“Slow Cobra Woman”: Herberto helder, a Poetics of Translation

This paper is about translations made by Herberto Helder. The lack of complete references to the sources (except for a few cases) results in doubts about the real existence of the non-Western translated poems and in the possible ascription of the autorship of these poems to Helder himself. Herberto Helder did not include them among in his O bebedor nocturno and in his Poesia toda (1990). In this paper I will analyse the translations of “A criação da lua”, by the Huni Kuin³, and of “Mulher cobra negra”, by the Gondos from central India.

KEYWORDS
indigenous poetics; translation; contemporary poetry; Herberto Helder