Harvest of Gems : Manifesto

Harvest of Gems : Manifesto

Principles of Beat translation

1.) Harvest and the English language.

All direct translations from English into the target language WILL FAIL. The translator must create a new work in his native language. It must be an acoustical mutation. It must be a new WORD COLLAGE. The English language is an accoustical mutation in its own right. Most languages are. But let's look at English. This is the language Harvest of Gems was written in. It is basically a combnation of French and German sounds. This sonic combination gives English certain unusual properties. A unique language is thus created. An absorbing combination of earth and air sounds. The French lifts the English while the German grounds it. Very unusual.
The ultimate result of this strange mix is a language that is absolutely plastic. It's like rubber that can be bent into many different shapes. Hence the POWER of the English language. Now take a closer look at Harvest of Gems. You will detect the influence of Jack Kerouac, one of the great American Beat writers. Kerouac was the father of the hippies in the U.S. and he used a cool and hip language.
This jazz English was stolen completely from American Black English! The rythms of Africa can be felt indirectly within the modern English slang of Jack Kerouac. Now if you look closely at the Swyambu chapter of Harvest of Gems. Kerouac's style is abandoned because the intellectual ideas become simply too heavy for this particular linguistic scaffold. James Joyce comes to the rescue. James Joyce was a linguistic revolutionary and a cultural terrorist. He wanted to destroy the old in language and create a new accoustical rythm. Joyce did this in ways that are still not fully understood. Joyce begins to break into a dream language that is normally hidden to most people and the reader starts to see multiple parts of the collective unconscious. Joyce attempts to echo this perception in novel ways. Something Kerouac failed to do.


To hear Joyce and Kerouac go to www.askjeeves.com and type in Kerouac. Go to the site: Kerouac speaks. Both Kerouac and Joyce can be heard on this site.

2.) Black and White Stress

What happens when Systems theory and Tantric Buddhism get fused? You get the theory of Black and White Stress. The human mind cannot handle complexity very well. It's tolerance is low. So when the enviornment becomes too complex most minds have a tendency to clampdown on complexity. This clampdown ranges from the authoritarian to homicidal. It's the path of least resistence: Black Stress.
Some minds embrace complexity and space-out. These minds range between anarchistic and suicidal extremes. The world's best artists and philosophers fall prey to this danger. Kerouac is a good example. It's a complete loss of identity. Fascists, Communists, Multinational Capitalists, and religious fanatics go for the Black solution. It's a rather narrow identity and it feels safe, but it isn't. If the enviornment changes this loss of flexibility can be fatal. The political and cultural system can collapse overnight. 1989-1991 in Eastern Europe is a good example of this process. What is fascinating about macro aspects of this theory is the existence of psychic vortices in major crossroads of the planet.
Central Europe, The Middle East, Nepal, Sotheast asia, Korea, and central America are fusion zones for many cultures and races. The complexity reaches White Stress levels and then becomes beaten down by the forces of Black Stress. This STRESS FLIP from Black to White and then back to Black is perpetual. Most of History's wars have occured in these Stress flip zones. Political solutions are hard
to find here.
There is no escape even in death. This is White Stress at its most intense. Total identity loss. The mind can't handle this. It seeks a new body and cages itself. reincarnation is simply another manifestation of Black Stress. Is there a solution?
Yes, for individuals. The Buddah said get to NO STRESS with meditation. No more mind, but this is harder than it sounds. On the way to this stress-free state, the Black and White Stress simply becomes more subtle as meditation takes the practioner to subtler and subtler states. The clampdown and space-out become more dangerous and harder to see. A teacher is needed. When Gross and Subtle B&W Stress converge a fusion of humns and demons emerges. The Nazis are a superb examplwof this sort of conversion. As more cultures fuse into a global and digital melting pot in the 21st century the challenges of B&W stress on subtler levels will become more and more acute. Strange cultural and political mutations will pop out of the psychic vortices with good and bad
reprucussions. The cyber-age is not a paradise nor is it a living hell. The spiritual path is the only way out of this vicious cycle. It transcends the entire range of both Gross and Subtle. What about the collective? How can it be saved? Individuals can become free if they follow the Buddhist map of release, but what of the collective? That is the role of saints. They are masters of B&W Stress. They handle the collective mess. They come in all walks of life. All genders and all societies and all cultures.

3.) Beat Translation

Most language fusion creates a richer and more flexible form of communication. English and French
evolved out of Latin. Hindi out of Sanskrit. This new flexibility allows cultures to echo complex and
drastic changes in the enviornment. Beat English is the latest example of this continuing linguistic
phenomena. Rap English too. Beat English was pre-MTV and it was mainly for the masses. Could Beat Hindi be far behind? Beat French? Beat Russian? Beat Chinese, beat Japanese? Beat German?
The Joycean-Beat heritage created the seeds of of a new English mutation equivalent to the
Norman-Anglo fusion in England during the 1000-1200's. It has just begun. Beat translation must follow this new linguistic spirit. It allows regional languages to breathe and evolve and to mutate to their own local beat while embracing a global conciousness that encourages SELECTIVE BORROWING frm other competing cultures in a friendly spirit of cooperation. Unity is maintained aswell as diversity as distinct cultures retain their freedom to locally evolve while maintaining a global awareness. New
combinations of souns, symbolism, meaning, and word order begin to create greater shades of meaning necessary towards the reflection of more complex local and global enviornments. Beat translation is basically populist. It's for the global masses. It's a dynamic process that creates new civilizations. It's a new word collage that creates a discontinuity, a gap where perception can then mutate and generate a new linguistic flow. This flow sometimes creates a new civilization. This is the way karma operates.

Here are some final words for the translators:

l.) There should be close communication between author and translator. The author must help the translator FEEL the text as he felt it during its creation. But not get in the way of the translator expressing these feelings in his new and native translation work.

2.) There can be no direct translation. It's always a NEW WORK.

3.) The new translated work should convey the same thoughts and emotions that arise in the original text, but with slang and idioms of the target language.

4.) A native-like grasp of both languages is useful, but not critical.


5.) Translators cannot edit their own work. A seperate editor should examine both the original and newly translated text in the name of objectivity. But he or she should understand that the translation is basically a new linguistic experiment. A possibly useful accoustical and cultural mutation.

6.) A translator is a reader. He or she will filter the original through her cultural lens and create a NEW WORK. The spirit and feeling of the new work should remain as much as possible, but it will be essentially a new work peculiar to the expressions of the target language. BE YOU within the framework of the original.

GOOD LUCK!

Michael Arthur Finberg

2.) Black and White Stress.


3.) Beat translation

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