From time to time I can't deny the incredible convenience of the internet. I came across the following lines on reading Le Clézio's VOYAGES DE L'AUTRE COTÉ:
Lanquan li jorn son lonc en may
m'es belhs dous chans d'auzelhs de lonh
E quan mi suy partitz de lay
Remembra'm d'un' amor de lonh:
Vau de talan embroncx e clis
Si que chans ni flors d'albespis
No'm platz plus que l'yverns gelatz. (66)
As a former French-major, I could guess it had to be some trouvadours songs, but that was it. Then I typed in "lanquan li jorn" and voilà, almost miraculously, its translation appeared! Here is a version by Professor Malcolm Hayward (now retired) of the Indiana University of Pennsylvania.
When the days grow long in May
and birds sing sweetly far away,
when I'm cut off from there,
I remember her who's far away
and walk with eyes which grasp the ground,
for neither song nor hawthorne flower
please me more than frozen winter.
Read them side by side, read them aloud, cherish them. In this immaterial medium space, the lyric beautifully lives on.
