Spanish, and can now communicate eff ecti vely with Hispanics in the fi eld situati ons. I frequently encounter non-English speaking Hispanics and I will fi nd this course helpful. I have seen a general increase in Spanish-speaking people in Concord. It taught me language I can use at work... Gives a strong start...very up to date and practi cal. [Gary] has an excellent teaching mannerism... perfect for cops... I feel that I learned a lot ...I’m inspired to try to learn more Spanish. ...Good phrases that are appropriate in law enforcement. I now feel that I can communicate on a basic level in Spanish. It is very helpful today to speak some Spanish in law enforcement. I had two semesters of Spanish and I got more out of this than both semesters. Content and vocabulary very appropriate for a police offi cer’s needs. More and more I fi nd the need for understanding and speaking Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] Very practi cal use of the language and should assist in doing the job bett er. My comprehension of Spanish has augmented considerably since the completi on of this course. It was designed for the specifi cs of our occupati on. This instructor was very good...he was understanding, considerate and easy to learn from. Provides a necessary background in Spanish for the use on the street. It provides assistance with a language that offi cers run into more and more...The book and tape are organized very well and fl ow together very well... I learned practi cal phrases for everyday use on the street. It will help me to communicate more effi ciently with people who speak Spanish. [Practi cal Spanish for the Working Lawman] very well presented. Organized and covered the necessary basics to start us speaking Spanish. Well organized and easy to understand. I feel I have a good basic understanding now, so that I can work further on it [Spanish] myself.

Medical exploitation often occurs because a patient does not understand the nature of his or her illness. Consequently the patient falls prey to simple explanations, like nails in the body causing pain or obstructing the normal progress of labor and delivery. The aim of this book is to improve doctor-patient communication in Igbo language by establishing an Igbo medical vocabulary, which both the doctor and patient can understand and speak. Ancillary objectives include the following: • Assignment of names to some organ systems of the body that are currently unnamed in Igbo language, and explanation of their functions; • Assignment of names to disease-causing agents such as virus and bacteria, which are not visible with the naked eye; • Introduction of the concept of chronic disease such as hypertension and diabetes, which can only be controlled but not usually curable; • Introduction of modern cell biology in Igbo language. We have met many challenges in writing this book. First, we found that the Igbo language is rich in naming external parts of the body, but lacks words for some internal organs and organ systems, such as the endocrine organs, the retculoendothelial system, the vascular system, the lymphatic system, etc. It even lacks the concept of cells and tissues, so that organs are only understood as they appear to the naked eyes. Second, we noted that some organ systems are lumped together in Igbo language, even though each system has its distinct group of diseases. For instance there are no words to differentiate string-like structures in the body. Thus nerves, arteries, veins, tendons, ligaments, lymphatic vessels and even fascia are collectively known as akwara. Our charge was to name these parts individually in Igbo. Third, disease causing agents not visible with the naked eyes, such as bacteria and viruses are not known in Igbo language, and needed newly minted words. Perhaps the most difficult challenge we faced is the fact that Igbo language lacks the flexibility of the English language, which borrows its medical terms very liberally from Greek and Latin roots, to create words that did not exist in the language. For instance the word atherosclerosis is derived from the Greek root, athere, meaning gruel or dirt, and skiros, meaning hard. Since Igbo language lacks such close interaction with other languages, English-to-Igbo interpretation of medical terms becomes necessarily descriptive and long. Where we have interpreted a medical term with more than one Igbo word we have tried to preserve the essence of the term. For instance we have named atherosclerosis Atịtị ọwa ọbara, meaning dirt in the blood channel. We have emphasized the concept of chronic disease in contrast with the well understood model of acute illnesses. In this regard we have highlighted hypertension (Obara Mgbanni Elu) stroke (Ọtụọ ọkara), diabetes (Ọrịa shuga), heart attack (Ọkụkụ mkpụrụobi) and heart failure (Okuko afọ mkpụrụobi). This is particularly important because chronic diseases require lifetime treatment, unlike the familiar model of acute diseases, such as malaria (Ịba anwụ nta) or appendicitis (Amahịa mgbakwunye eriri afọ) that requires only brief or intermittent treatment. Since Igbo culture is