Golden Hill by Mend-Ooyo has published in English

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Golden Hill by Mend-Ooyo has published in English

TRANSLATOR’S INTRODUCTION

Altan Ovoo represents Mongolian poet G Mend-Ooyo’s greatest literary achievement to date. He refers to it as an almanac, relating his own experience growing up in the Dariganga region of Mongolia, presenting the history and customs of his homeland through the focus of the topographical Golden Hill of the title.
Mongolian critics have expressed their difficulty in understanding precisely what Mend-Ooyo’s text is offering the reader. It is true that his use of language is sometimes complex and rather opaque, that his images are visionary rather than literal, that his metaphors reflect more his own inner life than the apparent reality of the world he inhabits, but it is precisely this personal and intimate approach which makes Golden Hill so extraordinary.
Golden Hill stretches across time, but it is not a history; it speaks of Mongolian culture, but it is not a cultural guidebook: rather it reveals an individual’s feeling for, understanding of and closeness to the worlds of dream and magic, the power of language, the closeness of family and the hardships and joys of nomadic life. Mend-Ooyo’s vision presents us with a world of flying horses, musicians, highway robbery, nomadic travel, astrology, hills and mountains, steppes and weather, lovers and words, a world through which the story of humanity gradually unfolds, both implicitly and explicitly, carried on the back both of metaphor and story.
The text will speak for itself, or not at all. As translator, however, I have had to battle against the lack of direct mapping, not between the English and Mongolian languages, but between the English and Mongolian cultures. I have been greatly aided by direct discussions with Mend-Ooyo, whose enthusiasm and terpsichorean method of illustration has seen him miming out his childhood games for me and firing imaginary arrows across his office, the latter in an attempt to relate an arcane piece of Mongolian astrological lore.
Mend-Ooyo’s assistant Mugi has been invaluable in explicating and interpreting the more complicated pirouettes of Mend-Ooyo’s mind; she has also been a source of coffee, biscuits and laughter. In fact, laughter has been a major feature of my work translating this book, it has kept us all relatively sane.
I should like to thank the following people, who have provided a place in which I might work on this translation: Kisha Boyles and Henrietta Derania, Lyn Coffin, Anu and Iiris Kumpulainen, Tiina Mielonen and Vesa Vehviläinen, Katharine Norris, Dave Renham and Katy Austin, Virginia Walker and Joanne Young.
My father, Frank, has also watched me working slowly through this text. As ever, his material, emotional and spiritual support has made possible my continual and mysterious walk along this strange path which I have chosen for my life.
And finally, there is Beth Myhr, without whose love I would not be the person I am now. This book is for her.

Simon Wickham-Smith
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
May 9th 2007

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About G Mend-Ooyo

G. Mend-Ooyo was born into a herding family in Dariganga, Mongolia, in 1952. He grew up riding horses and tending sheep, moving over the steppe by camel caravan.

In 1980, he published his first book of poetry, Birds of Thought, and has since published over forty books of poetry, novel, children’s book, fiction, criticism and essays. His ongoing work of poetic fiction, Golden Hill (first published in 1993), has become one of the most influential pieces of contemporary Mongol literature. Fifth edition of Golden Hill published in 2010, Mongolia.

Mend-Ooyo's writing deals with the life of Mongolia's nomadic herders, their culture and cultural knowledge. In his style and thematic material, he seeks to express the melody and richness of the Mongol language and nomadic society. His work has been translated into over thirty languages, including English, Japanese, Hungarian, Russian, Chinese and French, and has garnered prizes from literary organizations throughout the world. He received title Poet Laureate from World Academy of Arts and Culture /USA/ in 2009.

Also, G Mend-Ooyo is writing the Mongolian Calligraphy. He presented several exhibitions in Mongolia and abroad. Example, last his exhibition named “My Crystal Temple of Soul” in Modern Art Gallery of Mongolia, in January, 2010 and attended the President of Mongolia to it and given opening speech.

Mend-Ooyo lives in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, and directs the Mongolian Academy of Poetry and Culture.

My Gente Lyric by G Mend-Ooyo

I am a child of nomadic Mongolia. We would move at the break of dawn. As a child I used to sit in a basket on the loaded cart, greeting the morning sunshine at the even pace of the plodding camel; perhaps it was then that I felt the rhythm of my future poems. When we reached our new camp, everything – the blue cranes, the small trace of white fog, the cluster of boulders, the variegated hills – would all seem new to me.

My father would seat me on his lap and hold his fiddle in front of me, then play a long clear melody – the “Jaakhan Sharga” of the Dariganga Mongols – and as this song came neighing and whinnying out at me, the local mountains would more grand, the water clearer, the song of the birds more melodious. . . Thus my little body became the instrument and my father played on me. My poetry was tuned to the melody of the Morin Khuur across the sacred space of the steppe...

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Thursday, June 21, 2007

Golden Hill by Mend-Ooyo has published in English

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