A Fatal line
“Lo Fatal” is one of Dario’s most beautiful poems. The poem was published in 1905 in Dario’s book Cantos de Vida y Esperanza. The beauty of the poem matches the beauty of what many believe to be Dario’s most beautiful poem, “La Princesa Esta Triste”, and its wisdom parallels that of “Canción del Otoño en Primavera”. Overall, this mixture of beauty and wisdom makes me hold Dario’s poem so highly that if a man had to spend his entire life struggling to master the Spanish language just so that one day he could read “Lo Fatal”, I would consider that man an accomplished man. Therefore, when a translator venture in attempting to translate Dario’s poem, he has to understand that although nobody is expecting perfection we will all demand it. I will be concentrating my analysis on one or two verses of the poem that I have seen them translated many times a bit oddly.
Since, all the odd translations of these verses are similar I will use Lysander Kemp translation as a representation of the group. Lysander Kemp starts by translating the first line of “Lo Fatal”, “Dichoso el árbol, que es apenas sensitivo” into “The tree is happy because it is scarcely sentient”. “Happy” is a poorly placed word. Indeed, “dichoso” can mean happy but in this context its meaning is more similar to fortune or luck. For example, one can use “dishoso” in the following two ways ” yo tuve la dicha que no me pidieron papeles en la frontera” or “estamos dichosos de contar con su presencia”.In the first case “dishoso” is being used as fortune or luck and in the second instance is being used as happiness. The second verse of “Lo Fatal” “y más la piedra dura porque esa ya no siente,” translated by Kemp as “the hard rock is happier still, it feels nothing” clarifies that Dario intended to use “dishoso” as fortunate or lucky. Because how can a rock that feels nothing be more happy? Well it would only make sense if Dario finds no virtue in happiness at all. But recall that in this same book Dario will write some of his most famous verses “Juventud, divino tesoro, ¡ya te vas para no volver!” therefore Dario clearly acknowledges the values of happiness. Dario’s is just saying that it would be preferable not to feel at all because life is mostly pain.
In other words the ephemeral moments of happiness that a person gets to feel through life do not justify the degree in which one has to suffer. Finally, if Dario wanted to use happiness well he could have used the direct translation “felicidad”. The fact that he chose not to, proves that he did not mean to use it. In my opinion the most appropriate term in translation is the word “bless”. Because it captures the true meaning of Dario’s words, the blessing is not to not feel happiness, the blessing is not to feel anything. I personally believe Dario would agree with me.