No. 1338: The winners

Jaspistos reports: Competitors were asked for a verse translation, as strict or free as they pleased, of Goethe's poem 'Hypochonder'.

The title, which you didn't have to translate, would have been tricky. 'Hypochondria' is a howler. The hypochondrium, the abdomen, like the spleen and the bile, is a part of the body that we used to make a scapegoat for our bouts of misanthropic gloom, a mood to which the young Goethe was apparently subject. I invited you to translate without specifying into which language. James Warren produced an elegant version in Latin which would have merited a prize had it not been just surpassed by W. S. Brownlie's pellucid French one. I also invited you to translate as accurately or imaginatively as you liked, and so I have spread the loot as fairly as possible be- tween the allowable extremes. I hope that the half-dozen people who pleased me with strict renderings won't be too disappointed at not being rewarded. I hope too that winners and losers alike enjoyed Goethe's poem, which may have been as new to them as it was to me. All printed below get £6 each.

La race humaine Pent aller au diable; Elle inspire en moi une haine Peu raisonnable.

Souvent je desire La chasser de mes yeux; Je voudrais hien la rendre Au diable, au bon dieu. Ou a elle-meme.

Et puis (pas facile a comprendre) Je vois un visage, Et je l'aime. (W. S. Brownlie) The Devil take all humankind — They're maddening, drive you up the wall. Henceforth I'll see no one at all — How often I've made up my mind, Left them to God and one another And the Devil — I'd have none! But when I see a face —just one — I love it as I'd love a brother. (Wendy Cope) Deil tak' a' human kind, They drum ye frae your mind! Oft hae I inly sware Tae meet wi' folk nae mair. I'd gie the whole damn' horde T'Auld Nick or the Guid Lord. Yet once his face tae see Endears a mon tae me. (Hugh MacGandie) To hell with all humanity! I hate The bloody lot of 'em: they simply drive Me bonkers, and deserve whatever fate The Devil, God and man himself contrive.

I keep deciding I must run away From any sort of contact with mankind, See no one any more — and then one day

Somebody smiles, and ping! I change my min' (peter HadleY)

MEN!! Aincha just about sick of 'em?? Scargill, for starters — the biggest prick of 'on 'All!!! Except perhaps Mister MacGregor -- Let's face it, gals, what an ugly old beggar!! Doncha wonder sometimes why the heck we bother??!! But then you switch on the telly and see another Of those cuddly delegates at the Liberal Assembly, And it makes you come over all weak and trembly!!! (Peter Norman) To hell with all humanity!

They grate upon me more and more!

Each time, I swear that I shall go Inside my head, and close the door, And shut the whole damn boiling out To stuff themselves and screw their gods! And then I see those hope-filled eyes, And love the boring silly sods. (Bridget Rees) How welcome are the human race To go to Hell; they are a bore; Their manners are so gross and base I tell myself with a grimace I'll not have truck with any more.

May God or Satan deign to chase Humanity to some far shore; Or let them take off into Space!

But all at once I see a face, And with fresh love my heart is sore.

How welcome are the human race. (Paul GOO

I do not love the human race; I cannot stand its silly face; I'll never love the way it talks

And do not care which way it walks.

Yet. . when I'm introduced to one, Eitinkmeingottdissmanissfun!

(D. B. Jenkins°11)

What a shuttlecock I am!

All society I damn,

From the world I will cut loose—

Let it stew in its own juice!

One face shows, and I'm beguiled, To the world all reconciled.

(George Moot)