technologically challenged, we have difficulty coming up with a language that reflects the technology of modern medicine, such as x-ray, ultrasound, centrifuge, CAT scan etc. We have not addressed medical technology in any detail in this issue. In introducing the fundamentals of modern concept of cell biology and genetics in Igbo language we have made it possible for secondary and post secondary school students to understand the structure and functions of the cell organelles the way they never did before. It is a significant departure: from memorization of just words, to explanation of their significance at the same time. As stated in my inaugural address shown below I would like to emphasize that the problem of doctor-patient communication in vernacular language is not limited to the Igbo language, but exists in all Nigerian languages. The challenge of doctors in other language groups is to organize and produce a vernacular medical nomenclature appropriate for the language group. This book took the dedicated time and brainpower of many. In fact the collaborative nature of this project has necessitated the use of both PREFACE and FOREWORD for this book. First, I wish to thank the Aguata zone of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) under the leadership of its chairman, Dr Boniface Amah, for organizing the three conferences with workshops for this project. I am buoyed by the tremendous enthusiasm shown by them, as well as all other participants in those conferences. My special thanks go to Dr Dozie Ikedife, the immediate past President General of Ọhanaeze Ndigbo , and Professor Pita Ejiofor, the founder and national chairman of Otu Suwakwa Igbo, Nigeria, for their enthusiasm during those conferences. I thank Professor Obed Anizoba and all the members of the Society for Promotion of Igbo Language and Culture for their participation and guidance in the appropriate use of Igbo language. I thank my fellow doctors from other zones, especially Dr Obi Nwosu from Nnewi zone, who attended all three conferences and actively contributed to all discussions. He is currently the State chairman of NMA, Anambra State. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Professor Michael Echeruo, the William Safire professor of Modern Literature at Syracuse University, Syracuse, USA, and author of A comprehensive Igbo-English Dictionary, for his insightful review of our manuscript and useful suggestions Finally I thank the American Friends Foundation for African Healthcare Service (AFFAHS) for sponsoring those conferences.

Medical exploitation often occurs because a patient does not understand the nature of his or her illness. Consequently the patient falls prey to simple explanations, like nails in the body causing pain or obstructing the normal progress of labor and delivery. The aim of this book is to improve doctor-patient communication in Igbo language by establishing an Igbo medical vocabulary, which both the doctor and patient can understand and speak. Ancillary objectives include the following: • Assignment of names to some organ systems of the body that are currently unnamed in Igbo language, and explanation of their functions; • Assignment of names to disease-causing agents such as virus and bacteria, which are not visible with the naked eye; • Introduction of the concept of chronic disease such as hypertension and diabetes, which can only be controlled but not usually curable; • Introduction of modern cell biology in Igbo language. We have met many challenges in writing this book. First, we found that the Igbo language is rich in naming external parts of the body, but lacks words for some internal organs and organ systems, such as the endocrine organs, the retculoendothelial system, the vascular system, the lymphatic system, etc. It even lacks the concept of cells and tissues, so that organs are only understood as they appear to the naked eyes. Second, we noted that some organ systems are lumped together in Igbo language, even though each system has its distinct group of diseases. For instance there are no words to differentiate string-like structures in the body. Thus nerves, arteries, veins, tendons, ligaments, lymphatic vessels and even fascia are collectively known as akwara. Our charge was to name these parts individually in Igbo. Third, disease causing agents not visible with the naked eyes, such as bacteria and viruses are not known in Igbo language, and needed newly minted words. Perhaps the most difficult challenge we faced is the fact that Igbo language lacks the flexibility of the English language, which borrows its medical terms very liberally from Greek and Latin roots, to create words that did not exist in the language. For instance the word atherosclerosis is derived from the Greek root, athere, meaning gruel or dirt, and skiros, meaning hard. Since Igbo language lacks such close interaction with other languages, English-to-Igbo interpretation of medical terms becomes necessarily descriptive and long. Where we have interpreted a medical term with more than one Igbo word we have tried to preserve the essence of the term. For instance we