This site uses cookies.
Some of these cookies are essential to the operation of the site,
while others help to improve your experience by providing insights into how the site is being used.
For more information, please see the ProZ.com privacy policy.
This person has a SecurePRO™ card. Because this person is not a ProZ.com Plus subscriber, to view his or her SecurePRO™ card you must be a ProZ.com Business member or Plus subscriber.
Affiliations
This person is not affiliated with any business or Blue Board record at ProZ.com.
Services
Translation, Editing/proofreading
Expertise
Detailed fields not specified.
Rates
English to Spanish - Standard rate: 0.10 USD per word / 25 USD per hour Spanish to English - Standard rate: 0.10 USD per word / 25 USD per hour
Portfolio
Sample translations submitted: 1
Spanish to English: Family Portrait
Source text - Spanish ROSA MONTERO
(Madrid, 1951)
Retrato de familia
Isabel se ajustó las gafas y contempló la fotografía admirativamente. Ocupaba las páginas centrales de la revista y centelleaba como una joya oscura. A la derecha, un sol incandescente; a la izquierda, la vastedad inimaginable del espacio. Y ahí, perdidos entre el polvo estelar, estaban Venus y la Tierra, dos menudencias apenas visibles flotando en la negrura chisporroteante. Era una imagen conseguida por el Voyager, la primera foto del sistema solar, el primer retrato de familia. La mujer suspiró.
Antonio se incorporó con brusquedad, una mano arrugando el borde de la toalla y la otra sujetándose ansiosamente el pecho.
—Me siento mal —dijo.
Y se dejo caer sobre la felpa a rayas.
—Eso es el sol. Te dije que te taparas la cabeza —le reconvino Isabel en tono distraído y sin abandonar la lectura.
Antonio jadeo. La mujer bajo la revista y le observe con mayor atención. El hombre permanecía muy quieto y su rostro tenía una expresión blanda y descompuesta, como si fuera a quebrarse en un sollozo.
— ¿Que te pasa? —se inquieto Isabel.
—Me siento mal —repitió el en un ronco susurro, con los ojos desencajados y tendidos en el cielo sin nubes.
Transpiraba. La calva del hombre se había perlado súbitamente de brillantes gotitas. Claro, que hacia mucho calor. Mas abajo, los profundos pliegues de la sotabarba eran pequeños ríos, y, mas abajo aun, el pecho cubierto de canosos vellos y el prominente estomago relucían alegremente en una espesa mezcla de sudor y ungüentos achicharrantes. Pero las gotas de la calva eran distintas, tan duras, claras y esféricas como si fueran de cristal. Lagrimas de vidrio para una frente de mármol. Porque estaba poniéndose muy pálido.
—Pero, Antonio, ¿que sientes, que te duele? —se angustio ella.
—Tengo miedo —dijo el hombre con voz clara.
Tiene miedo, se repitió Isabel confusamente. La mano se crispaba sobre su pecho. La mujer se la cogió: estaba fría y húmeda. Le aliso los dedos con delicadeza, como quien alisa un papel arrugado. Esos dedos moteados por la edad. Esa carne blanda y conocida. Apretó suavemente la mano de su marido, como hacía a veces, por las noches, justo antes de dormirse, cuando se sentía caer en el agujero de los sueños. Pero Antonio seguía contemplando el cielo fijamente, como si estuviera enfadado con ella.
—Ya han ido a buscar al médico —dijo alguien a su lado.
Isabel alzó el rostro. Estaba rodeada por un muro de piernas desnudas. Piernas peludas, piernas adiposas, piernas rectas como varas, piernas satinadas y aceitosas, atentísimas piernas de bañistas curiosos. Entre muslo y muslo, en una esquina, vio la línea espumeante y rizada del mar.
—Gracias.
