Dulce et Decorum Est...

A Reuters story notes that Marines aboard the USS Peleliu are taking time between routine training chores to study anger management and World War I poetry.

Among the favorites, apparently, is Wilfred Owen's Dulce et Decorum Est, a poem that is new to me. The title is Latin, and translates as "It is sweet and right." It is the first "half" of a famous line from Horace, which ends: Pro patria mori ("to die for your country.") The line was apparently widely understood and often quoted at the start of the Great War.

DULCE ET DECORUM EST

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! -- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.

8 October 1917 - March, 1918

* * *It's almost 7 am; time to finish dressing and go downstairs and join the general flail.

Cheers...

Oh, my aching throat...

One of the main reasons for attending a conference such as this one, of the American Translators Association, is to take advantage of the opportunity to network with other folks.

And to renew acquaintances with colleagues.

I met a bunch of people this morning at the opening session of the association, and took the second half of the morning off, in order to go out and find a pair of black shoes to go with my suit for my talk tomorrow and for a couple of evening activities that also involve suits on Friday and Saturday nights.

The afternoon was taken up with the annual meeting of the Slavic Languages Division and with the fourth in a series of lectures devoted to the Division's founder, a little old lady from Flushing, New York by the name of Susana Greiss. This year's speaker was Patricia Newman, who used to work at the national lab at Sandia, New Mexico until a couple of years ago, and who also was instrumental in bringing to completion the fourth edition of a standard dictionary among translators who work from Russian to English folks, the Callaham's Russian-English Dictionary of Science and Technology, first compiled by Lyudmilla Ignatiev Callaham many years ago.

The annual meeting went well. Nora F. was elected to a two-year term as division administrator, and your humble servant was elected to a similar terms as the division assistant administrator. The talk by Newman went very well, too. I found it inspiring, actually, and even felt a pang of regret that I was not able to have made the acquaintance of Ms. Callaham prior to her death in 1990. Pat's recollections and reading of excerpts from her correspondence with Callaham was very well receivedl, and I must admit to a moment or two during which my eyes teared up. It turns out I can be a sentimental slob, too.

Lunch was taken at a quasi-Japanese fast take-out place across Grand and down in the direction of 7th. (We are well and truly in downtown L.A.) Dinner - can one eat dinner at McDonald's? - consisted of a bratwurst and a strawberry shake. Normally, that combination would make me queasy, but I had very stimulating company on the road to and from the Golden Arches.

The annual "networking session" started at 7 pm. Part of the effect is lost by people tending to clump together by language (Slavic, Nordic, etc.) and interest (technical, literary, etc.). After all, most folks already know their colleagues who work in the same language pair, and although it would seem that you're not likely to get work from people who - basically - are competing with you, the reality is that every translator gets overloaded from time to time, and knowing someone (or several someones) who will not screw up a part of your assignment is a Good Thing.

Too, while it is possible to exchange cards with someone in the same language combination who does not work in the same subject areas, or who works in the opposite "direction," the major opportunity afforded by a session such as this is meeting new people.So, I made a point of circulating and distributing a large number of my business cards to people I'd never seen before in my life

It is shortly after 8 pm as I type this, and I'm recovering in my room in preparation for an evening "literary café" event, a recent wrinkle at these conferences. This will be my first. I have well and truly no idea what is supposed to happen at this shindig.

I've looked at my presentation one more time and rehearsed it, though not all the way through in one pass. I feel more and more confident as I review the slides, and believe I am ready. The hour of truth (actually, three-quarters of an hour) comes tomorrow morning.

Cheers...