have named atherosclerosis Atịtị ọwa ọbara, meaning dirt in the blood channel. We have emphasized the concept of chronic disease in contrast with the well understood model of acute illnesses. In this regard we have highlighted hypertension (Obara Mgbanni Elu) stroke (Ọtụọ ọkara), diabetes (Ọrịa shuga), heart attack (Ọkụkụ mkpụrụobi) and heart failure (Okuko afọ mkpụrụobi). This is particularly important because chronic diseases require lifetime treatment, unlike the familiar model of acute diseases, such as malaria (Ịba anwụ nta) or appendicitis (Amahịa mgbakwunye eriri afọ) that requires only brief or intermittent treatment. Since Igbo culture is technologically challenged, we have difficulty coming up with a language that reflects the technology of modern medicine, such as x-ray, ultrasound, centrifuge, CAT scan etc. We have not addressed medical technology in any detail in this issue. In introducing the fundamentals of modern concept of cell biology and genetics in Igbo language we have made it possible for secondary and post secondary school students to understand the structure and functions of the cell organelles the way they never did before. It is a significant departure: from memorization of just words, to explanation of their significance at the same time. As stated in my inaugural address shown below I would like to emphasize that the problem of doctor-patient communication in vernacular language is not limited to the Igbo language, but exists in all Nigerian languages. The challenge of doctors in other language groups is to organize and produce a vernacular medical nomenclature appropriate for the language group. This book took the dedicated time and brainpower of many. In fact the collaborative nature of this project has necessitated the use of both PREFACE and FOREWORD for this book. First, I wish to thank the Aguata zone of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) under the leadership of its chairman, Dr Boniface Amah, for organizing the three conferences with workshops for this project. I am buoyed by the tremendous enthusiasm shown by them, as well as all other participants in those conferences. My special thanks go to Dr Dozie Ikedife, the immediate past President General of Ọhanaeze Ndigbo , and Professor Pita Ejiofor, the founder and national chairman of Otu Suwakwa Igbo, Nigeria, for their enthusiasm during those conferences. I thank Professor Obed Anizoba and all the members of the Society for Promotion of Igbo Language and Culture for their participation and guidance in the appropriate use of Igbo language. I thank my fellow doctors from other zones, especially Dr Obi Nwosu from Nnewi zone, who attended all three conferences and actively contributed to all discussions. He is currently the State chairman of NMA, Anambra State. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Professor Michael Echeruo, the William Safire professor of Modern Literature at Syracuse University, Syracuse, USA, and author of A comprehensive Igbo-English Dictionary, for his insightful review of our manuscript and useful suggestions Finally I thank the American Friends Foundation for African Healthcare Service (AFFAHS) for sponsoring those conferences.

Medical exploitation often occurs because a patient does not understand the nature of his or her illness. Consequently the patient falls prey to simple explanations, like nails in the body causing pain or obstructing the normal progress of labor and delivery. The aim of this book is to improve doctor-patient communication in Igbo language by establishing an Igbo medical vocabulary, which both the doctor and patient can understand and speak. Ancillary objectives include the following: • Assignment of names to some organ systems of the body that are currently unnamed in Igbo language, and explanation of their functions; • Assignment of names to disease-causing agents such as virus and bacteria, which are not visible with the naked eye; • Introduction of the concept of chronic disease such as hypertension and diabetes, which can only be controlled but not usually curable; • Introduction of modern cell biology in Igbo language. We have met many challenges in writing this book. First, we found that the Igbo language is rich in naming external parts of the body, but lacks words for some internal organs and organ systems, such as the endocrine organs, the retculoendothelial system, the vascular system, the lymphatic system, etc. It even lacks the concept of cells and tissues, so that organs are only understood as they appear to the naked eyes. Second, we noted that some organ systems are lumped together in Igbo language, even though each system has its distinct group of diseases. For instance there are no words to differentiate string-like structures in the body. Thus nerves, arteries, veins, tendons, ligaments, lymphatic vessels and even fascia are collectively known as akwara. Our charge was to name these parts individually in Igbo. Third, disease causing agents not visible with the naked eyes, such as bacteria and viruses are not known in Igbo language, and needed newly minted words. Perhaps the