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First ProZ.com Translation Contest 2007: "First ProZ.com Translation Contest 2007" » English to Spanish » Entry by Alfredo Tanús

Source text in English

Translation by Alfredo Tanús (#24)

When she moved into his tiny house in Stroud, and took charge of his four small children, Mother was thirty and still quite handsome. She had not, I suppose, met anyone like him before. This rather priggish young man, with his devout gentility, his airs and manners, his music and ambitions, his charm, bright talk, and undeniable good looks, overwhelmed her as soon as she saw him. So she fell in love with him immediately, and remained in love for ever. And herself being comely, sensitive, and adoring, she attracted my father also. And so he married her. And so later he left her - with his children and some more of her own.

When he'd gone, she brought us to the village and waited. She waited for thirty years. I don't think she ever knew what had made him desert her, though the reasons seemed clear enough. She was too honest, too natural for this frightened man; too remote from his tidy laws. She was, after all, a country girl; disordered, hysterical, loving. She was muddled and mischievous as a chimney-jackdaw, she made her nest of rags and jewels, was happy in the sunlight, squawked loudly at danger, pried and was insatiably curious, forgot when to eat or ate all day, and sang when sunsets were red. She lived by the easy laws of the hedgerow, loved the world, and made no plans, had a quick holy eye for natural wonders and couldn't have kept a neat house for her life. What my father wished for was something quite different, something she could never give him - the protective order of an unimpeachable suburbia, which was what he got in the end.

The three or four years Mother spent with my father she fed on for the rest of her life. Her happiness at that time was something she guarded as though it must ensure his eventual return. She would talk about it almost in awe, not that it had ceased but that it had happened at all.
Cuando ella se mudó a su diminuta casa en Stroud, y se hizo cargo de sus cuatro hijos pequeños, Mamá tenía treinta y todavía estaba bastante saludable. Supongo que nunca había conocido a alguien como él antes. Este joven bastante moralista, con su devota gentileza, sus aires y modos, su música y sus ambiciones, su carisma, su conversación animada y su innegable atractivo, la abrumó apenas lo vio. Entonces se enamoró de él inmediatamente, y continuó enamorada para siempre. Y ella, atractiva, sensible y adorable, también enamoró a mi padre. Entonces él se casó con ella. Y más tarde la dejó – junto a sus hijos y algunos más de ella.

Cuando él se fue, ella nos trajo al pueblo y esperó. Esperó durante treinta años. Creo que ella nunca supo que fue lo que motivó su abandono, aunque las razones parecían estar bien claras. Ella era muy honesta, demasiado natural para este hombre temeroso; muy alejada de sus prolijas leyes. Después de todo, ella era una campesina; desordenada, histérica, amorosa. Era desordenada y peleadora como un cuervo de chimenea, hacía su nido con trapos y joyas, era feliz al rayo del sol, chillaba fuerte cuando estaba en peligro, era metida y una curiosa insaciable, se olvidaba de comer o comía todo el día, y cantaba cuando los atardeceres se ponían rojos. Ella vivió bajo las simples leyes de la naturaleza, amó al mundo y no hizo planes, era muy buena para captar las maravillas de la naturaleza y no pudo mantener su casa en orden en toda su vida. Lo que mi padre deseaba era algo bastante diferente, algo que ella nunca pudo darle – el orden protector de una irreprochable vida suburbana, que fue lo que él finalmente obtuvo.

Mamá se alimentó durante toda su vida de los tres o cuatro años que pasó junto a mi padre. Atesoraba la felicidad de aquellos tiempos como si ello asegurara su eventual retorno. Hablaba de aquello casi con admiración, no como si hubiera terminado sino como si nunca hubiera ocurrido.
[Subject edited by staff or moderator 2007-02-12 16:39]