Lettres à Antonio Saura (excerpt)

Here are the first four chapters of Marcel Cohen’s latest book, Lettres à Antonio Saura (Letters to Antonio Saura), published in a bilingual Judeo-Spanish–French edition (L’Échoppe, Paris, 1997)¹.

I	I
Karo Antonio,	Dear Antonio,
Kyero eskrivirte en djudyo antes ke no keda nada del avlar de mis padres. No saves, Antonio, lo ke es morirse en su lingua. Es komo kedarse soliko en el silensyo kada dya ke Dyo da, komo ser sikileoso sin saver porke.	I wanted to write to you in djudyo before the language of my forebears dies out altogether. You cannot imagine, Antonio, what it is to watch a language in its death throes. It is a little like finding yourself alone in the silence. It is to feel sikileoso² without understanding why.

II	II
Lo ke aki te eskrivo, Antonio, es el poko de ke me akodro despues de estos cinkos syekolos en Turkya. Yo naci en Asnières, ke es una sivdeka cerka de Paris, ama mi padre y mi madre eran cerka de los treynta kuando vinieron a morar en Francia. Dainda avlavan en frances ke era la lingua de todos los djudyos de Turkya en akel tyempo porke l’Alliance israélite universelle asi les embezo. Despues de este se foueron al Lycée français de Galata Sarail en Stambol y es por eso ke tanto les plazya la Francia, ma en kaza nunka decharon de avlar djudyo y ansina es ke yine yo me embezi.	What I note here is more or less everything I keep in memory despite the five centuries my forebears spent in Turkey. I was born in Asnières, a suburb of Paris, and my parents were in their thirties when they came to settle in France. They spoke perfect French, since it was, at the time, the language of all the Jews of the former Ottoman Empire. They learned it very young in the schools of the Alliance israélite universelle, and then, in Istanbul, at the Lycée français of Galata Sarail. How could they not have loved France? That in no way kept them from speaking djudyo at home, and so it was by listening to them that I steeped myself in it, short of altogether speaking it myself.

Lo ke aki te eskrivo, Antonio, es el poko de ke me akodro despues de estos cinkos syekolos en Turkya. Yo naci en Asnières, ke es una sivdeka cerka de Paris, ama mi padre y mi madre eran cerka de los treynta kuando vinieron a morar en Francia. Dainda avlavan en frances ke era la lingua de todos los djudyos de Turkya en akel tyempo porke l’Alliance israélite universelle asi les embezo. Despues de este se foueron al Lycée français de Galata Sarail en Stambol y es por eso ke tanto les plazya la Francia, ma en kaza nunka decharon de avlar djudyo y ansina es ke yine yo me embezi.

What I note here is more or less everything I keep in memory despite the five centuries my forebears spent in Turkey. I was born in Asnières, a suburb of Paris, and my parents were in their thirties when they came to settle in France. They spoke perfect French, since it was, at the time, the language of all the Jews of the former Ottoman Empire. They learned it very young in the schools of the Alliance israélite universelle, and then, in Istanbul, at the Lycée français of Galata Sarail. How could they not have loved France? That in no way kept them from speaking djudyo at home, and so it was by listening to them that I steeped myself in it, short of altogether speaking it myself.

III	III
Antes de eskrivirte, Antonio, devo serar los ojos para akodrarme del avlar de mis padres. La difikoldad es ke muchos biervos me vyenen al tino y ke no se kualo dizirte con eyos. Ke dizirte kon la “yaka” (“Este me pasa por la yaka”, dizya mi nona), kon la ekspresyon “el kulo de pipino” ke mos saltava la riza, el “ijo de mamzer”, kon todas las kozas ke son “kozas de tresalirse” ?	To find my words again, I must close my eyes, Antonio, and many expressions come back to me without my knowing what to say with them all the same. What am I to tell you with the yaka³ (“That goes right through my yaka,” my grandmother used to say), with the expression “the cucumber’s backside” that made us roar with laughter, “the son of a mamzer⁴,” all the things that are “enough to drive you out of your mind”?…
Los biervos stan lokos, Antonio. Atornan y se fuyen. No ay mas ke asperar de eyos. No dizen mas ke la rolor, la dulsura lejana de la dondurma, de las keftifas, de los platikos ke se gizaba enkaza. No dizen mas ke el gusto y el tormento del pasado, la lokura del tyempo. Se van los biervos y, lechos de mi, se mueren komo las nuves del cyelo.	The words go mad. They surge up and slip away just as fast. What more is there to hope for from them? No doubt they tell only of the smell, the distant sweetness of the dondurma⁵, of the keftikas⁶, of the little dishes one used to cook at home. They reflect, in short, only the nostalgia and the dramas of the past, the madness of the times. Barely glimpsed, the words escape me and fray away like clouds.