most difficult challenge we faced is the fact that Igbo language lacks the flexibility of the English language, which borrows its medical terms very liberally from Greek and Latin roots, to create words that did not exist in the language. For instance the word atherosclerosis is derived from the Greek root, athere, meaning gruel or dirt, and skiros, meaning hard. Since Igbo language lacks such close interaction with other languages, English-to-Igbo interpretation of medical terms becomes necessarily descriptive and long. Where we have interpreted a medical term with more than one Igbo word we have tried to preserve the essence of the term. For instance we have named atherosclerosis Atịtị ọwa ọbara, meaning dirt in the blood channel. We have emphasized the concept of chronic disease in contrast with the well understood model of acute illnesses. In this regard we have highlighted hypertension (Obara Mgbanni Elu) stroke (Ọtụọ ọkara), diabetes (Ọrịa shuga), heart attack (Ọkụkụ mkpụrụobi) and heart failure (Okuko afọ mkpụrụobi). This is particularly important because chronic diseases require lifetime treatment, unlike the familiar model of acute diseases, such as malaria (Ịba anwụ nta) or appendicitis (Amahịa mgbakwunye eriri afọ) that requires only brief or intermittent treatment. Since Igbo culture is technologically challenged, we have difficulty coming up with a language that reflects the technology of modern medicine, such as x-ray, ultrasound, centrifuge, CAT scan etc. We have not addressed medical technology in any detail in this issue. In introducing the fundamentals of modern concept of cell biology and genetics in Igbo language we have made it possible for secondary and post secondary school students to understand the structure and functions of the cell organelles the way they never did before. It is a significant departure: from memorization of just words, to explanation of their significance at the same time. As stated in my inaugural address shown below I would like to emphasize that the problem of doctor-patient communication in vernacular language is not limited to the Igbo language, but exists in all Nigerian languages. The challenge of doctors in other language groups is to organize and produce a vernacular medical nomenclature appropriate for the language group. This book took the dedicated time and brainpower of many. In fact the collaborative nature of this project has necessitated the use of both PREFACE and FOREWORD for this book. First, I wish to thank the Aguata zone of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) under the leadership of its chairman, Dr Boniface Amah, for organizing the three conferences with workshops for this project. I am buoyed by the tremendous enthusiasm shown by them, as well as all other participants in those conferences. My special thanks go to Dr Dozie Ikedife, the immediate past President General of Ọhanaeze Ndigbo , and Professor Pita Ejiofor, the founder and national chairman of Otu Suwakwa Igbo, Nigeria, for their enthusiasm during those conferences. I thank Professor Obed Anizoba and all the members of the Society for Promotion of Igbo Language and Culture for their participation and guidance in the appropriate use of Igbo language. I thank my fellow doctors from other zones, especially Dr Obi Nwosu from Nnewi zone, who attended all three conferences and actively contributed to all discussions. He is currently the State chairman of NMA, Anambra State. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Professor Michael Echeruo, the William Safire professor of Modern Literature at Syracuse University, Syracuse, USA, and author of A comprehensive Igbo-English Dictionary, for his insightful review of our manuscript and useful suggestions Finally I thank the American Friends Foundation for African Healthcare Service (AFFAHS) for sponsoring those conferences.

Rimbaud thought of and described himself as a “Voyant.” Not as a “voyeur,” although there was surely something of that in him as well. The word he used was “Seer,” as in the word “Prophet,” as one who looks beyond the obvious, the apparent, the exterior appearances of peoples, places, and things. The AMERICAN HERITAGE DICTIONARY (1969-70-71) relates a “seer” to a “clairvoyant,” or to “someone who has the supposed power to perceive things that are out of the natural range of human senses.” The irony of this statement in regard to Rimbaud is that anyone who is in the least way acquainted with his work or with him, the boy genius who wrote most of his entire oeuvre between the ages of seventeen and twenty-three, went about his oxymoronic poetic career with a project, that of deliberately “deregulating his senses,” so as to become a Poet-Seer. To see – or not to see: that was his option. “To See” became his will. In his poetic career, Rimbaud chose “to see” by confounding the very instruments of vision: his eyes and his intellect. He dreamed about and “saw” the Crusades, he “saw” enchantments, magical dream-flowers, a flower that says its name, a digitalis that “opens up over a tapestry of silver filigree, of eyes, and tresses,” flowers that were