A Change in Voice

Originated in a journal entry from 24th April

The hills around Santo Stefano Belbo, Pavese's birthplace. Photo Credit: langhe.net

It is no coincidence that the majority of what we learn about Pietro in the story comes from the mouths of other characters. The game of whispers which occurs in the village has its mouthpiece in Nino and his aunt. The seclusion of the hermit enables his personal mythology to develop but in actuality, he is just a man. If I am to translate this character then I need to know him, I need an understanding of his background, how he speaks, and the way he moulds language to express himself. Pavese leaves a hint to how the hermit might speak in that he “chewed on exotic words in his dialect” but to understand his voice fully I must de-mythologise him and reduce him from a semi-religious figure to a person who walks among us. Understanding his voice will allow me to “glimpse his experiences, his beliefs and his desires.”¹ Which is precisely my aim with this variant. The story will be told in his voice, from his hillside point of view.

As the last of the women departed, I took my bag and went out to check on the rabbits. The valley spilled from the mouth of my cave and the small stone path I had laid gave my feet a soft warmth in the sun of the morning. My traps were empty, but I had pelts from the day before to sell, so I walked towards the village. The cobbles of the piazza hummed with footsteps and children chased between the stalls. Colino, the young fisherman who sold his catches here once a week, caught my eye and called me over. We had visited many of the same ports and so enjoyed swapping stories from our time on the sea. After leaving the fishmonger I felt a thud against my legs and looked down to see a young boy. His eyes grew enormous, he mumbled an apology and ran after his friends. I got a good price for the pelts.

The summer was unforgiving on the hillside, even in this ventilated valley. I often walked down to the river to wash and cool off but after my turn to the market, I had a sense of being watched while I swam. Rustles in the bushes seemed louder than a bird or squirrel would have been. Most days, when the sun was at its highest and threw no shadows, I took my goat, Maria, into the woods to shelter and graze. As we approached home, I could hear the voices of two people, made louder by their echoes. One sounded familiar but I stayed in the shade of the woods, too exhausted from the temperature to speak with them.

“we’re going, we shouldn’t be here.” said the deeper voice in a harsh whisper.

A few minutes passed and they departed, the boy from the market leading a man I did not know, in the direction of the river. Their voices dropped away as the hill did. My cave was untouched except for a few splashes on the dusty floor. The chill of the intrusive breeze stuck to me that night. No matter the temperature during the day, the warmth never reached the deepest point in the hill. I took my waistcoat from the wall for a little more protection, burrowed my hands into the pockets expecting to find only warmth, but I pulled out a small, half-spent cigar. I smoked it until the flame snagged my fingers and I drifted to sleep in the headrush.

The days that followed were immense and scorched, they withered the lush hillside to a sandy brown. I set off before sunrise to set traps and forage for what fruit and berries hadn’t pruned completely. Once the labour was done, and night had not long given way to morning, I dragged myself to the river to escape the closeness which was already stifling. Trampling through the ferns and brambles, I reached the bank at the same time as the boy from the market emerged opposite. Joy and shock bobbed on the water between us.

“Are you supposed to be alone here?” I asked

“I’m not alone, you can keep an eye on me,” he replied as he began to undress.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“It’ll be fine, just rescue me if I start to drown.”

He waded until he was waist-deep in the water before starting to bathe. I didn’t know this boy, but that river could catch a foot and pull you under in a moment so, I felt compelled to stay. I sat on the hot pebbled shore with my feet in the water and the weight of responsibility on my shoulders.

The voice of the hermit, which I hear as I read this text, is layered. It’s one of a linguistic chameleon who picked up words and phrases from each port he visited. It’s one that is as comfortable speaking in languages which contort the mouth in strange ways as it is speaking its native language. I chose to incorporate that into this translation through Italianising words in his narration. Let’s take, for example, the sentence: “after my trip to the market”. The word ‘trip’ when used in this context, would be ‘giro’ in Italian. The next step would be to find an Italianised English equivalent of this word. The verb ‘girare’ is very close to ‘giro’ and means ‘to turn’ so a suitable solution would be to use the word ‘turn’ in place of ‘trip’. The result is a sentence which, while making sense to an English reader without any extra effort on their part, would emphasise the difference in the hermit’s use of language from the other characters in the story. The technique resulted in the changes of ‘left -> departed’, ‘cast -> threw’, ‘work -> labour’, to name a few, however using this too much would make the work feel clumsy, which would neither be readable nor representative of the hermit. The figure below will provide some clarity on the process used in these transformations.

“After my trip to the market”

A trip -> un giro -> girare -> to turn -> a turn

“After my turn to the market”

Given the character’s choice to live as part of nature rather than separate from it, his points of reference are parts of the world around him. His day is timed not by the town clock but based on the position of the sun. He is, in this translation an attuned character who has a distinctive voice and, in turn, listens to the voice of the world that surrounds him. I feel that an aspect of this variant which could be explored further is how the narration would change once the hermit integrates into the village. Would he then try to hold onto his connection to nature or begin to live in the same rhythm as the other villagers? In terms of its contribution to the final translation, I feel that this version, much like the first variant, has helped to provide more of a writer’s view of the character. By this I mean that it enables a more three-dimensional understanding of this character and as I translate it will be more natural to draw upon any aspects of him that I feel would help portray him in my version. For example, this variant provided space to analyse how the character would speak and use language, which will undoubtedly play a large role in my shaping of the final draft.