The Person And The Personal

The Person And The Personal

- Matthew Landrum

Who is Aleksandur Kristiansen?The question was simple on the face of it. My co-translator had sent me a biopic note explaining that he was a Faroese poet a generation older than Jóanes Nielsen.

We were working on Nielsen’s “I Brushed the Dust off an Intoxicated Poet,” in which wiping “the dance-floor dust” off a drunken Kristiansen’s jacket serves as a sort of laying on of hands for Nielsen when he is a fledgling young poet. It’s an intensely personal poem.

For me, translating is about entering into the poem and inhabiting its space. It wasn’t enough to know the facts. I wanted the feeling, but without a connection to or experience with Aleksandur Kristiansen, my translation felt wooden.