Hello everybody,
On another anniversary of the recovery of the Malvinas / Falklands by Argentina, I would like to place this few lines, written during the conflict by perhaps the most important Argentine writer of the past century, Jorge Luis Borges, eternal candidate to the Nobel price of literature.
Nothing nationalistic, just a tragic reminder of what happened then… among friends… as he says… “on some too famous islands”…
In memory of all the fallen 26 years ago, whatever their nationality and their ideas… hoping to learn that wars are not the answer to anything in a modern world.
They go in Spanish and in English because I might have made a lousy translation ( of JLB), with my respects and remembrance of all the Juan López and John Wards that left their lives then in such an intense and short conflict.
Something that could have been settled peacefully since over a century ago… I hope our leaders would read this lines everyonce in a while.
Best Regards,
Pánzon. ( Juan Mielke)
JUAN LÓPEZ Y( &) JOHN WARD
Les tocó en suerte una época extraña.
It was a strange time for them to live in.
El planeta había sido parcelado en distintos países, cada uno provisto de lealtades, de queridas memorias, de un pasado sin duda heroico, de derechos, de agravios, de una mitología peculiar, de próceres de bronce, de aniversarios, de demagogos y de símbolos. Esa división, cara a los cartógrafos, auspiciaba las guerras.
The planet had been parcelled in different countries, each one provided with loyalties, of dear memories, of a doubtless heroic past, of rights, of grievances, of a particular mythology, of bronze statues, of demagogues and symbols. That division, beloved by cartographers, forecasted wars.
López había nacido en la ciudad junto al río inmóvil; Ward, en las afueras de la ciudad por la que caminó Father Brown. Había estudiado castellano para leer el Quijote.
López was born in a city to the side of the inmobile river; Ward, just outside the city over which once walked Father Brown. He had studied Castillian Spanish to read the Quixote.
El otro profesaba el amor de Conrad, que le había sido revelado en un aula de la calle Viamonte.
The other, proffessed his love for Conrad, who was revealed to him in a classroom on the Viamonte street.
Hubieran sido amigos, pero se vieron una sola vez cara a cara, en unas islas demasiado famosas, y cada uno de los dos fue Caín, y cada uno, Abel.
They would have been friends, but they saw each other face to face only once, on some too famous islands, and each of the two was Cain, and each one Abel.
Los enterraron juntos. La nieve y la corrupción los conocen.
They were buried together. The snow and the corruption know them.
El hecho que refiero pasó en un tiempo que no podemos entender.
The Fact I am referring to happened in a time we can not understand.
Jorge Luis Borges.