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| Umberto Boccioni, La strada entra nella casa, 1911 |
This is Bora Mici's original loose translation of Gianni Rodari's poem for children Proverbi, or Proverbs in English. The challenge of this translation was to maintain the simplicity of the original, while translating the proverbs accurately. In this process, some of the original directness and succinctness was lost, but the overall spirit and playful tone is still there. I also thought this would be an appropriate translation given the current climate of solidarity and group action around the world. Gianni Rodari always furnishes a great political lesson through his seemingly innocent wordplay and playful inventions for little children in Italian. This translation and the others I have completed and published on Arttists Speak are derived from his collection of poetry and short stories Il libro degli errori, The Book of Errors, which features the redoubtable Professor Grammaticus, on his quixotic journey to correct orthographic errors around Italy, and the unhinged twins Marco and Mirco, out to butcher the Italian language deliberately and disobediently, among other morally encouraging critical pieces like this one.
A proverb from bygone times is a litany
“Better alone than in bad company”
We should examine another at length
They say “Unity makes strength.”
Who knows why, a proverb we should shelf
Says “If you want it done, do it yourself”
I don’t hear well out of this ear, I’d bet a zillion
“A thousand friends are worth a million”
A moldy proverb thinks I’ll burst his bubble:
“A lonely man keeps out of trouble”
I say this is a patent lie
“The more the merrier,” my rallying cry.
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