\\\"Nada de lo que fuiste, fuiste y fuimos a no ser habitantes de tu infierno\\\" "You and we were nothing of what you were, as we had no part in your (own private) hell"
Explanation: "Nada de lo que fuiste, fuiste y fuimos a no ser habitantes de tu infierno" "You and we were nothing of what you were, as we had no part in your (private) hell"
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 13 mins (2016-12-29 01:22:04 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
this is open to a lot of renderings, so let's see what others have to say
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 15 mins (2016-12-29 01:23:33 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
poetry is always a challenge
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 27 mins (2016-12-29 01:36:24 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
"You and I (poetic licence here) were never part of what you were, as we never entered into/lived your (own) private hell"
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 31 mins (2016-12-29 01:39:59 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
http://www.poemas.de/algo-sobre-la-muerte-del-mayor-sabines/
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 43 mins (2016-12-29 01:51:29 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
doesn't rhyme but don't think that's the point
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8 hrs confidence: peer agreement (net): +4 None of what you were we were as well / Except that we were living in your hell
Explanation: A iambic rhyming couplet, though semi-accidental. I am not at all sure I have grasped all the subtleties of what he is expressing here, but I am pretty confident about the meaning of "a no ser", which I think is the crux. To put it another way, fairly literally: Of what you were, there is nothing that both you and we were, except being inhabitants of your hell. The only thing we shared with you was living in your hell. Watching you die, we were in that hell as well. These are the last two lines of a poem by Sabines addressed to his father (I presume that is the "mayor Sabines") who has died (of cancer). The first part says that all the dead person's things are still there, "Te sobrevive todo". The line before these two is "y queremos tenerte aunque sea enfermo". Then this: "Nada de lo que fuiste, fuiste y fuimos, a no ser habitantes de tu infierno" I don't know whether the comma after "fuimos" was intended by the poet, but I think it was; it is present in his Antología poética, published by FCE, which is probably an authoritative text: https://books.google.es/books?id=TVBVo594R50C&pg=PR133&lpg=P... In any case, there is a natural pause at the end of the line. So I don't think it's "fuimos a no ser", and to me it doesn't make any sense read like that. I think it's "No fuiste y fuimos nada de lo que fuiste, a no ser...". "A no ser is used like this in a passage from a classic of Mexican literature, El llano en llamas by Juan Rulfo: "No, el Llano no es cosa que sirva. No hay ni conejos ni pájaros. No hay nada. A no ser unos cuantos huizaches trepeleques y una que otra manchita de zacate con las hojas enroscadas; a no ser eso, no hay nada." https://books.google.es/books?id=RH9UUph_rHgC&pg=PA8&lpg=PA8... I wonder also whether there is a play on "fuiste": whether "Nada de lo que fuiste, fuiste", might mean that when dying, living in that hell, his father was not what he had been. My suggestion does not reflect that possibility. But I am not sure about it anyway.
| Charles Davis Spain Local time: 09:52 Specializes in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 296
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