Translating the "Grey tower"

The next poem is a kind of a lullaby Vlada (one of the creators) sings to her wounded apprentice as he falls asleep. Nobody knows who wrote it, maybe she did. It tells us about the lost love between her and another creator, Sereg, but doesn’t go into details. It sounds sad, but not dark. The poem gives us some hints about the creators’ past and the main character’s future, so they should be preserved in the translation:

The Grey Tower (or just the tower), an important location in the story. You may keep the open windows as well. It’s not crucial, but may be a nice detail, because later we’ll learn that Sereg likes his rooms cold and open windows are quite usual in his tower.
Key to happiness. It’s the creators’ lost son. They tried to fill the void by creating Omnis (the world), but it didn’t help much.
North and South. The two parts of the world where the creators live, far away from each other, most of the time.

Original Russian text:

С давних лет, с давних пор
Эта башня за миром глядит.
С острых северных гор
Снег в открытые окна летит.
Завывают ветра,
Одинокие песни поют
И печальные вести
На крыльях холодных несут.

Эта башня не дремлет;
Пространства пред нею, как стол.
Вновь в далекие земли
Хозяин суровый ушел.
Ветер с Юга примчался
И скорую встречу сулил
С той, кого он когда-то
Давно очень сильно любил.

Так случается часто,
Что сводит их вместе беда.
Ключ потерян от счастья,
Его не найти никогда.

My rough translation:

Since the ancient times
This tower watches the world.
From the sharp peaks of northern mountains
Snow flies into its open windows.
Winds howl
Their lonely songs
Bringing sad news
On their wings.

This tower never sleeps,
The lands are seen like a table before it.
Again into far away lands
Its stern lord went.
Warm wind came from the South
And promised him he’d meet again
The one he used to love
A long time ago.

It happens often
That some trouble drives them together,
But the key to their happiness is forever lost
And can never be found again.

---

Translation by Alan Jackson + his comments:

So I’ve cheated here – but a lullaby in English always has verses of the same length. I had an obvious option: split both the first two verses, making five verses. But the second half of the first verse looks startlingly different in your English version – a big contrast in line length and in rhythm to the rest, and it doesn’t seem to advance the story; why not treat it differently, I thought: why not make it a chorus! Yes, the Russian probably doesn’t justify it, but OK, sue me. On the metre: this is absolutely the sort of thing ballad metre lives for, hiding depths under a cool, casual, innocent, apparently naïve surface. The chorus: I tried to shorten the lines to resemble the English you sent, but I was only partly successful. It’s a song so I’ve given you a very simple tune to sing the English to – I bet it doesn’t fit the Russian!!

The tune is adapted from a Welsh traditional melody: Llangloffan

From long ago, from days of old
The Grey Tower guards the world
Where snow from northern mountains cold
Through open windows swirled
Hark! The winds are singing
Howling, loud and shrill,
Hark! The winds are bringing
Sad news and chill

Unsleeping, o’er the wide world’s spread
The Grey Tower keeps its stand
Again, again its stern lord sped
To some far distant land
Hark! The winds are singing
Howling, loud and shrill,
Hark! The winds are bringing
Sad news and chill

From southern realms with promise good
He heard the warm wind blow;
He’d meet again the one he loved
So many years ago
Hark! The winds are singing
Howling, loud and shrill,
Hark! The winds are bringing
Sad news and chill

And yet though oft some troubles draw
Them near, but still apart,
Their key of happiness is no more –
No meeting there of heart
Hark! The winds are singing
Howling, loud and shrill,
Hark! The winds are bringing
Sad news and chill



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About the project:
My scifi and fantasy novels have a lot of poems in them that can not be removed without destroying the plot. Alas, my English in not good enough for translating poetry. Alan Jackson helps me translate the poems. It makes the translation of my novels possible.

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Random stuff

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McColl34:
Faith and Hope are fairly common English names. Love is not used as a name as often. It is not unheard of, but not as common. The trio of names first appeared in the Bible (I assume it was first appearance, the letters to the Corinthians were written about 1,900 years ago). Specifically, in First Corinthians 13:13, "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." In the original Greek, they would be "πιστις" (pistis), "ελπις" (elpis) and "αγαπη" (agape).
Norns (Wyrd, Vernandi, and Skuld) come from North mythology, but there are similar mystical creatures (three women - old, middle aged, and young - having something to do with fate) in many different cultures, including Greek.
Aprillen:
The Norns were indeed Fates -- Urd means "fate", Verdandi means "in the making" and Skuld means "future". They would sit at the foot of the World Tree and measure out peoples lives and destinies. (Urd=Wyrd; I'm used to the modernised Norse variants of the names since I'm Scandinavian.)
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I'm a cruel author. Not George Martin style cruel, but still...
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McColl34:
Smoky Is a common name for grey or greyish cats. Socks is also fairly common for cats with different color fur on their feet.

Mildegard:
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Jourell:
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Jourell:
What we think of as fairy tales and folk tales were originally a lot darker and didn't always have a happy ending. Children weren't necessarily considered different, they had to be taught lessons in a world that was generally a lot harder than it was today. there were often morals yes, but they were as much warnings of things that could happen. For example Hansel and Gretal was about the dangers of trusting strangers, particularly if they deliberately tried to attract children to them. Red Riding hood had sexual undertones and was a warning against rapists. In Cinderella one of the ugly stepsisters cuts off part of her foot to try to fit inside the shoe and the blood gives her away.
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Jude Wilkins:
Was there a Norn before Faith? Otherwise how do the embryos get implanted a woman in each generation? Thinking that since Hope is 24, Faith is likely around twice as old. So wouldn't Faith surrogate mother still be around or is the life expectancy shortened because of all that happened?

Mildegard:
Yes, there were many Norns before Faith. They go in and out of cryosleep as the situation demands and take shifts. Three are awake at every given time, but it's not always the same three.
Jude Wilkins:
I'm curious to see what size Faith is compared to Nolan. If Hope is 24 years old, she's an adult but she's so small compared to Nolan plus she looks childlike still. Is Nolan larger than the people being grown from the embryo stage or is this something that you'll explain later?

Mildegard:
Nolan is tall, but not extraordinary tall. Just about 190 cm (no more than 40 cm taller than Hope).
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Nolan's case: he no longer carries the virus and his immune system is mad at his own body cells. We can give him the drug and it might work, but once we remove it the effect won't last long. The drug will have to be present in his bloodstream every minute of his life (hello side effects and a deadly overdose!) just like the nanites he survived on. In theory, we can prolong his life for some days/weeks with the said drug but it will be torture and not really a solution. The solution is reprogramming his immune system so it wouldn't see him as an enemy anymore.
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No donation is too small. Where I live 1$ can buy me a tasty protein-rich lunch or two bus tickets.
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See a typo or a badly translated phrase? Tell me about it and I'll fix it as soon as I can.
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"Gifts of wandering ice" has a Discord channel. You can chat with me and the other readers there.
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Jan
"Nightmares are fun and so much better than life".
Jan
"The world is so real it hurts".
Elie
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Что случилось с русской версией комикса "Дары бродячих льдов"?
Комикс Дары бродячих льдов перезапущен в новом формате на сайте mildegard.ru
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GWI has a store with 1$ books and juicy freebies! Check it out :)
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Did you know that there is a way to support the author of GWI without spending your money? Here you go: download Tapas app, subscribe to one of Olga's stories on Tapas, earn Tapas Ink in the app by watching ads or playing games, donate the ink. Easy :)
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