III

Antes de eskrivirte, Antonio, devo serar los ojos para akodrarme del avlar de mis padres. La difikoldad es ke muchos biervos me vyenen al tino y ke no se kualo dizirte con eyos. Ke dizirte kon la “yaka” (“Este me pasa por la yaka”, dizya mi nona), kon la ekspresyon “el kulo de pipino” ke mos saltava la riza, el “ijo de mamzer”, kon todas las kozas ke son “kozas de tresalirse” ?

To find my words again, I must close my eyes, Antonio, and many expressions come back to me without my knowing what to say with them all the same. What am I to tell you with the yaka³ (“That goes right through my yaka,” my grandmother used to say), with the expression “the cucumber’s backside” that made us roar with laughter, “the son of a mamzer⁴,” all the things that are “enough to drive you out of your mind”?…

Los biervos stan lokos, Antonio. Atornan y se fuyen. No ay mas ke asperar de eyos. No dizen mas ke la rolor, la dulsura lejana de la dondurma, de las keftifas, de los platikos ke se gizaba enkaza. No dizen mas ke el gusto y el tormento del pasado, la lokura del tyempo. Se van los biervos y, lechos de mi, se mueren komo las nuves del cyelo.

The words go mad. They surge up and slip away just as fast. What more is there to hope for from them? No doubt they tell only of the smell, the distant sweetness of the dondurma⁵, of the keftikas⁶, of the little dishes one used to cook at home. They reflect, in short, only the nostalgia and the dramas of the past, the madness of the times. Barely glimpsed, the words escape me and fray away like clouds.

IV	IV
La lingua maternal : asi se dize de lo ke se entendya enkaza, ma, en este kavzo, Antonio, la madre no se muere nunka. Siempre se keda fuerte. Puedes azer el mas grande viage, kuando retornas la topas bien en pies. En eya vive tu pasado, en eya te sientes presente a ti mismo. Las palavras son tu verdadero lougar y tu esperanza. Kale ser loko para pensar ke, en eyas, podryas, ser un dya el mousafir de ti mizmo. En el mas profondo de ti saves ke las kozas, o al meno el sentido ke tienes de las kozas, no mueren nunka.	The mother tongue: so one names what one used to hear at home, but does this mother ever die? In her our past keeps watch, in her we are wholly present to ourselves. And if words are our true dwelling, how should they not also be a good part of what we are to become? How to imagine that we might one day become, in our own language, the mousafires⁷ of ourselves? In the deepest part of us, we sense full well that things, or at least the feeling we have of things, do not die.
Ma, kuando se bozea tu lingua, kuando se deskae, desaziendos en el mabul, kuando deves serar los ojos, soliko en tu kamaretika y pensar por oras antes ke trucher dos vierbikos en la luz, kuando no ay nada ke meldar en tu lingua, inguno dentro tus amigos para avlarla kon ti, kuando el poko ke te keda no lo vaz a dechar a ninguno despues de ti, kuando la mujer de tu alma te mira komo a un razino ke pok a poko se fuye el meoyo y ke, kada dya, te deves olvidar mas de ti para ser bien al lado de eya, kuando mirando a su kerida facha te vez, algunos dyas ke te akodras del pasado, komo a un zinguano ke no ubyera nunka dourmido kon eya y ke nunka lo podrya porke saves ke, en akeyos momentos, la distansya entre vozotros es tan grande ke parece a la mar, eya veyendo solamente una partizika de ti, alora, Antonio, saves ke la muerte avla por tu boka.	But when this language crumbles away day after day, Antonio, when it lies dying, dissolving slowly into the mabul⁸; when, alone in your room, you must close your eyes to exhume a few shreds of it, and without quite knowing what to do with them either; when there is nothing left to read in this language, none of your friends to speak it with you, when the little of it that remains to you, you do not pass on; when the woman who shares your life looks at you like an invalid slowly losing what reason he has left, and you feel bound to forget a little more of yourself without cease so as not to alarm her too much; when, peering at her on certain days when the past comes back to you in gusts, you take yourself for a stranger who has never truly shared her roof, since an ocean separates you and, despite all her efforts, keeps her from glimpsing more than a sliver of yourself — then, Antonio, you must indeed admit that death speaks through you.

