It’s almost certainly a fool’s errand for someone like me, whose Spanish has such a limited scope, to attempt translating César Vallejo. His language is famously thorny in the original, and the temptation in bringing him over into English is either to be as literal as possible or to sand away his edges by over-demystifying his torqued tropes. I’ve taken the middle road. In the end, I have to admit that I don’t comprehend the poem, though I feel I understand it, and I know I haven’t served it as well as it deserves.Read More