like crystal disks, or made of agate and rubies. He “saw” giant candelabras, grasses made of emeralds and steel, theatrical stages that could accommodate horrors or masterpieces, circus horses and children. He “heard” rare music, the sounds of waves and of water, or “the rare rumor of pearls, conchs, and seashells” hidden deep in the ocean. He saw russet robes, objects made of opal, sapphires, or metals. He “saw” objects made of steel studded with golden stars, angels of fire and of ice, carriages made with diamonds. He also described what one might call “nothingness” as opposed to “being,” in these days of ours. And there was great diversity in his “visual” geography: he “saw” Epirus, the Peloponnese, Japan, Arabia, Carthage, Italy, America; he envisioned tacky embankments in Venice, and he juxtaposed human ugliness to the surreal beauty of nature. But frequently, after “seeing” gorgeous visions, as in “Bridges,” a sheaf of light, falling straight down from the sky, “[would annihilate] that comedy.” In the Rimbaud poem that some have translated as “The Word’s Alchemy,” he invented colors for vowels: A was black, E white, I red, O blue, and U green. And he went on to say: “I adjusted each consonant’s shape and movement, and with instinctive rhythms, I complimented myself on inventing a poetics that, one day or other, would become accessible to all.” His visionary “poetics,” he clearly believed, would become universal. As one reads through ILLUMINATIONS, a title given to Rimbaud’s posthumously printed collection of poems written late in his youthful literary career (some scholars believe it should be considered as one long poem, divided into parts), the reader’s “eyes” begin to envisage certain thematics that are not only visually “distracting,” in the sense of disturbing or diverting from the original meaning of an object or word, but as consonant in the variety of meanings the words contain. One notices the sensual, the visual and the auditory power of water, flowers, geography, the elements, the exotic, the country, the city, the theatrical, in all senses of the word (a space for both masterpieces and failures), the sounds of rarefied music and underwater shells, the opposition of terror to beauty and vice-versa, the desire for being, for unity, for fulfillment, as opposed to the knowledge of nothingness, emptiness, cruelty, and loneliness. One senses the contrasts of colors and the taste for grandeur and immensity as opposed to that which is boring, vicious, and dull. The tensions that exist in Rimbaud’s poetry between a taste, a desire, a dream of grandeur and magnificence – that he wished he could fulfill not only for himself but for the world – are striking. He continued to encounter the opposite: cruelty versus kindness, the low versus the high, diamonds and dust, youth and old age, flowers and futility, the ugliness and filth in people and in cities over against the grandeur of palaces. His poems describe the tensions between dark nightmares and color-filled dreams, between love and hate, beauty and ugliness, life and death. These pervade his entire oeuvre, not only ILLUMINATIONS. The oppositions create assent for the ascensions in the writer’s and the reader’s spirit, as well as in the recognition of the barbarity of the universe that he represented so vividly. Rimbaud’s ILLUMINATIONS are both luminous and enlightening. They decorate our world with magical stones and flowers, even as they flash beams upon our minds and hearts that display the inhumanity of nature and of humankind. II. Translations Many translations of Rimbaud’s ILLUMINATIONS exist, many more than I thought existed when I started upon this “voyage.” And many books on the subject of what translation is, in and of itself, have been published. A fairly recent one is Clive Scott’s work titled TRANSLATING RIMBAUD’S ILLUMINATIONS (University of Exeter: 2006). Scott addresses translation and creativity, reflections on the relationship between the source text and the translator’s text. He studies questions of time and rhythm, moving images, the displacement from silence and time to noise and space, and he puts great emphasis on the reader’s “space.” He adds three appendices. In the first one he presents a translation from English to French of Wordsworth’s poem, “The Daffodils,” that was translated by François-René Daillie; the second one is comprised of prose translations of selected ILLUMINATIONS, and the third is of several poems that Scott made to look like Apollinaire’s (and others’) CALLIGRAMMES, otherwise known as “concrete poetry.” He creates at least 19 examples, in “concrete poetry” form, of Rimbaud’s poem “Mystique.” An excellent linguistic exercise for students (and faculty) is to ask a class to translate one poem, individually, and then discuss the multiple possibilities open to all. I have compared poems that were translated by Chilcott, Fowlie, Harding & Sturrock, Leclercq, Sloate, Trearne, Bernard, Carline, Mason, Peschel, Rooham, Schmidt, Sorrell, not to mention myriad translations of individual poems from the ILLUMINATIONS that have appeared in print since Rimbaud’s