On variance in poetic translation

On the example of three translations of Blaže Koneski's poem "The Angel of St. Sophia" (by Andrew Harvey and Anne Pennington, Ilija Časule and Thomas Shapcott), the author analyses certain procedures (apart from the question of satisfying the requirements of form) which translators adopt in their rendering of a poem. These range from semantic reduction and various degrees of elucidation and supplementation to transformation and redirection of the meanings of the original poem. It is argued that poetry is translatable in its universality and that the translator is a creative man of letters who widens the semiotic range of the poem, opening up new directions for its existence and possibilities for its further growth. The author concludes that in a sense the poetic translation and the original are like the two faces of Koneski's angel - the original is given and eternal, whereas the poetic translation is in a constant search and variance "under the plaster of the chest" of the other language - "like a sister in its beauty" with respect to the original.11 page(s