Padding out English; making it flower(y)

A familiar problem: I'm currently at 15 lines when the original is 17 lines. Metail's Oulipian form is 48 characters per line; 24 lines per page. English is so much more concise than French, and I also think American writers are culturally inclined to say more in less. Laconic is a complimentary adjective here in the U.S. Think Gary Cooper. Clint Eastwood. (Don't think Vince Vaughn.) But to equal 24 to 24 lines, I've got to go against my culture and pad, pad, pad. To circle. To circumbobulate. To say, "The brush of my teeth," rather than "Toothbrush." (Or, after reading Dr. Seuss to Ismael every day, "Nooth Grush.") So much depends on the barrow of my (translation) wheel that is red.

Exuberant Waters Fray

I signed up for Harrap's month-long free trial, as I liked the pirated copy that M. Oliver gave me so much, but which is, alas, not transferable from my vieux computer to my nouvel computer. (I think it pretty funny that computer is ordinateur in French, but also "computer." Actually, the definitions associated with "ordinateur" are rather fertile: you've got "macro-ordinateur" and "micro-ordinateur" that mean, respectively, mainframe and microcomputer. Now, I don't think the Academicians are doing a very good job when they allow "laptop" to be translated as "micro-ordinateur portable"--you're practically begging for the English (or would that be American?) to be used.)

Anyway, before I digressed there, I signed up so that I would work on my translation of Earth's Horizons. Like, as in, that I must do work before the month elapses, because otherwise Harrap's is very expensive. So, a few days ago, I achieved this:

EVEN IF THE MASS PERSISTS IN RECOILING FROM
PRIMITIVE EXTENSIONS THAT CULMINATE ON DUPLICATE SIDES
WHERE FLESHY SUMMIT RIDGES OUTLINED IN THEIR
ROUNDNESS TILT TOWARD THE NORTH DEPRESSING PLACES
OF ERRATIC CONVERGENCES THAT THE DESERTED SLOPES
TO THE BENEFIT OF CRESTS MORE ACCIDENTAL IN THEIR
DOING WHEN THEY SHARE EXUBERANT WATERS FRAYING
OVER THE STEPPED SPURS OF WHERE THE UNDULATING HEIGHTS
DRAW AWKWARDLY THEIR CLIMBS DISAPPEARING ON THE FLANK

I had a short consultation with my father about translating "AU PROFIT DES CRETES" to "TO THE BENEFIT OF CRESTS" instead of "TO THE PROFIT OF CRESTS." I'm also not happy with "DEPRESSING" as that's got another connotation in English that overpowers the meaning of the French. I'll have to resort to the dictionary of geological terms to find some alternatives. But ultimately, all of the above lines, after this first rough translation, must be put into a line of 48 characters, per Metail's original Oulipian form. So enjoy what you see above as it will be changed, as summits tilt and waters fray, to perhaps unrecognizable form.

On the griot trail

Bob Holman and Papa Susso's blog on filming endangered languages in West Africa. Be prepared to be riveted. I look even more forward to one day taking Ismael (my wee griot) to Senegal.