La lingua maternal : asi se dize de lo ke se entendya enkaza, ma, en este kavzo, Antonio, la madre no se muere nunka. Siempre se keda fuerte. Puedes azer el mas grande viage, kuando retornas la topas bien en pies. En eya vive tu pasado, en eya te sientes presente a ti mismo. Las palavras son tu verdadero lougar y tu esperanza. Kale ser loko para pensar ke, en eyas, podryas, ser un dya el mousafir de ti mizmo. En el mas profondo de ti saves ke las kozas, o al meno el sentido ke tienes de las kozas, no mueren nunka.

The mother tongue: so one names what one used to hear at home, but does this mother ever die? In her our past keeps watch, in her we are wholly present to ourselves. And if words are our true dwelling, how should they not also be a good part of what we are to become? How to imagine that we might one day become, in our own language, the mousafires⁷ of ourselves? In the deepest part of us, we sense full well that things, or at least the feeling we have of things, do not die.

Ma, kuando se bozea tu lingua, kuando se deskae, desaziendos en el mabul, kuando deves serar los ojos, soliko en tu kamaretika y pensar por oras antes ke trucher dos vierbikos en la luz, kuando no ay nada ke meldar en tu lingua, inguno dentro tus amigos para avlarla kon ti, kuando el poko ke te keda no lo vaz a dechar a ninguno despues de ti, kuando la mujer de tu alma te mira komo a un razino ke pok a poko se fuye el meoyo y ke, kada dya, te deves olvidar mas de ti para ser bien al lado de eya, kuando mirando a su kerida facha te vez, algunos dyas ke te akodras del pasado, komo a un zinguano ke no ubyera nunka dourmido kon eya y ke nunka lo podrya porke saves ke, en akeyos momentos, la distansya entre vozotros es tan grande ke parece a la mar, eya veyendo solamente una partizika de ti, alora, Antonio, saves ke la muerte avla por tu boka.

But when this language crumbles away day after day, Antonio, when it lies dying, dissolving slowly into the mabul⁸; when, alone in your room, you must close your eyes to exhume a few shreds of it, and without quite knowing what to do with them either; when there is nothing left to read in this language, none of your friends to speak it with you, when the little of it that remains to you, you do not pass on; when the woman who shares your life looks at you like an invalid slowly losing what reason he has left, and you feel bound to forget a little more of yourself without cease so as not to alarm her too much; when, peering at her on certain days when the past comes back to you in gusts, you take yourself for a stranger who has never truly shared her roof, since an ocean separates you and, despite all her efforts, keeps her from glimpsing more than a sliver of yourself — then, Antonio, you must indeed admit that death speaks through you.

Notes

With the kind permission of the author and the publisher: L’Échoppe éditeur, 30 rue Léopold-Bellan, 75002 Paris. In bookshops, distribution Distique, 72F, or 85F postpaid.↩︎
Sikileoso: (Turkish) anxious, oppressed.↩︎
Yaka: (Turkish) collar.↩︎
Mamzer: (Hebrew) bastard.↩︎
Dondourma: (Turkish) ice cream.↩︎
Keftikas: (Turkish) meatballs.↩︎
Mousafir: (Turkish) stranger, visitor.↩︎
Mabul: (Hebrew) flood. [Editor’s note: this word is not glossed in a note in the original text but corresponds to the context of the biblical Flood.]↩︎

Notes

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