Books - Gavinicuss Books
The Complete Poetry and Translations of Clark Ashton Smith, Volume 3, Hardback
By: by Clark Ashton Smith, edited by S.T. Joshi and David E. Schultz
$50.00
Hippocampus Press ( May 2007)
ISBN: 0977173429
In addition to being a prolific and innovative poet in his own right, Clark Ashton Smith was a noted translator of French and Spanish poetry. Teaching himself French in the mid-1920s, Smith undertook the ambitious program of translating the entirety of Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil) into English.
Over the next several years he succeeded in translating all but six of the 157 poems that comprised the definitive (1868) edition of Les Fleurs du mal. Smith would begin with a relatively literal prose translation and would later render it into verse; in the end, Smith versified about a third of the poems, the rest remaining in prose.
His mentor George Sterling testified to the remarkable spiritual affinity between Smith and Baudelaire, rendering him the perfect translator of this difficult poet. Smith also translated other noteworthy French poets-Paul Verlaine, Victor Hugo, Alfred de Musset, and Théophile Gautier, among others-as well as such obscure poets as Marie Dauguet and Tristan Klingsor. In the 1940s Smith taught himself Spanish, making splendid verse translations of such poets as Amado Nervo, Gustavo Adolfo Becquer, and and Jorge Isaacs. The great majority of the poems included in this volume are unpublished.
The current edition presents, for the first time, Smith's complete translations in French and Spanish, also printing the French and Spanish texts on facing pages. All texts are annotated by S. T. Joshi and David E. Schultz.
Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961) is a towering figure in American poetry and in the literature of fantasy and horror. Born and raised in California, Smith early fell under the tutelage of George Sterling, and later established friendships with H. P. Lovecraft, August Derleth, Benjamin de Casseres, and other leading figures. His tales of exotic fantasy have achieved a worldwide audience, while his meticulously crafted poetry, published here in a complete edition for the first time, will establish him as a leading poetic voice in his time.
S. T. Joshi is a leading authority on H. P. Lovecraft, Lord Dunsany, and other writers of fantasy and horror. He is the author of The Weird Tale (1990) and H. P. Lovecraft: A Life (1996) and the coeditor of World Supernatural Literature: An Encyclopedia. He has edited Smith's juvenile novel, The Black Diamonds, for Hippocampus Press. David E. Schultz is a pioneering scholar on H. P. Lovecraft. He is the editor of Lovecraft's Commonplace Book (1987) and the coeditor (with S. T. Joshi) of Smith's The Last Oblivion: Best Fantastic Poems (2003) and The Shadow of the Unattained: The Letters of George Sterling and Clark Ashton Smith (2005).
Table of contents
Introduction
Les Fleurs du mal, by Charles Baudelaire
Preface
Spleen et Idéal
I. Bénédiction
II. The Albatross
III. Elevation
IV. Correspondences
V.
VI. The Beacons
VII. The Sick Muse
VIII. La Muse vénale
IX. The Evil Monk
X. L'Ennemi
XI. Le Guignon
XII. Anterior Life
XIII. Travelling Gypsies
XIV. L'Homme et la Mer
XV. Don Juan aux Enfers
XVI. To Theodore de Banville
XVII. Chastisement of Pride
XVIII. Beauty
XIX. The Ideal
XX. The Giantess
XXI. Le Masque
XXII. Hymn to Beauty
XXIII. Exotic Perfume
XXIV. The Chevelure
XXV.
XXVI.
XXVII. Sed non Satiata
XXVIII.
XXIX. Le Serpent qui danse
XXX. Une Charogne
XXXI. De profundis clamavi
XXXII. The Vampire
XXXIII.
XXXIV. The Remorse of the Dead
XXXV. The Cat
XXXVI. The Duel
XXXVII. The Balcony
XXXVIII. The Possessed
XXXIX. Une Fantôme
XL.
XLI. Semper Eadem
XLII. Tout entière
XLIII.