El muro de mirones la asfixiaba. Bajó la cabeza y descubrió la revista, medio enterrada junto a sus rodillas, aun abierta por la página del Voyager. Los granos de arena que se habían adherido al papel satinado parecían minúsculos planetas en relieve. Estamos en la foto, se dijo Isabel con desmayo; lo increíble es que estamos en la foto. Ahí, en esa diminuta chispa de luz que era la Tierra, estaba la playa, y la toalla de rayas azules, y el bosque de piernas. Y Antonio jadeando. Aunque no, la foto había sido tomada tiempo antes, a saber que habrían estado haciendo ellos en ese momento. Quizá el disparo de la cámara los pilló durmiendo, o jugando con los nietos, o cortándose las uñas. O quizá sucediera el domingo pasado, cuando Antonio y ella fueron a bailar para festejar el comienzo de sus vacaciones. Era en una terraza del paseo Marítimo, con orquestina y todo; trotaron y giraron y rieron y bebieron lo suficiente como para ponerse las orejas al rojo y el corazón ligero, y luego, a eso de las once, cayó un chaparrón. El aire olía a tierra caliente y recién mojada, olía a otros veranos y otras lluvias, y regresaron al hotel dando un paseo, cogidos del brazo e inmersos en el aroma de los tiempos perdidos. Sí, ese tuvo que ser el momento justo de la foto, una pequeña y calida noche terrestre encerrada en la helada y colosal noche estelar. Antonio gimió e hizo girar los ojos en sus orbitas.
—Me estoy muriendo.
—No digas tonterías —contesto Isabel—. Uno no puede morirse con el sol que hace.
Era verdad. ¿Donde se había visto una muerte a pleno sol, una muerte tan pública, tan iluminada, tan impúdica? Isabel parpadeo, mareada. Hacia tanto calor que no se podía pensar. Y la luz. Esa luz cegadora, irreal, como la de los sueños. Restañó el sudor de la frente de Antonio con la toalla de rayas azules y luego, tras doblarla primorosamente, se la colocó bajo la nuca. Antonio se dejaba hacer, rígido y engarabitado. Tenía las mejillas blancas y los labios morados.
—Mama, ¿está muerto ese señor? —preguntó un niño a voz en grito señalándolos con un cucurucho de helado.
—Shhhh, calla, calla...
En el círculo de piernas expectantes no corría ni una brizna de aire; olía a aceite bronceador y a salitre, a carne caliente y podredumbre marina. Al niño le goteaba la vainilla del helado por la mano. Tendré que pasar por la cestería y anular el encargo del sillón, se dijo Isabel, abrumada por el sofoco, por el peso de la luz y el estupor. De la orilla llegaron las risas de un par de muchachos y el retumbar pasajero de una radio. La fría mano de Antonio apretó tímidamente la suya, como hacían, a veces, antes de dormirse; pero ahora el hombre jadeaba y contemplaba el cielo con los ojos muy abiertos, unos ojos oscurecidos por el pánico. Tan indefenso como un recién nacido. Isabel sorbió las lágrimas y, por hacer algo, se puso a limpiar de arena el cuerpo de su marido.
—No te preocupes, el médico debe de estar a punto de llegar.
Y también ella miró hacia arriba, intentando entrever, mas allá de la lámina de aire azul brillante, la gran noche del tiempo y del espacio.
Del libro Amantes y enemigos. Ed. Alfaguara, 1998.
Translation - English Family Portrait
By: Rosa Montero
Translated by: Raquel Lubowski
Isabel adjusted her eyeglasses and contemplated the photograph admiringly. It occupied the middle pages of the magazine and sparkled like a dark jewel. On the right, an incandescent sun; on the left, the unimaginable vastness of space. And there, lost within the stellar powder, were Venus and the Earth, two barely visible specks floating in the sputtering darkness. It was an image attained by the Voyager, the first photo of the solar system, the first family portrait. The woman sighed.
Antonio sat up suddenly, one hand wrinkling the edge of the towel and the other holding the chest anxiously.
- I don’t feel well – he said.
And he allowed himself to fall on the striped plush.
- It’s the sun. I told you to cover your head – Isabel reprimanded him in a distracted manner and without abandoning her reading.
Antonio panted. The woman lowered the magazine and observed him more attentively. The man remained very still and his face had a soft and disarranged expression as if it was about to break into tears.
- What’s wrong? - worried Isabel.
- I don’t feel well – he repeated in a coarse whisper, with eyes distorted and fixed on the cloudless sky.
He perspired. The man’s bald spot became pearled suddenly with shinny droplets. Evidently, it was very hot. Lower down, the deep folds of the bearded chin were small rivers and, even lower, the chest covered with gray hairs and the prominent stomach glistened with a mixture of sweat and ointments. But the drops on the bald spot were different, so hard, clear and spherical as if they were made of crystal. Tear of glass for a forehead of marble. Since he was becoming very pale.
