‘In Flanders Fields’ honoured by Elder
15-YEAR PROJECT CULMINATES IN BLACKFOOT TRANSLATION OF CLASSIC POEM
This past Remembrance Day, Lena Heavy Shields-Russell, an Elder of the Kainai, and her daughter Maria unveiled the first ever Blackfoot translation of “In Flanders Fields” during the annual ceremony held at Standoff.
Heavy Shields-Russell began working on her translation of the famous First World War poem by Canadian soldier. Lt. Col. John McCrae sometime around 2003. It took her 15 years to come up with a translation which she felt not only captures the words of the poem, but also the intent and emotion behind them.
“I just decided to do it,” says Heavy Shields-Russell. “It’s my field: The structure of our language and the written part of our language. Every year the kids in school are learning that poem, and I just felt I should translate it into Blackfoot.”
Heavy Shields-Russell says respect for soldiers and veterans, and honouring those who die in battle, is a concept which translates in any language.
“Generally, the poem is sad, of course, with the war and the killing,” she says. “But there is a part there, where the sound of the words come out so sad (in Blackfoot). In the part where the dead are talking, one says, ‘Kiannohka nita’tamitaihtsiihpinnaan I’niiksi itaihstaahpi.’ ‘They were once alive, they were loved and they did things, but now they are dead.’ I was doing a direct translation and the sadness just came out. It’s a very sad poem, and I wanted to make sure that sadness was there in Blackfoot.”
Once Heavy ShieldsRussell decided to translate “In Flanders Fields” it just had to be right, she says, that’s why it took her so long to finish. She admits what she has come up with is an extremely close, but not perfect, translation.
“There is no Blackfoot name for poppy; so I put in there red flowers,” she explains by way of example. “I am not happy with that because a red flower could be a red rose, for example, and that is not a poppy. I would have liked to get a better word, but the way it is was my thinking when I did that. And I don’t want to keep changing it. For the kids, or whoever is going to use it, they will use this beside the original.”
But there are some concepts which translate and resonate powerfully in Blackfoot, says Heavy Shields-Russell.
“Noohkakohkootsiimoka nitaawaawahkaotsiimannaaniksi,” she reads from her translation of the first line of the final stanza of the McCrae poem. “Noohkakohkootsiimoka means ‘could you talk to them, the ones we went to war with.’ The next line is: ‘No’tsinnaanistsi aii’sistsikooyi.’ ‘Our arms are tired.’ And then: ‘Nitsitapaapiksi’pinnaan isstsaana’kima’tsisi.’ Which means: ‘We throw to you the torch.’ So altogether, ‘We throw the torch to you because our arms are tired.’ ‘Ma’tsika,’ ‘Take it’”
Heavy Shields-Russell hopes others will now take up the torch she has thrown to make her translation of “In Flanders Fields” into something which will continue to resonate among Blackfoot speakers for many years to come.
“I think now when I have translated it that am hoping people would read it, especially the kids,” she says. “I am seeing the future of this. We can make a little film with this poem and some pictures to make it more meaningful, and present it at the Remembrance Day. That way we can honour the warriors and veterans.”