All about Walt Whitman

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Whitman and Borges:

Fernando Alegría writes the last essay in this volume on Whitman, a wonderful essay titled “Borges’s ‘Song of Myself’” (GREENSPAN, 1997, pp.208-219). It is, of course, about Borges’s translation of “Song of Myself” into Spanish. The critic considered Borges’s translation as a literal one, although the translator sometimes “does take liberties as he translates, but always making an effort to stay close to Whitman’s directness and bluntness” (p.209). However, he is sure that Borges knows when he is using other words instead of the correct one (in the literal sense) in his translation, for Borges is actually being faithful to meaning, and not to form. He then provides numerous passages of the translated text, which shows indeed that Borges’s literal and spontaneous way of rendering Whitman’s verses into Spanish is worth praising. The only sad note in this entire story is that we have been unable to locate this translation.[1] This volume of The Cambridge Companion to Walt Whitman also brings detailed primary bibliography and extensive secondary bibliography on Whitman, which is very useful to any reader.

[1] The reference we have is: “Jorge Luis Borges, Hojas de hierba (Buenos Aires: Juárez Editor. Selección, traducción y prólogo de J. L. Borges; estudio crítico de Guillermo Nolasco Juarez; grabados de Antonio Berni, 1969)” (GREENSPAN, 1997, p.218).

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