There is no higher literary art than creative translation, or transcriação, which is Haroldo de Campos’ lovely neologism. The only people who believe that there is an inherent untrustworthiness in translations are those with a purely mechanistic understanding of the art, or those who blindly accept primitive notions of transcendent individual genius, whether they know it or not.

It sometimes troubles me that my versions are always in danger of being received as accurate reproductions. They are not. They are not meant to be.

All translations are provisional, as Pierre Joris has written and said on a number of occasions.

I translate only poets whose work moves me to translate, though that’s always subject to change. Sometimes it happens that I’m unable to translate a poet I admire greatly. That changes over time, as well.

While I don’t intend to achieve scholarly completeness, I realize that the translator’s work can be culturally world-historical and that we all have the responsibility to provide a strong foundation for further translation and study. But that’s my third aim.

My second aim is to introduce the poetry of an international culture that I have come to love, to the people among whom I was born and raised.

My first aim is to practice our beloved art (poetry’s red-headed steptwin) as ethically and as pleasurably as I can, in a spirit of interdependent autonomy.

Cmde Daniels, 3/25/2006

On the Shining Screen of the Eyelids (SPD)