Lost in the fire of last year's Pierrot centennial was translation. After all, it was Otto Erich Hartleben's German--translated from the original French of Albert Giraud--that Arnold Schoenberg had set.
And with Stanley Appelbaum's Anglicised Hartleben turning 20 next year (not to mention having its own Twitter account @PierrotTweets), Classicalite figured a new English language translation was passed due.
A pallid washerwoman Washes pale cloths in the nighttime, She stretches bare, silvery white arms Down into the flowing water.
— Pierrot (@PierrotTweets) May 31, 2011
To wit, for the next 21 weekdays, we'll be offering a new take on each of Giraud/Hartleben/Appelbaum's 3x7 poems...alongside some of our favorite performances.
PALE LAUNDRESS
A pale laundress,
Pallid linens washing in the night,
Stretches naked, white-silver arms
Downward into the flood.
The breeze steals through the clearing,
Gently curling the stream.
A pale laundress,
Pallid linens washing in the night.
And the tender maid of heaven,
Little fondled by the boughs,
Lays out on the darkling meadow
Her beam-woven clothes--
A pale laundress.
Up next: "Valse De Chopin"
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