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POEMS OF THE RIVERS WANG. - Wang Wei
Madrid, Publishing house Trotta, 2004. Translation and edition of Pilar González España.
In the last years there have been published in Spain diverse translations of Chinese classic poetry, especially of the Chinese poetry of the dynasty Tang. For example, of the book that occupies us, Poems of the river Wang, of Wang Wei, we have two translations in Spanish very next in the time of his publication: the first translation belonged to Juan Ignacio Preciado, with the collaboration of Clara Janés (Editions of the East and the Mediterranean, 1999), and this second of Pilar González España. Neither it is necessary to forget the translation realized by Anne-Hélène Suárez on the same poet (99 quartets of Wang Wei and his circle, Pretexts, 2000). These translations have achieved that the name of Wang Wei is already not a whole not known in the ambience of the Spanish poetry and that his poetry is located at a height of others big poets of the dynasty Tang, like Li Bai (701-762), Du Fu (712-770) and Bai Juyi (772-846).
The edition that Pilar González España has realized is inspired in the one that was his doctoral thesis. It includes two translations, more literal (along with the Chinese original text) and another personal version of the translator, what allows to appreciate the work in the movement process; the authoress believes that the literal translation "not only harms extremely to the perception that there could have the western reader of the Chinese language, but, also, it deforms completely the message, in this case, poetically. The Chinese reader, on having read a poem, understands the meaning of the same one across semantic blocks, as it happens with any other western language." Also, every poem is accompanied by a comment of the translator, less academicista and closer to the poetical essay.
Wang Wei (699-761) is one of the big poets of the Chinese classic literature. Also he was a big painter, founder of the called "school of the south of painting." This artistic facet is tied closely to his poetry, because Wang Wei was the big poet of the poetry of scenery. To approach his work, the reader must bear in mind the religious currents and of thought that they fed spiritually to the poet: the Taoism and the Buddhism "chan" (Zen, in Japan). In the beginning, imbued by the most anxious spirit of the youth, the Taoism illuminated his meaning of life; later the Buddhism would mark his existence. Wang Wei bought to himself a house to the outskirts of the capital, along with the river Wang, where the poems of this book consisted. After his mother died, he constructed a temple in his memory. Immersed in this nature, accompanied by his good friend Pei I Gave, he lived in harmony in entire solitude, dedicated to the meditation, vanishing in the scenery as one more element of the nature. Wang Wei was always of solitary and friendly character of the retirement; along with the river Wang it found the perfect place to move away from the complicated world of the Court. The voice of the man vanishes in the middle of the mountains and the forests. In the same place it found a peace refuge after the rough riot of An Lushan, which would mark one earlier and later in the history of the dynasty Tang, when he had to suffer a period of prison accused of treachery.
The poems of the river Wang consist of 20 poems, of four poems each one; every poem is formed by five characters. The Nature is the extract of the whole work. The contemplation, the meditation, the quietude and the solitude are the distinctive features that mark the reading of these poems. Wang Wei achieves the plenitude with the scenery poetry. His pictorial facet cannot come undone of his poetical creation. Two arts come together in his way of expressing themselves and of showing his artistic sensibility. Painting and poetry, poetry and painting. The way: the scenery, the interiorización of the contemplation of the nature across the word.
In sum, this version of Wang Wei is a very finished contribution of one of the most important poets of the dynasty Tang, the Golden Age of the Chinese poetry, which it never stops surprising us for his high lyric quality.
JAVIER MARTÍN RIVERS
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