This last century has been one of the world's most decisive eras. Progress in all fields has been lightning fast and spectacular - another Renaissance, whose technologically "upgraded" alchemy has changed the face of the earth radically and irrevocably. And of course, art and poetry had to reflect all the unavoidable vicissitudes, while also keeping an eye on its equally inescapable archetypal foundations.
Folk or formal, classical or modern, rhymed or in free verse, idyllic or melancholy, from any country and in any language, poetry is the most reliable vehicle for a dream trip through time and space, in the known and unknown universe.
The Sonnets to His Dark Love (Sonetos del Amor Oscuro - written in 1936 and published posthumously, in 1983) are Lorca's last poetic work, inspired by the style and themes of San Juan de la Cruz, Shakespeare and Gongora. They are his personal statement about love and poetic art, made even more poignant by the fact that he was arrested and executed by his country's dictatorial government the very same year the poems were written. The Sonnets are therefore not a complete work, cut horifically short by the poet's unjust and untimely death at the age of 37.
Translation is more than the mere issue of a mental process. It is both an intellectual enterprise and a physical task. Things become even more difficult when having to deal with a literary text: literature has its own determining features, and language, the instrument of its expression, is a self-sufficient living system in which every presupposition of perfection has been fulfilled. The risks a translator is obliged to take in this case are much similar to those taken by a surgeon who performs a delicate operation: although the result may perfectly be accomplished under conditions of utmost conscientiousness and knowledge, nothing can guarantee that the patient will eventually survive. In fact, a literary text rarely manages to survive without any more or less serious damages when transferred from one language into another. The task is excessively hazardous; skill in manipulating written speech is as essential as profound linguistic intuition and instruction; a wide spectrum of academic information is as indispensable as personal sensitivity to the subject one is occupied with.
