Dear Rubén,
It was not my intention to distance myself, but things have been complicated, lately, and much has changed since we last spoke. I now study with citizens of the empire and well before you rush to judge me let me just say that you may be surprised to know that for the most part they are good people. Most of them are either against the actions of the empire or are simply unaware of them. Truth be told, my affections for them has grown so strong that I now consider them my brothers and sisters. For the most part my life is easier in this side of the border. I spend most of my time studying mathematics and although it is not easy, compared to before, I have little to complain about.
However, I do worry that the price of assimilating into this culture is to surrender my Latin American identity. The system constantly lectures me into what it means to be a Latin America. According to them, we are lazy and bad at math. We are bunch of machistas that discriminate and suppress women. We hate democracy and love Stalin’s communism. And most importantly, we are illegal. At times the propaganda is so successful that I want to just hand them my identity. I have tried to explain what we are about but now that I live in such privileged community whenever I speak about the protest, the speeches, the wars, the audacity and the nobility of our people, I feel like a man in search of a lost time.
This brings me to my main reason for writing to you. I translated into English “A Roosevelt”. Because it has always helped me understand the struggle of our Latin American brothers. Oddly, translating the poem has made me understand it even deeper. Thanks to the act of translation I now know every single word of it. I wanted to translate it so that others could understand our culture better, so that it helps remove the calumny that they have bestowed upon our identity. But I do not think my translation or any of the translation’s I read achieve this.
Nevertheless, translating “A Roosevelt” did give me a gift. Translating your poem helped me like few other things have in terms of preserving my identity. To me translating your poem has been like a cultured rebirth. Thanks to translation I now understand your words better and it was in the act translation that I was reminded of who we truly are and how far we have come.
Overall my experiences in translating your poem has reinforce my believe that the society that I now live in would benefit from a successful translations of your poem. I am wondering if you have any advice to offer regarding the translation of your poem. I know that you are not a translator, but if my memory serves me well you were always an eloquent man. And what are good friends for if we can’t borrow their wisdom. Let me give you an update on the situation we are in now, so that you can see why it is important to create a better translations of your poem.
On the front side, I am sure that you will be happy to hear that Spanish-America is no longer being suppress so vigorously and although a united Spanish-America has not risen into being we do remain a spiritually united people. Most importantly, the socio-economic situation has truly picked up in the region, and our brothers and sisters are now starting to finally enjoy relative peace. However, it breaks my heart to inform you that imperialism has never been as strong. It still traces its roots to Roosevelt, but to be fair the empire is slowly morphing into a ghost country that will sooner rather than later transcend even Roosevelt’s authority.
Terror runs deep in the veins of our species, and I fear that soon our hatred for each other will blind us into oblivion. Most of the terror is now concentrated in the Middle East and as a consequence, my Middle Eastern brothers are suffering like never before. The hypocrisy of the empire also has never been as strong. Whenever terror strikes the homes of my new brothers and sisters, Roosevelt’s newspapers do an excellent job at denouncing it. However, when Roosevelt and his accomplices are the authors of terrorist acts, you can’t even hear a pin drop in the defense of my Muslim brothers. Nevertheless, Roosevelt screams full of anger condemning the terrorists and killing millions of my Muslim brothers supposedly in the name of justice but we both know that Roosevelt’s actions are nothing more than a disproportional vengeance. At times one could swear that Roosevelt has forgotten the words of Shylock, If you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.
Since your poem, Ruben, was the source of inspiration for much of Spanish-America’s courage, I would love to ask you to write us another poem, but sadly we both know that your hands are tied in this one. So, translating it will have to do. The problem is that translators, like me, have failed to rescue the tone of your poem. There is no denying that English is a beautiful and resourceful language. Our good friend William Shakespeare proves that point, but some of the words in your poem are so attached to our history that I really feel frustrated by my inability to translate them. For example “Vive la America Española!” just doesn’t have a satisfactory translation. I mean “Alive is Spanish America” and “Hispanic America Lives” sound horrible to me, and yet they are more accurate than “Long live Spanish America”.
Lastly, I have to admit that it may be that I just do not master the English language sufficiently and therefore the failure to translate A Roosevelt properly into English is completely my own. Indeed translating your poem showed me that I have a lot to learn before I master the English language. Most importantly, translation has given me a better sense of the beauty of the English language because. I now am more connected with the musicality of the English language. Yet I do not only just feel that my translation failed to capture the essence of your poem. I feel that all the translations I have read have failed to satisfactorily translate your poem. Therefore if I am the problem, I am not only failing to find the essence of your poem in my translation, but I am failing to find it on all the other translations I have read. I much rather this would be the case, but I doubt it. I simply do not believe that my understanding of English is so poor that I would failed to recognize the essence of your poem in English. You should have found a copy of my translation when you opened the mail. I include it so that you can read it on your own time. As always I will await for your answer patiently.
Sincerely, hasta la victoria siempre
Felipe Pereira DeBayle.