Zukofsky, Pound, and the dialect of the tribe

[J. Scappettone]

Dear all,

A bit more fodder for tomorrow's discussion, on the subject of purifying (or further contaminating) the "dialect of the tribe": I couldn't resist "boddering" you with another pregnant juxtaposition of Louis Zukofsky's second-wave modernism with that of his predecessors—here placing him in explicit dialogue with Ezra Pound.

In his 1940 study for “A”-9 ("A" being Zukofsky's own epic poem in the making), Zukofsky created one of the wittiest and most trenchant dialect poems of (so-called "Second-Wave") modernism: “A foin lass bodders” (translation: "A fine lass bothers"), his translation of Guido Cavalcanti’s 13th century poem "Donna mi Prega" into Brooklynese (itself a foil for Yiddish dialect).

It is a response to Ezra Pound’s 1928 translation of “Donna mi Prega”:

Because a lady asks me, I would tell
Of an affect that comes often and is fell
And is so overweening: Love by name.
E'en its deniers can now hear the truth,
I for the nonce to them that know it call,
Having no hope at all
that man who is base in heart
Can bear his part of wit …

Here is Zukofsky:

A foin lass bodders me I gotta tell her
Of a fact surely, so unrurly, often'
'r 't comes 'tcan't soften its proud neck's called love mm . . .
Even me brudders dead drunk in dare cellar
Feel it dough poorly 'n yrs. trurly rough 'n
His way ain't so tough 'n he can't speak form above mm . . .
'n' wid proper rational understandin'  … 

The entirety of Zukofsky's poem can be found in a volume by Hugh Kenner, here: http://books.google.com/books?id=CS7lEYCPKEUC&pg=PA122&lpg=PA122&dq=a+foin+lass+bodders&source=bl&ots=Bq0__I5wvL&sig=QqtQabgF6mzZ3NJRs0ephz6qlaE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=M6tlUc_oLMTr2wWCw4DADA&ved=0CD0Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=a%20foin%20lass%20bodders&f=false

and the full poem by Pound can be found in a pinch here: http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/donna-mi-prega/

"A foin lass" is performed by Zukofsky in a fascinating manner at
http://media.sas.upenn.edu/Pennsound/authors/Zukofsky/Kenner-1975/Zuk…

(compare this performance, if interested, with Pound's performances of his poetry; a pertinent example is the subject of a recent PennSound "PoemTalk" episode:
http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/daily/200811.php#14_16:16 )

And performed by Charles Bernstein in a very different way at
http://media.sas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Bernstein/McGann-Session…

A helpful link by Zukofsky's biographer, Mark Scroggins:
http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/zukofsky/bio.htm