XLIV. Le Flambeau vivant
XLV. Réversibilité
XLVI. Confession
XLVII. The Spiritual Dawn
XLVIII. Evening Harmony
XLIX. Le Flacon
L. The Poison
LI. Doubtful Skies
LII. Le Chat
LIII. Le Beau Navire
LIV. L'Invitation au voyage
LV. The Irreparable
LVI. Causerie
LVII. Song of Autumn
LVIII. A une Madone
LIX. Chanson d'après-midi
LX. Sisina
LXI. Vers pour le portrait d'Honoré Daumier
LXII. Franciscæ meæ laudes
LXIII. A une Dame créole
LXIII. To a Creole Lady
LXIV. Mœsta et errabunda
LXV. The Phantom
LXVI. Sonnet d'automne
LXVII. Tristesses de la lune
LXVIII. The Cats
LXIX. The Owls
LXX. La Pipe
LXXI. La Musique
LXXII. Sépulture
LXXIII. Une Gravure fantastique
LXXIV. Le Mort joyeux
LXXV. The Barrel of Hate
LXXVI. La Cloche fêlée
LXXVII. Spleen
LXXVIII. Spleen
LXXX. Spleen
LXXXI. Obsession
LXXXIII. Alchemy of Sorrow
LXXXIV. Horreur sympathique
LXXXIV. Sympathetic Horror
LXXXV. Le Calumet de Paix
LXXXVI. A Pagan's Prayer
LXXXVII. The Cover
LXXXVIII. L'Imprévu
LXXXIX. Examination at Midnight
XC. Madrigal of Sorrow
XCI. The Adviser
XCII. To a Malabaress
XCIII. The Voice
XCIV. Hymn
XCV. The Rebel
XCVI. The Eyes of Bertha
XCVII. The Fountain
XCVIII. La Rançon
XCIX. Very Far from Here
C. Le Coucher du Soleil Romantique
CI. On "Tasso in Prison" by Eugène Delacroix
CII. The Gulf
CIII. The Lament of Icarus
CIV. Contemplation
CV. L'Héautontimorouménos
CVI. The Irremediable
CVII. The Clock
Tableaux Parisiens
CVIII. Paysage
CIX. The Sun
CX. Lola de Valence
CXI. La Lune offensée
CXII. A une Mendiante rousse
CXIII. Le Cygne
CXIV. Les sept Vieillards
CXV. Les Petites Vieilles
CXVI. The Blind
CXVII. To a Passer-by
CXVIII. The Toiling Skeleton
CXIX. Evening Twilight
CXX. The Game
CXXI. The Dance of Death
CXXII. The Love of Falsehood
CXXIII.
CXXIV.
CXXV. Mists and Rains
CXXVI. A Parisian Dream
CXXVII. Le Crépuscule du matin
Le Vin
CXXVIII. L'Ame du vin
CXXIX. The Wine of the Rag-Pickers
CXXX. The Wine of the Assassin
CXXXI. The Wine of the Solitary
CXXXII. The Wine of Lovers
Les Fleurs du Mal
CXXXIII. Epigraph for a Condemned Book
CXXXIV. Destruction
CXXXV. Une Martyre
CXXXVI. Femmes damnées
CXXXVII. The Two Kind Sisters
CXXXVIII. The Fountain of Blood
CXXXIX. Allégorie
CXL. Beatrice
CXLI. Un voyage à Cythère
CXLII. Love and the Cranium
Révolte
CXLIII. The Denial of St. Peter
CXLIV. Abel et Caïn
CXLV. Litany to Satan
La Mort
CXLVI. The Death of Lovers
CXLVII. La Mort des pauvres
CXLVIII. La Mort des artistes
CXLIX. La Fin de la journée
CL. La Rêve d'un curieux
CLI. The Voyage
[Jetsam]
I. Les Bijoux
II. Lethe
III. To Her Who Is Too Gay
IV. Lesbos
V. Femmes damnées: Delphine et Hippolyte
VI. The Metamorphoses of the Vampire
Translations from the French
Marie Dauguet
[Untitled]
Théophile Gautier
The Flower-Pot
The Impassible
Pastel
Gérard de Nerval
Artemis
Golden Verses
José-Maria de Heredia
Antony and Cleopatra
The Coral Reef
La Dogaresse
Nemea
Oblivion
On a Broken Statue
The Samurai
A Setting Sun
The Stained Window
Victor Hugo
Twilight
What One Hears on the Mountain
The Wheel of Omphale
Tristan Klingsor
Plaisir d'Amour
Alphonse Louis Marie de Lamartine
The Lake
Charles Marie René Leconte de Lisle
The Black Panther
Ecclesiastes
The Exhibitionists
The Howlers
The Sleep of the Condor
Solvet Seclum
Charles van Lerberghe
Song
Pierre Lièvre
Elysian Landscape
The End of Supper
Stuart Merrill
A Woman at Prayer
Alfred de Musset
Remember Thee
Song
Sully Prudhomme
Siesta
Albert Samain
I Dream
[Myrtil and Palemone]
Fernand Severin
Sonnet
Paul Verlaine
IX (Ariettes Oubliées)
Il Bacio
La Bonne Chanson
Crimen Amoris
En Sourdine
The Faun
Green
Moonlight
Song from Les Uns et Les Autres
Spleen
To a Woman
Translations from the Spanish
Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer
Invocation
The Sower
Where?
The World Rolls On
José A. Calcaño
The Cypress
José Santos Chocaño
The Sleep of the Cayman
Rubén Darío
The Song of Songs
Juana de Ibarbourou
Rustic Life
Jorge Isaacs
Luminary
Juan Lozano y Lozano
Rhythm
Amado Nervo
Night
Appendix
The Peace-Pipe
XXVII. Sed Non Satiata
LV. L'Irréparable
CXLI. Un Voyage à Cythère
Notes
Index of Titles
Index of First Lines