A big locomotive has pulled into town,
Heavy, humungus, with sweat rolling down,
A plump jumbo olive.
Huffing and puffing and panting and smelly,
Fire belches forth from her fat cast iron belly.
Poof, how she's burning,
Oof, how she's boiling,
Puff, how she's churning,
Huff, how she's toiling.
She's fully exhausted and all out of breath,
Yet the coalman continues to stoke her to death.
Numerous wagons she tugs down the track:
Iron and steel monsters hitched up to her back,
All filled with people and other things too:
The first carries cattle, then horses not few;
The third car with corpulent people is filled,
Eating fat frankfurters all freshly grilled.
The fourth car is packed to the hilt with bananas,
The fifth has a cargo of six grand pi-an-as.
The sixth wagon carries a cannon of steel,
With heavy iron girders beneath every wheel.
The seventh has tables, oak cupboards with plates,
While an elephant, bear, two giraffes fill the eighth.
The ninth contains nothing but well-fattened swine,
In the tenth: bags and boxes, now isn't that fine?
There must be at least forty cars in a row,
And what they all carry — I simply don't know:
But if one thousand athletes, with muscles of steel,
Each ate one thousand cutlets in one giant meal,
And each one exerted as much as he could,
They'd never quite manage to lift such a load.
First a toot!
Then a hoot!
Steam is churning,
Wheels are turning!
More slowly - than turtles - with freight - on their - backs,
The drowsy - steam engine - sets off - down the tracks.
She chugs and she tugs at her wagons with strain,
As wheel after wheel slowly turns on the train.
She doubles her effort and quickens her pace,
And rambles and scrambles to keep up the race.
Oh whither, oh whither? go forward at will,
And chug along over the bridge, up the hill,
Through mountains and tunnels and meadows and woods,
Now hurry, now hurry, deliver your goods.
Keep up your tempo, now push along, push along,
Chug along, tug along, tug along, chug along
Lightly and sprightly she carries her freight
Like a ping-pong ball bouncing without any weight,
Not heavy equipment exhausted to death,
But a little tin toy, just a light puff of breath.
Oh whither, oh whither, you'll tell me, I trust,
What is it, what is it that gives you your thrust?
What gives you momentum to roll down the track?
It's hot steam that gives me my clickety-clack.
Hot steam from the boiler through tubes to the pistons,
The pistons then push at the wheels from short distance,
They drive and they push, and the train starts a-swooshin'
'Cuz steam on the pistons keeps pushin' and pushin';
The wheels start a rattlin', clatterin', chatterin'
Chug along, tug along, chug along, tug along! . . . .
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Comments
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The Locomotive
From guest Michael Dembinski (contact)
I was unaware of any half-decent translations of this masterpiece of Polish children's verse - not bad at all! Many rhymes here that I wish I'd fallen on (track/clickety-clack, pistons/distance, lightly and sprightly she carries her weight). My translation, for comparison, is here: http://jeziorki.blogspot.com/search/label/Tuwim%27s%20Lokomotywa -
The locomotive
From guest Darek Kowalczyk (contact)
I am really amazed by this translation. It might not be literal but... it translates the very spirit of it, the rhyme, the pace and so on. It gives the filling of the original. It had to be really tough work, but well done. The same challenge met the translation of Lewis Caroll’s “Jabberwocky” into Polish and I assume into any other language. -
poetry for a summer afternoon
From guest Steve Carr (contact)
Spent the afternoon looking at Polish poetry, and came to this one. What a treat! Where can I find the original Polish? -
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I can't read Polish but here is a link, hopefully this is it:
http://czasdzieci.pl/czytanki/id,338d5-julian_tuwim_lokomotywa.html
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locomotive (Tuwim) Whipple translation
From guest Bozena Bienias (contact)
Very good translation, comment from someone who has translated a book from Polish to English before. Has the English Whipple translation been published into a book for English speaking children? I am looking for a copy for my grandchildren. -
Lokomotywa
From guest Monika D. Sears (contact)
My congratulations and admiration. I have tried to translate this for nearly a year and have not got near a country mile of your version. -
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awesome
From guest Ania (contact)
I was looking without much hope for an english translation - to impress my friends with Tuwim genious. And this is it! Awesome! -
From guest kamil (contact)
brilliant job by the Professor! look up Walter Whipple at Wikipedia and you'll find a number of links to his other translations of Polish poetry -
Definetly impressed
From guest radek (contact)
That's an excellent translation of an essentially untranslatable poem. -
I have just completed my end-of-semester work on prof. Whipple's translation of the poem and only to get some additional info on the translator did I happen to come across this site. Using this opportunity I allow myself, as the novice to the field of translation studies, express my appreciation and admiration for the translation he had created. The semantic level of the original version has been maintained almost with no exceptions, not mentioning the amazing fidelity to all the prosodic features. I hope it entertains young readers in other countries equally to the original amusing Polish children.
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well, the original version is slightly different, but the rythm is the same
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What a wonderful translation of my favorite childrens poem. I ofter read it (in Polish) to my seven-year old, Julian (named after the poet). Julian knows very little Polish but he likes the rythm of and dynamic of the poem. Now I will have a chance to read it to him in English. Mr. Whipple had done a fantastic job preserving the audial (?) effects of the poem.
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