In Memoriam: Tomas Tranströmer

The Swedish Nobel Laureate Tomas Tranströmer has passed away. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2011. I figured a fitting tribute would be to post one of his poems in Swedish and in English. The English translation is done by Robin Fulton.

Den halvfärdiga himlen

Modlösheten avbryter sitt lopp.
Ångesten avbryter sitt lopp.
Gamen avbryter sin flykt.

Det ivriga ljuset rinner fram,
även spökena tar sig en klunk.

Och våra målningar kommer i dagen,
våra istidsateljéers röda djur.

Allting börjar se sig omkring.
Vi går i solen hundratals.

Var människa en halvöppen dörr
som leder till ett rum för alla.

Den oändliga marken under oss.

Vattnet lyser mellan träden.

Insjön är ett fönster mot jorden.

The Half-Finished Heaven

Despondency breaks off its course.
Anguish breaks off its course.
The vulture breaks off its flight.

The eager light streams out,
even the ghosts take a draught.

And our paintings see daylight,
our red beasts of the ice-age studios.

Everything begins to look around.
We walk in the sun in hundreds.

Each man is a half-open door
leading to a room for everyone.

The endless ground under us.

The water is shining among the trees.

The lake is a window into the earth.

Copyright ©2015 Zee from A Tea Stained Page. This post was originally posted by Zee from A Tea Stained Page. It should not be reproduced without express written permission

In Remembrance: Terry Pratchett

For me Terry Pratchett was an integral part of my teen years. The amount of times my friends and I uttered the words "I WAS AT A PARTY" from The Light Fantastic or giggled about Death in general. The discussions we had about Wizards with cork hats or the turtle. I suppose it is fitting though that I found out about his passing from my best friend in high school, Mel, with whom most of those discussions to place, often over a cup of tea and our favourite cafe.

Those teenage years are the years when one tries to make sense of the world, only to realise that the world does not make sense, and never will. One of the most influential people in my coming to realise that was Sir Terry Pratchett. His books were filled with great wisdom and I was an eager student. One of the things that has staid with me is the following quote from Interesting Times:

“Chaos is found in greatest abundance wherever order is being sought. It always defeats order, because it is better organized.”

As I grew older I discovered the Tiffany Aching series and I was once again hooked. However my favourite character will always be, rather ironically, Death, with the Grim Squeaker in second place.

And now I am sad.

My reviews of several Pratchett books on my old site (I'll be moving them over here shortly)

Hogfather Reaper Man The Last Hero Unseen Academicals
 
Tiffany Aching Series
Wee Free Men
A Hat Full of Sky
Wintersmith 
I Shall Wear Midnight

Copyright ©2015 Zee from A Tea Stained Page. This post was originally posted by Zee from A Tea Stained Page. It should not be reproduced without express written permission