Writers Unbound

Take a look at these three versions of Lot’s Wife by the eminent Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. The differences between them in diction, tone and the like simply affirm that classic Italian phrase: traduttore, traditore!

And the just man trailed God’s shining agent,
over a black mountain, in his giant track,
while a restless voice kept harrying his woman:
“It’s not too late, you can still look back

at the red towers of your native Sodom,
the square where once you sang, the spinning-shed,
at the empty windows set in the tall house
where sons and daughters blessed your marriage-bed.”

A single glance: a sudden dart of pain
stitching her eyes before she made a sound . . .
Her body flaked into transparent salt,
and her swift legs rooted to the ground.

Who will grieve for this woman? Does she not seem
too insignificant for our concern?
Yet in my heart I never will deny her,
who suffered death because she chose to turn.

Like some great light, Lot turned and climbed away,
His shade a blot on Sodom’s last black hill.
But Grief addressed his wife, who heard it say,
“It’s not too late to stop and look back still;
To see the towers of the town for one
Last time—the places where you walked and sang;
The windows of the room you bore your son
In and the child bed there that shared each pang.�
Before she’d gone half-way, she could not see.
The blinding crystal she became burned bright
With hard, salt tears; the pillar she would be,
Transfixed by love, stood fast in clearest sight.
Now who will mourn the cities of the plain,
Or cry for her, Lot’s wife? The life she took
May be forgot, but I commend her pain
Who tried to see, and died for one last look.

The just man followed then his angel guide
Where he strode on the black highway, hulking and bright;
But a wild grief in his wife’s bosom cried,
Look back, it is not too late for a last sight

Of the red towers of your native Sodom, the square
Where once you sang, the gardens you shall mourn,
And the tall house with empty windows where
You loved your husband and your babes were born.

She turned, and looking on the bitter view
Her eyes were welded shut by mortal pain;
Into transparent salt her body grew,
And her quick feet were rooted in the plain.

Who would waste tears upon her? Is she not
The least of our losses, this unhappy wife?
Yet in my heart she will not be forgot
Who, for a single glance, gave up her life.