Translations of French poet by Irish writer and critic

national | arts and media | press release Monday July 27, 2009 18:36 by Western Writers' Centre - Ionad Scríbhneoiri Chaitlín Maude - Western Writers' Centre, Galway westernwriters at eircom dot net Canavan Hse., Nuns Island, Galway 087.2178138

Fred Johnston's writing turns to France

Writer, founder of the annual Cúirt literature festival and Director of The Western Writers' Centre (Ionad Scríbhneoirí Chaitlín Maude) Fred Johnston has been writing and publishing his poems almost entirely in French for some time now; but it all began with translating short stories of Breton folklore and French poems.

Fred Johnston

He is not the first Irish poet who has abandoned English to write poetry in French. "I found I needed new eyes, as it were. The Irish poetry scene, to me, began to look like a bull-pen. Good poets wrote anyway. But I had experienced too much grubbiness, perhaps. One day I thought: 'We've lost our dignity somewhere.' And I am not alone." A translated French tale appeared in the magazine, Albedo 1. Recently, in Brittany, he began what he calls a test-run towards a possible book of photographs on the Monts Arrée region. And he has just recorded five short programmes for a Breton radio station on Irish culture and heritage.
But this year will see the publication of a longer project when his translations of the Breton-based poet, Colette Wittorski, are finally published.
"We met recently in Brittany - in Huelgoat, the town from which novelist Jack Kerouac's people emigrated in the 18th century - and discussed the final touches," he says. "Colette is a prize-winning poet and her work deserves a wider audience. This dual-language collection, hopefully, will acquire that to some extent."
Working on the project for two years, he found it tough but satisfying. "It was pleasurable, but it was a translation in the real sense, not merely something built on a crib by someone else. Often a phrase would seem clear, then turn out to have several meanings. Anyone who has attempted translation will understand. But finalising each phrase was like opening a window on a new way of seeing things. Colette Wittorski is happy with the end result and that's what matters." It is expected that the book will be launched both in Dublin and in Brittany and further details will be announced.
Fred Johnston's own poems written in French have appeared in, among others, Hopala! (Brittany), L'Empreinte Orange, Fôret de Milles Poètes, Le Cerf-Volant (Paris), Éclats de Rêves, Ouste, In-Fusion, Le Grognard, and here in The Stony Thursday Book and Studies Review. Plans are in motion to bring out a selection of his short stories, translated into French by writer and film-maker, Kristian Le Bras, later this year or early next year. He has read his work at the Franco-Irish Literature Festival in Dublin.
Meanwhile, the Western Writers' Centre is working to conclude the Bus Éireann-sponsored Irish-language poetry project for which they received an award at the end of last year.