jan Pawe en jan Kawe
jan Pawe li lon sewi tomo. taso, jan Kawe li lon anpa pi tomo ni.
jan Pawe li ike ala tawa jan. jan Kawe li musi wawa mute a! ona li alasa lon tomo ona e soweli tu lon poka supa a.
ona li alasa, li tawa sike, li kalama wawa pi ike mute. jan Pawe li ken ala pilin pona;
ona li tawa jan Kawe, li wile: “sina, o pona, o kalama ala tan ni: sinpin li weka tan lupa mi.” jan Kawe li toki: “jan Tome li ken lon tomo a”.
mi o toki e seme a? jan Pawe li tawa tomo, li len e lawa a. jan Kawe li lape pona a. taso, telo li kama tawa nena ona. ona li kama tan lape, li tawa.
mu! pini. ona li lukin lon lupa e seme? telo li lon ale tomo.
jan Pawe li lon supa a, li jo e palisa. — “sina seme?” — “mi alasa e kala.” — “taso, telo li tawa mi!” jan Pawe li toki: “jan Tome li ken lon tomo a”.
toki ni li pana e sona ni a: jan li sama tawa sina.
sona (lon toki Inli)
This section mostly contains translator’s notes.
- This is jan Esuwa’s translation of Aleksander Fredro’s fable Paweł i Gaweł.
- Made on September 6, 2025. In that day’s episode of Koło Fortuny, one of the puzzles was a quote from that poem.
- Modified later on September 8, 2025. The line that originally said, “li kama tawa jan Kawe, li toki:” was changed to: “ona li tawa jan Kawe, li wile:”
- Published on September 9, 2025.
- I attempted to keep the syllable counts the same as the original. Most lines have 11 syllables.
- In the middle of a poem, the 1947 edition splits a line, but here I decided to merge them, like in the original 1880 version, since the resulting line would have 11 syllables.
- The stanzas are also according to the 1947 version. They stem from the fact the poem was split into several pages with illustrations. Still, I decided to split off the last two lines, like the 1880 version.
- The first two lines say mostly the same thing as the original, but they flow differently to the original for metrical reasons.
- I translated the proverb “Wolnoć, Tomku, w swoim domku” literally. The actual meaning, according to PWN, is: “someone does things they want at home and doesn’t care if they are bothering their neighbors.” However, when I found this out, I decided not to change it.
- The last line, “Jak ty komu, tak on tobie”, proved difficult to translate while keeping the syllable count and understandability. sama is the same as ijo sama. Because pali doesn’t mean “to do”.
- This work is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.