- But, Antonio, what do you feel, what hurts? – She got worried.
- I’m scared – said the man in a clear voice.
He’s afraid, Isabel repeated to herself puzzled. The hand twitched over his chest. The woman grasped it: it was cold and moist. She straightened his fingers gently, like someone who straightens a wrinkled paper. Those fingers speckled by age. That soft and familiar skin. She gently squeezed her husband’s hand, as she did sometimes, at night, just before going to sleep, when she felt herself fall through the hole of dreams. But Antonio continued contemplating the sky intently, as if he was annoyed with her.
- They already went to get the doctor – said somebody besides her.
Isabel raised her head. She was surrounded by a wall of naked legs. Hairy legs, chubby legs, legs as straight as sticks, silky and oily legs, very attentive legs of curious bathers. Between thigh and thigh, in a corner, she saw the foaming and rippling line of the sea.
- Thank you.
The wall of onlookers suffocated her. She lowered her head and discovered the magazine, partly buried by her knee, still opened to the Voyager page. The grains of sand that had become stuck to the shinny paper seemed like minuscule planets in relief. We are in the picture, said Isabel faintly to herself; the incredible thing is that we are in the photo. There, in that tiny spark of light that was the Earth, was the beach, and the towel with blue stripes, and the forest of legs. And Antonio panting. Although no, the photo was taken some time before, who knows what they were doing at that moment. Maybe the shot caught them sleeping, or playing with the grandchildren, or cutting their nails. Or maybe it took place last Sunday, when Antonio and she went dancing to celebrate the beginning of their vacations. It was a terrace on the promenade, with a band and all; they trotted and twisted and laughed and drank enough to make their ears red and their hearts light, and later, around eleven, it poured. The air smelled of hot and recently wet earth, it smelled of other summers and other rains, and they strolled back to the hotel, arm in arm and absorbed in the scent of lost times. Yes, that had to be the precise time of the photo, a small and warm earthly night enclosed in a frosted and colossal stellar night. Antonio groaned and made his eyes swirl in their orbits.
- I’m dying –
- Don’t be silly – answered Isabel -. One can’t die with this sun.
It was true. Where has anyone seen a death in broad sunshine, a death so public, so illuminated, so disrespectful? Isabel blinked, dizzy. It was so hot that she couldn’t think. And the light. That blinding, unreal light, like in the dreams. She wiped the sweat off of Antonio’s forehead with the towel with blue stripes and then, after folding it skillfully, placed it under his neck. Antonio allowed himself to be handled, rigid and crooked. His cheeks were pale and his lips purple.
- Mom, is the man dead? - asked a child loudly with an ice cream cone.
- Shhhh, be quiet, be quiet…
In the circle of expectant legs not a thread of air went through; it smelled of tanning oil and salt, of warm flesh and of seashore decay. The vanilla of the ice cream dripped down the child’s hand. I’ll have to stop by the basket shop and cancel the armchair order, Isabel told herself, oppressed by the suffocation, the weight of the light, and the stupor. From the shore came the laughs of a couple of boys and the passing boom of a radio. Antonio’s cold hand shyly squeezed hers, as they did, sometimes, before going to sleep; but now the man breathed heavily and gazed at the sky with eyes wide open, eyes darkened by fear. As defenseless as a newborn. Isabel swallowed the tears and, to have something to do, started cleaning the sand off of her husband’s body.
- Don’t worry, the doctor should be arriving soon.
She also looked upward, trying to glimpse, farther than the sheet of bright blue air, the great night of time and space.
More
Less
Translation education
Bachelor's degree - University of West Georgia
Experience
Years of experience: 4. Registered at ProZ.com: Feb 2004.
I was raised in Caracas, Venezuela in a bilingual family. I have studied Spanish in Venezuela and English in the United States. I studied Spanish at the State University of West Georgia where I'll receive my bachelors.
I spent the first 18 years in Venezuela and the last 15 in the U.S. I understand well the use of idioms in both languages and can translate them accurately.
I specialize in translations related to art, art history, literature, crafts, electronics, video games, computer software, and educational materials.
Portfolio 
CV/Resume (TXT)