Adam Mickiewicz
Polish national poet, dramatist, essayist, publicist, translator, and political activist
Adam Mickiewicz (24 December 1798 – 26 November 1855) was a Polish writer and poet of Belarusian descent, considered by many to be the greatest Polish Romantic poet of the 19th century.
QuotesEdit
Dziady (Forefathers' Eve) [1]Edit
- Bo słuchajcie i zważcie na siebie: Kto nie dotknął ziemi ni razu, ten nigdy nie może być w niebie.
- Translation: So listen to them, heed them: Who never touch the earth, can never be in heaven.
- Part two.
- Serce ustało pierś już lodowata, ścięły się usta i oczy zawarły; Na świecie jeszcze, lecz już nie dla świata. Cóż to za człowiek - Umarły
- Translation: My heart stopped, my breast frozen, my lips and eyes barred. Still in the world, but not of the world. Here, yet already departed.
- Part one.
- Patrz duch nadzieji życie mu nadaje, gwiazda promyków użycza, umarły wraca na młodości kraje. Szukać lubego oblicza
- Translation: The spirit of hope gives him life
As a star offers its rays.
Dead, he returns to the country of his youth
searching for his love's face. - Part one.
- Translation: The spirit of hope gives him life
- Do mamy lecim do mamy! Cóż to, mamo nie znasz Józia? Ja to Józio ja ten samy. A to moja siostra Rózia. My teraz w raju latamy, Tam nam lepiej niż u mamy. Patrz jakie główki w promieniu, Ubiór z jutrzenki światełka, A na oboim ramieniu Jak u motylków skrzydełka, w raju wszystkiego dostatek, Co dzień to inna zabawka, gdzie stąpim wypływa trawka, gdzie dotkniem rozkwita kwiatek. Lecz choć wszystkiego dostatek dręczy nad nuda i trwoga. Ach mamo dla twoich dziatek zamknięta do nieba droga!
- Translation: For mum we're fly. What mum you don't know who am I? I am Józio. And this is my sister Rózia. Now we're fly in sky! There is better than mum. See how heads in ray. Clothes with lucifer light. And on my hand as butterfly airfoil in sky we have all what we want, every day other toy, where we go here is grass, where we touch here is a flower. But we have what we want, torture us boring and trepidation. Oh mum for Your children road to heaven has been closed! On Always!
- Part two.
- Ja i ojczyzna to jedno. Nazywam sie Milion, bo za miliony kocham i cierpię katuszę.
- Translation: I and motherland are one. My name is Million, because for millions do I love and suffer agonies.
- Part three, scene one.
- Translation: I and motherland are one. My name is Million, because for millions do I love and suffer agonies.
- Ty Boże, ty naturo! dajcie posłuchanie.
Godna to was muzyka i godne śpiewanie.
Ja mistrz!
Ja mistrz wyciągam dłonie!
Wyciągam aż w niebiosa i kładę me dłonie
Na gwiazdach jak na szklannych harmoniki kręgach.- Translation: Listen to me, God, and you, Nature!
Here is music that is worthy of you, songs that are worthy of you.
I am master!
Master, I stretch out my hands!
I stretch them to the sky, I place my fingers on the stars.
They are my musical glasses, my armonica.- Part three, scene two ("The Great Improvisation"). Translated by Louise Varese.
- Translation: Listen to me, God, and you, Nature!
- Kiedy spójrzę w kometę z całą mocą duszy,
Dopóki na nią patrzę, z miejsca się nie ruszy.- Translation: If I gaze at a comet with all the strength of my soul,
It cannot stir from the spot while my eyes are upon it.- Part three, scene two ("The Great Improvisation"). Translated by Louise Varese.
- Translation: If I gaze at a comet with all the strength of my soul,
- Herod - Panie cała Polska młoda wydana w ręce Heroda. Co widzę? Długie białe dróg krzyżowych biegi, Drogi długie - nie dojrzeć - przez puszcze - przez śniegi, Wszystkie na północ! Tam, tam, w kraj daleki, płyną jak rzeki
- Translation: Herod, God! - all young Poland 's given into Herod's hands. What do I see? Long white roads like stations of the cross, long roads unseen through ancient forests, through the snow, all roads leading North. There, there, to the far country, they float like rivers.
- Part three, scene 5.
- Będę o to Pana Boga pytać,
On to wszystko zapisał, wszystko mnie opowie.- Translation: We'd better send
For God. He will remember and tell us all.- Part three, scene seven ("The Prisoner's Return"). Translated by Jerzy Peterkiewicz and Burns Singer.
- Translation: We'd better send
Crimean SonnetsEdit
- Monsters merge and welter through the water's mounting
Din. All hands, stand fast! A sailor sprints aloft,
Hangs, swelling spider-like, among invisible nets,
Surveys his slowly undulating snares, and waits.- "The Crossing" [2].
- In spring's own country, where the gardens blow,
You faded, tender rose! For hours now past,
Like butterflies departing, on you're cast
The worms of memories to work you woe.- "The Grave of the Countess Potocki" [3]
Pan Tadeusz (Sir Thaddeus) [4]Edit
- Litwo! Ojczyzno moja! ty jesteś jak zdrowie;
Ile cię trzeba cenić, ten tylko się dowie, Kto cię stracił...- Translation: Lithuania, my country! You are as good health;
How much one should prize you, he only can tell, Who has lost you...- Opening lines, translated by Marcel Weyland
- Translation: Lithuania, my country! You are as good health;
- Sound as a burrow'd marmot he slept
On the straw where he'd tumbled fully-dressed that night.- Book Four: Tadeusz' Awakening (trans. Christopher Adam Zakrzewski).
