Marti's Poems

What I find most interestign about Marti's peoms is the fact that he contradicts things throughout his poems in order to convey harsh/emotional thoughts. For example, in his poem "The opposite of ornate and rhetorical poetry" he describes poety as "there an arid stone, here a golden/ Bird that gleams...". In other words, first he goes to say that it is like a stone, or something not beautiful, but then contardicts it by saying that it is like a glorious golden bird. As I was reading this poem, I noticed a lot of imagery. He referenced animals frequently to make a point, which I liked beacuse it really gave me a clear understanding of what he was trying to say. Animals (nature) is a common thing in the world, and what better way to convey certain points than with the creatures humans share the world with.

Ideas for the paper

During our conversation with Nina Scott, she had a very interesting comment regarding the moment in the novel when Sab takes Carlota, Theresa, and Don Carlos down to visit the caves in Cubitas and that Carlota's name is carved into the cave wall. Sab was the one to carve her name onto the wall and this is one of the moments in which we see that Sab is expressing the way he feels. A possible essay topic would be to write about how each of the characters in the novel express thier emotions differently. Sab uses underground or isolated places (also like the garden) in order to express himself, while Carlota expresses her emotions about Enrique openly. Theresa seems to not share many of her emotions but little by little her character begins to unravel. In toher words, this would be like a character development essay, but instead of just writing about the traits of certain characters, it would discuss how the characters express their emotions throughout the novel.

Skyping with Nina Scott

I thought that our conversation with Nina Scott this morning was very interesting and informational. I really enjoyed how she took the time to actaualy go through our questions one by one, and how her responses were very clear in informing us what we had asked. I had imagined that Nina Scott had translated other novels/poems, but I was surprised to find out that she felt as if the poems were much harder to translate. I thought that because a novel was much longer than a poem, and had many more symbols/allusions/plot, that a novel would be harder to translate. I also liked how Nina Scott was not embarrassed to say that her original translated version of Sab was not very good. Many other translators would not share that information, but as Nina explained, through her errors she was able to revise the original translation and make it into what her translated version of Sab is today. I do believe that Nina made a good decision to translate Sab into the 19th century English. If she would have written it in contemporary English, I feel like some of Avellaneda's original work would have been changed, and therefore the novel would have lost some of its time meaning to me. When I first bought the novel Sab, I looked at the picture on the front cover for quite some time, trying to understand and predict what the novel was about based on the book. Just now did I realize that I was looking it too superficially. I loved how Nina Scott explained how and why she chose this picture to be the cover of the text. This picture has true depth to it, with symbolism, and really what Sab says throughout the novel. At the start, this was just like any ordinary picture of a slave I had seen, but now I understand that it truly characterizes the character of Sab. Like he said in the novel, Sab is just a mulatto and a slave, which is exactly what the picture is portraying. In other words, I feel that all my questions of Sab were answered, and it was pretty cool to talk with the translator of Sab.

Sab's Characteristics

When i was first introduced to the novel "Sab", I immediatlty thought that it was going to be like all the other books that are written abotu slaves; a slave that falls in love with the master's daughter and then ends up being punished by the owner. However, Avellaneda fills Sab's personality with mystery, passion, intensity, love, and desperation. One of the moments in the novel that seems to support the idea of Sab having a mysterious personality is the event that occurs the night of the storm in which Enrique gets injured. Right after Enriques fall, Avellaneda describes that Sab made a "terrible smile". (Page50) His soul was divided into two opposite thoughts; Sab smiled beacause part of him was content with what had happened to Enrique, but Sab's smile wasnt entirley positive. His terrible smile meant that he did not want to be the cause of Enrique's death or be put in a situation in which he has to decide his fate, which is why ultimitly Sab saves Enrique's life. One would think that Sab, like any other man who is despertly in love with a woman, would do anything in order to have Carlota's love just for himself, but instead there are many moments throuhgout the novel in whcih Sab sacrifices his chances of being with Carlota.