Espais literaris de Jesús Moncada

El Verge del Carme va asclar-se enfront de l’Illa dels Tretze Sants

1. Català
2. Alemany
3. Anglès
4. Aragonès
5. Castellà
6. Eslovè
7. Francès
8. Hongarès
9. Neerlandès
10. Polonès
11. Serbi
12. Txec

Llegit per Judith Willis

Shortly before the sluice-gates of the Riba-roja reservoir were shut, heavy rain began lashing the empty, demolished town. Floodwater from the Castle mountains burst furiously onto the quayside, the frayed moorings in the boats’ graveyard snapped and the aged barges were scattered. They drifted off down a seething Ebro – which had forgotten the furrows that their keels made and the cadences of their oars – and came to grief in gorges and rapids. The Virgin of Carmel was smashed to pieces near Thirteen Saints Island, her prow ran aground among the riverside poplars. When the river subsided, no one recognized the debris; the raging storm had obliterated all traces of its third name. The old Neptune, which had been launched from the Widows’ Wharf with speeches, flag-waving and music on one of the splendid days of the Eden was for ever more an anonymous carcass of dead wood.

The Towpath [Camí de sirga] Trad. a l’anglès de Judith Willis. Londres, Harvill Press (HarperCollins), 1994.