These days which, like yourself, Seem empty and effaced Have avid roots that delve To work deep in the waste. In James Merrill's own English version of this epigraph (published in 1985 in Late Settings), these four lines are translated into English as follows: Unusual for Merrill, the poem bears a mysterious four-line epigraph in German ( Rilke's translation of the first half of stanza 7 of the poem "Palme" by Valéry), which is printed without translation or attribution:ĭiese Tage, die leer dir scheinen und wertlos für das All, haben Wurzeln zwischen den Steinen und trinken dort überall. "Lost in Translation" may be classified as an autobiographical narrative or narrative poem, but is better understood as a series of embedded narratives. The poem is mainly in unrhymed pentameter but includes a section in Rubaiyat quatrain stanzas. It consists of 215 lines with an additional four line epigraph.
The poem is dedicated to Merrill's friend, the distinguished poet, critic, and translator Richard Howard. Not only is "Lost in Translation" a poem about a child putting together a jigsaw puzzle, it is an interpretive puzzle, designed to engage a reader's interest in solving mysteries at various narrative levels. Merrill's parents would divorce in 1939, when Merrill was thirteen years old, in a scandal that was front-page news on the New York Times. "Lost in Translation" describes a profound childhood bond with the woman who taught him French and German. Given that his parents were often preoccupied, his father with business, his mother with social obligations, Merrill developed a number of close relationships with household staff. (Merrill had two older half siblings from his father's first marriage.) He enjoyed a privileged upbringing in economic and cultural terms, although his intelligence and exceptional financial circumstances often made him feel lonely as a child. Born in New York City, Merrill was the son of the founder of the world's largest brokerage firm.
Merrill wrote in his lifetime mainly for a select group of friends, fans, and critics, and expected readers of "Lost in Translation" to have some knowledge of his biography. "Lost in Translation" is Merrill's most anthologized poem. It was originally published in The New Yorker magazine on April 8, 1974, and published in book form in 1976 in Divine Comedies.
"Lost in Translation" is a narrative poem by James Merrill (1926–1995), one of the most studied and celebrated of his shorter works. James Merrill's childhood home was a 50-room mansion called "The Orchard," located in Southampton, New York
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