time. In my own translations I depended, simply, upon the words that I thought were the most appropriate, that made the most sense, and tried not to imitate any one else’s interpretations of words or phrases. The volume of Rimbaud’s poetry that I used was the Pléiade edition of the Oeuvres complètes, the 1972 edition that was established, presented, and annotated by Antoine Adam. This edition is easily accessible, and I used the disposition of the texts as they are pictured therein. I had recourse only to the French texts, since they are in the public domain, and read but did not use Adam’s introduction or notes. The commentaries I made in the TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE refer only to my own reading of Rimbaud’s texts. There is no better way of reading a text than to try to translate it. Wyatt Mason called Rimbaud “the decadent genius,” and I simply refer to him as “the boy genius.” I tried not to comment upon Rimbaud’s biography, upon his relationship to Verlaine, and others, and the remarks I make in this preface are strictly related to my own readings of the poetry. The biographical fallacy is one I tried to avoid, tempting though it might be, and opted, instead, for reading what the boy genius wrote about flowers, birds, water, geography, theater, music, sounds, children, colors, grandeur, boredom, filth, cruelty, deception, and so many other universal themes that one can interpret in many of the ways we wish to give them. I disagree completely with Steve Murphy, who is quoted, by Grian G. Kennelly, as saying (in Journal of Literature, Language and Linguistics, vol.1, issue 1, 2007) p. 1, that “si Rimbaud est illisible, il doit être a fortiori intraduisible” (if Rimbaud is illegible, he should be a fortiori untranslatable”). I much prefer saying what I said to myself at the start of this venture, that “there’s no better way to read a poem by Rimbaud than by trying to translate it!”

Rimbaud thought of and described himself as a “Voyant.” Not as a “voyeur,” although there was surely something of that in him as well. The word he used was “Seer,” as in the word “Prophet,” as one who looks beyond the obvious, the apparent, the exterior appearances of peoples, places, and things. The AMERICAN HERITAGE DICTIONARY (1969-70-71) relates a “seer” to a “clairvoyant,” or to “someone who has the supposed power to perceive things that are out of the natural range of human senses.” The irony of this statement in regard to Rimbaud is that anyone who is in the least way acquainted with his work or with him, the boy genius who wrote most of his entire oeuvre between the ages of seventeen and twenty-three, went about his oxymoronic poetic career with a project, that of deliberately “deregulating his senses,” so as to become a Poet-Seer. To see – or not to see: that was his option. “To See” became his will. In his poetic career, Rimbaud chose “to see” by confounding the very instruments of vision: his eyes and his intellect. He dreamed about and “saw” the Crusades, he “saw” enchantments, magical dream-flowers, a flower that says its name, a digitalis that “opens up over a tapestry of silver filigree, of eyes, and tresses,” flowers that were like crystal disks, or made of agate and rubies. He “saw” giant candelabras, grasses made of emeralds and steel, theatrical stages that could accommodate horrors or masterpieces, circus horses and children. He “heard” rare music, the sounds of waves and of water, or “the rare rumor of pearls, conchs, and seashells” hidden deep in the ocean. He saw russet robes, objects made of opal, sapphires, or metals. He “saw” objects made of steel studded with golden stars, angels of fire and of ice, carriages made with diamonds. He also described what one might call “nothingness” as opposed to “being,” in these days of ours. And there was great diversity in his “visual” geography: he “saw” Epirus, the Peloponnese, Japan, Arabia, Carthage, Italy, America; he envisioned tacky embankments in Venice, and he juxtaposed human ugliness to the surreal beauty of nature. But frequently, after “seeing” gorgeous visions, as in “Bridges,” a sheaf of light, falling straight down from the sky, “[would annihilate] that comedy.” In the Rimbaud poem that some have translated as “The Word’s Alchemy,” he invented colors for vowels: A was black, E white, I red, O blue, and U green. And he went on to say: “I adjusted each consonant’s shape and movement, and with instinctive rhythms, I complimented myself on inventing a poetics that, one day or other, would become accessible to all.” His visionary “poetics,” he clearly believed, would become universal. As one reads through ILLUMINATIONS, a title given to Rimbaud’s posthumously printed collection of poems written late in his youthful literary career (some scholars believe it should be considered as one long poem, divided into parts), the reader’s “eyes” begin to envisage certain thematics that are not only visually “distracting,” in the sense of disturbing or diverting from the original meaning of an object or word, but as consonant in the variety of meanings the words contain. One notices the