Laboratorio di traduzione: Philip Schultz, Failure

Di seguito anticipiamo la versione originale di Failure, emblematico testo-titolo della raccolta di Philip Schultz che elabora terapeuticamente il doppio cocente lutto della perdita e del fallimento, proprio tramite l’uso consapevole di quelle parole scritte che tanti problemi gli avevano dato in gioventù. Domando con fatica le sue due bestie nere: il dolore e la dislessia, Shultz riesce infine a salvare se stesso dal cono d’ombra proiettato da un evento lontano e pur capace di ipotecare sinistramente il futuro. E riusce soprattutto ad affrancarne la propria discendenza, come vediamo dalla dedica del libro: "For My son Augie, a success story". Ed è forse questa forma di successo interiore, il più difficile da conquistare, che il Pulitzer ha voluto premiare (fiorenza mormile).

FAILURE To pay for my father's funeral I borrowed money from people he already owed money to. One called him a nobody. No, I said, he was a failure. You can't remember a nobody's name, that's why they're called nobodies. Failures are unforgettable. The rabbi who read a stock eulogy about a man who didn't belong to or believe in anything was both a failure and a nobody. He failed to imagine the son and wife of the dead man being shamed by each word. To understand that not believing in or belonging to anything demanded a kind of faith and buoyancy. An uncle, counting on his fingers my father's business failures— a parking lot that raised geese, a motel that raffled honeymoons, a bowling alley with roving mariachis— failed to love and honor his brother, who showed him how to whistle under covers, steal apples with his right or left hand. Indeed, my father was comical. His watches pinched, he tripped on his pant cuffs and snored loudly in movies, where his weariness overcame him finally. He didn't believe in: savings insurance newspapers vegetables good or evil human frailty history or God. Our family avoided us, fearing boils. I left town but failed to get away.