Talk:Hushang Ebtehaj

book titles in English

The English translation to Sayeh's works are mostly ad-hoc. Some are from Mahmoud Kianush's "Modern Persian Poetry" and any other English source I could find. Alas, Black Fortune (سیاه مشق) is my creation, and I'm not sure it's the best choice. Open to other suggestions. Amirak 00:33, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Regarding the above question, the following (admittedly belatedly) may be relevant: firstly, to make a correct translation of Siah Mashgh one should know the work, and unfortunately and ashamedly I do not; secondly, mashgh is related to the composite phrase a-māle shagh-ghe (difficult tasks or exercises, hard labour --- I dimly remember that in the past some people/criminals were given prison sentences which included a-māle shagh-ghe, i.e. hard labour; that in the colloquial Persian mashgh is the word used for homework, is a misnomer; at worst, it reflects a very negative view, on the part of those who chose to call homework mashgh, on practices that may lead to learning: an overly anti-intellectual way of naming things) so that it certainly does not mean "Fortune" as you seem to have translated it. Rather, "mashgh" seems to me to be here the equivalent of "Exercise" in the sense of action or actions involving "exertion" (vigorous action --- you may know that in the old days the military exercises of soldiers in their army baracks, i.e. drill, used to be referred to as mashgh); thirdly and lastly, in spite of my declared ignorance of the work, I venture to translate "Siah Mashgh" as "Stygian Exercise". For completenss, "Stygian" has its root in the Classical Mythology and refers to "Styx": A dark gloomy river in Hades, over which Charon ferried the souls of the dead; figuratively, an evil gloomy place. Stygian therefore means: Characteristic of or resembling the region of Styx, specifically, (a) black [whence my choice of "Stygian" for "Siah"], gloomy, indistinct, (b) infernal, hellish (source: Oxford English Dictionary). I emphasise that your translation "Black Fortune" cannot be correct; this I am absolutely certain of. Kind regards, --BF 06:24, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the detailed comment. You are quite right. I mistranslated سیاه مشق. I must have been thinking along the lines of fate/fortune or لوح سرنوشت. One friend suggested it literally means 'draft' or 'unedited' or 'under contruction!' referring to writing that is still in progress. Perhaps this is what the poet meant. I'm inclined to give a direct translation (perhaps guessing as to the poet's intent in case of multiple meanings) rather than take a liberal license. Also 'black' is inappropriate as clearly the poet did not intend color, but dark & gloomy. So I will suggest "Bleak Travails" to capture not only arduous, repetitive task, but the gloominess of 'black' in both words. As 'Black Fortune' is arguably incorrect, I will make the change immediately, but certainly open for further discussion, suggestion. Also I've added "H.A. Sayeh" back as this is the transliteration of the pen name and is used as such elsewhere on the net. Having both will allow the page to be found readily on searches. Thanks. Amirak (talk) 22:56, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Dear Amirak, you are welcome. I must say that I find it surreal that you posted a message on this page on 1 September 2004, to which I responded on 22 June 2007, to which you responded on 14 March 2009.

Incidentally, since you are (by your own statement on your personal page) interested in Persian poetry, you might wish to consider the biographies of e.g. Ahmadreza Ahmadi and Pegah Ahmadi (these entries badly need to be extended). The former came to my attention today through this short article (unfortunately, I have found several inconsistencies in the dates that Mr Ahmadreza Ahmadi mentions in the audio slideshow of the latter page). Remarkably, Jadid Online is building, slowly but surely, a vast repository of very interesting and important information, consisting of e.g. this, this, this, this, this, this, this, etc. You may wish to consult this on-line magazine on a regular basis. Kind regards, --BF 01:55, 15 March 2009 (UTC).

Dear friend, thank you for the Jadid Online links. I found the Nima pictures especially interesting. It is indeed a great resource and I have seen many original presentations there. I become active on wikipedia back in 2004 because it was new and I had extra time on my hands. My free time dropped and, frankly, so did my enthusiasm in supplying wikipedia with original contributions, because of their strict policing of the copyright policy. Mind you I'm all for protecting the rights of content owners. But the preemptive policing of every picture or reference for copyright violations seemed to benefit more the business model than to serve wikipedia's original goal of disseminating information and sharing knowledge. That, along with factionalism within the Iranian niches (is it Persian or Farsi? Persia or Iran? ad nauseum...), was a big turn off. (It baffles me that Sayeh is in the Iranian poets category but not in Persian poets. Why have two anyway!?) Still I find wikipedia an invaluable reference and use it daily. I hope to see much more articles on Iran's history, culture, media, literature, etc. (Sorry for the rant and happy new year!.) Amirak (talk) 09:17, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

My friend Mojdeh Marashi and I have been translating Sayeh into English for six years and publishing the poems in literary journals in the U.S. I posted links to the poems. We will soon publish a selected works of Sayeh's poems as soon as we find the right publisher. I'm happy to say that American audiences have loved reading Sayeh's poems in English and in hearing them read aloud in both English and Farsi when Mojdeh and I do public readings. Cheers, Chad Sweeney —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skydogchad777 (talk • contribs) 22:17, 9 August 2009 (UTC)