sensual, the visual and the auditory power of water, flowers, geography, the elements, the exotic, the country, the city, the theatrical, in all senses of the word (a space for both masterpieces and failures), the sounds of rarefied music and underwater shells, the opposition of terror to beauty and vice-versa, the desire for being, for unity, for fulfillment, as opposed to the knowledge of nothingness, emptiness, cruelty, and loneliness. One senses the contrasts of colors and the taste for grandeur and immensity as opposed to that which is boring, vicious, and dull. The tensions that exist in Rimbaud’s poetry between a taste, a desire, a dream of grandeur and magnificence – that he wished he could fulfill not only for himself but for the world – are striking. He continued to encounter the opposite: cruelty versus kindness, the low versus the high, diamonds and dust, youth and old age, flowers and futility, the ugliness and filth in people and in cities over against the grandeur of palaces. His poems describe the tensions between dark nightmares and color-filled dreams, between love and hate, beauty and ugliness, life and death. These pervade his entire oeuvre, not only ILLUMINATIONS. The oppositions create assent for the ascensions in the writer’s and the reader’s spirit, as well as in the recognition of the barbarity of the universe that he represented so vividly. Rimbaud’s ILLUMINATIONS are both luminous and enlightening. They decorate our world with magical stones and flowers, even as they flash beams upon our minds and hearts that display the inhumanity of nature and of humankind. II. Translations Many translations of Rimbaud’s ILLUMINATIONS exist, many more than I thought existed when I started upon this “voyage.” And many books on the subject of what translation is, in and of itself, have been published. A fairly recent one is Clive Scott’s work titled TRANSLATING RIMBAUD’S ILLUMINATIONS (University of Exeter: 2006). Scott addresses translation and creativity, reflections on the relationship between the source text and the translator’s text. He studies questions of time and rhythm, moving images, the displacement from silence and time to noise and space, and he puts great emphasis on the reader’s “space.” He adds three appendices. In the first one he presents a translation from English to French of Wordsworth’s poem, “The Daffodils,” that was translated by François-René Daillie; the second one is comprised of prose translations of selected ILLUMINATIONS, and the third is of several poems that Scott made to look like Apollinaire’s (and others’) CALLIGRAMMES, otherwise known as “concrete poetry.” He creates at least 19 examples, in “concrete poetry” form, of Rimbaud’s poem “Mystique.” An excellent linguistic exercise for students (and faculty) is to ask a class to translate one poem, individually, and then discuss the multiple possibilities open to all. I have compared poems that were translated by Chilcott, Fowlie, Harding & Sturrock, Leclercq, Sloate, Trearne, Bernard, Carline, Mason, Peschel, Rooham, Schmidt, Sorrell, not to mention myriad translations of individual poems from the ILLUMINATIONS that have appeared in print since Rimbaud’s time. In my own translations I depended, simply, upon the words that I thought were the most appropriate, that made the most sense, and tried not to imitate any one else’s interpretations of words or phrases. The volume of Rimbaud’s poetry that I used was the Pléiade edition of the Oeuvres complètes, the 1972 edition that was established, presented, and annotated by Antoine Adam. This edition is easily accessible, and I used the disposition of the texts as they are pictured therein. I had recourse only to the French texts, since they are in the public domain, and read but did not use Adam’s introduction or notes. The commentaries I made in the TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE refer only to my own reading of Rimbaud’s texts. There is no better way of reading a text than to try to translate it. Wyatt Mason called Rimbaud “the decadent genius,” and I simply refer to him as “the boy genius.” I tried not to comment upon Rimbaud’s biography, upon his relationship to Verlaine, and others, and the remarks I make in this preface are strictly related to my own readings of the poetry. The biographical fallacy is one I tried to avoid, tempting though it might be, and opted, instead, for reading what the boy genius wrote about flowers, birds, water, geography, theater, music, sounds, children, colors, grandeur, boredom, filth, cruelty, deception, and so many other universal themes that one can interpret in many of the ways we wish to give them. I disagree completely with Steve Murphy, who is quoted, by Grian G. Kennelly, as saying (in Journal of Literature, Language and Linguistics, vol.1, issue 1, 2007) p. 1, that “si Rimbaud est illisible, il doit être a fortiori intraduisible” (if Rimbaud is illegible, he should be a fortiori untranslatable”). I much prefer saying what I said to myself at the start of this venture, that “there’s no better way to read a poem by Rimbaud than by trying to translate it!”