Throwback: you by Chantal Neveu, translated by Erin Mouré

“My challenge was… to find an original form, not apparently narrative, and generous enough to render freely, tonally, and as fluidly as possible the complexity of love and love relationships”
(Chantal Neveu in Erin Mouré ,YOU VIA ME, (A TRANSLATOR’S POSTFACE)

you is one long lyric poem, a book of unknown possibilities— nuances, labyrinths, mazes, dead ends, hidden corners, narrow footpaths and rapid transitions. Lines are spare, text dense and double-spaced. Although much is said, much is not.

The form and its spare diction creates intensity and evokes desire. Whose love story is this? In English, `you’ is many-gendered, can denote singularity, plurality, a finger-pointed other, a reflective self. By process of elimination/inclusion, you speaks to us all. The choice of the English you for the title of a book written in French has clear intention.

There are details, there is a sense of narrative, of a woman and her male lover. There are meeting places, moments of joy, of hope, of disillusionment, awareness of others and lack of it, the passionate torrent that is new love.

first his breathing then his pupils

I watch his mouth

its furrows its swells

slight circle of his irises

from the dark hole a tube

he sees me

impulsion…. 

…..private

spheres

spontaneous revelation

the ineffable

freshness of a stream

are we already naked

Readers are told very little about the context material surrounding these powerful and elegant words and phrases. But that may well be the point. We don’t need more than what is offered. The book is in relationship with its own text and spaces, but also with you. The emergent story of you in the imagination of each reader is likely to have its own distinct voice and cadences, although we are likely to share one experience: a narrative arc marked with the dynamics, pacing, passion and uncertainty of love.

To let go of assumptions of distance between book and reader, to be invited, perhaps required, to investigate oneself in reading means that you is disruptive, unsettling. Also, enchanting.

you is a work of masterful writing honoured by a highly accomplished translation.

The lack of punctuation, the sparse language, the spaces between words are apt. They maintain momentum and bring each line’s condensed language into conversation with what goes before and follows:

suspension

we are fully aware

plunge into the vortex

our days are numbered

displacement

without appeal

Much could be happily discussed about the writing and translation of you. I suspect a graduate student in an MFA program somewhere in Canada may be doing just that for us now, as I write. But for the purpose of this short review, to parse the book and its translation risks denying the value and importance of you’s economy of language and form in addressing one of the most written-about themes in human literature—love.

I will make one comment about the form here: Erin Mouré notes that each line in the translation is in relationship with all that comes before, all that follows. No word or phrase stands alone. From that perspective, the extracts included in this review may be a bit of a travesty. But I want to share with you a little more of you’s erudite grace:

literally

setting out again

from the belvedere

mortal

nonchalant

willingly

plainsong.

Now, go get the book and read, or-re-read, it. Revel in it. It’s all about you.

Chantal Neveu is the author of seven books of poetry, including you; La vie radieuse (This Radiant Life, winner of the 2021 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation and the 2021 Nelson Ball Prize.; coït (Coït); Une spectaculaire influence (A Spectacular Influence); mentale; èdres; and Dans l’architecture (co-written with Nicolas Tardy). She has created numerous interdisciplinary literary works, in Canada and abroad. Her work has appeared in many magazines and anthologies: Cyclages/Grupmuv, Espaces de savoir, Laboratoire parcellaire. She has held residencies at Maison de la poésie de Nantes (France), Passa Porta and Villa Hellebosch (Belgium), and Villa Waldberta (Germany). Neveu lives in Montreal.

Erín Moure is a poet and poetry translator. Most recent book: Chus Pato’s The Face of the Quartzes (2021) from Galician. Her translation of Chantal Neveu’s This Radiant Life (2020) won the 2021 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation from French and the Nelson Ball Prize. Her latest book of poetry and biotext is Theophylline: an aporetic migration via the modernisms of Rukeyser, Bishop, Grimké (de Castro, Vallejo).

Publisher: Book*hug Press (March 19, 2024)
Paperback 5.75″ x 7.75″ | 336 pages
ISBN: 9781771668828

Susan Wismer

Susan is grateful to live on Treaty 18 territory at the southern shore of Manidoo-gitchigami (Georgian Bay) in Ontario, Canada with two human partners and a very large dog. Recent publications include a collaborative chapbook,Hand Shadowswith Michele Green and Suzette Sherman (Wintergreen Press, 2024). Hag Dancesis coming out with At Bay Press in Spring 2025.www.susanwismer.com