German looks like a very tricky language! I've read a good bit of German Literature in translation (Thomas Mann, Franz Kafka, Heinrich Böll, Rilke), and I've always been amazed at how widely the translations vary, especially in the cases of Mann and Rilke. I've probably seen well over 6 translations of Rilke's Duinio Elegies; the 8th elegy is especially pretty, and I have wondered how it reads in German:
(just the beginning part, which I find very haunting/pretty)
One translation:
With all their sight, the creatures go
into the Open. But our inward turned eyes
surround it like snares
it catches then escapes to freedom.
To know what’s enough, we look at the face
the animal wears; we take even the smallest child,
turn him around and make him look back
at our wholeness, not at that open
deep and invisible within the animal’s face. Free from death.
We know death by sight; that free animal
has always its decline behind it (like a tail)
and God in front, and when it moves, it moves
already in eternity, like running springs.
Another translation:
The creature gazes into openness with all
its eyes. But our eyes are
as if they were reversed, and surround it,
everywhere, like barriers against its free passage.
We know what is outside us from the animal’s
face alone: since we already turn
the young child round and make it look
backwards at what is settled, not that openness
that is so deep in the animal’s vision. Free from death.
We alone see that: the free creature
has its progress always behind it,
and God before it, and when it moves, it moves
in eternity, as streams do.
(very pretty work)
