Katrine Jensen, Singer Scholar at Columbia University
Hans Christian Andersen or H.C. Andersen (1805–1875) was a Danish author and poet whose work has been translated into 150 languages. His fairy tales were – and are still – equal to love stories and the world of wonderment of any Scandinavian child, who became bewitched by his mysterious, dreamlike voyages of tales, the wealth of his imagination, as well his strong moral voice.
H.C. sits on a bench in Central Park, New York, somewhere between the Whitney Museum and Conservatory Water, his book wide open and his reflective gaze perhaps stops at the first page of The Ugly Duckling or perhaps it is The Little Mermaid, Thumbelina, or The Little Match Girl. For sure one of his 168 tales!
H.C. Andersen’s poetry is lesser known, however. We are soon about to learn more about it and the reason for that is Katrine Jensen.
Like many Scandinavians, Katrine has had the great fortune of indulging in Andersen’s fables as a child. Katrine, a 2014-15 TTS scholar, was born in Denmark. Her goal is to translate H.C. Andersen’s poetry into English for the very reason that his poetry remains largely unknown.
H.C. wrote more than 1000 poems during his lifetime, and only a small percentage of them have been translated to English. “I hope to make H.C. Andersen’s unread poetry accessible to the public, and do so in an artistic and scholarly way.”
“My grandmother would read H.C. Andersen’s stories to me as a child. Before I went to bed, she would play classical music and give me a book of fairy tales to read – her home was a nest of safety and imagination. Still today she will quote a H.C. Andersen story on any occasion. She inspired me with words. Even though her formal education ended at grade 7, she is the wordsmith in the family. She is cultured. She is an inspiration.”
“The woman who created my interest in the English language, however, was my mother. She would bring children’s books home from London and I would copy the stories by writing down the English words in my notebook. I quickly noticed the pride and attention from my mother the first time I copied a Postman Pat book, so I just kept going!”
“My mother has a degree in English literature and my father a degree in Danish literature. I grew up with a lot of books, especially literature in English and world literature in translation. My mother continuously encouraged me to improve my knowledge, especially of English which, she said, is the key to the world.”
Was she right? I ask her. An animated yes leaves room for no doubt!
In 2009, Katrine became an intern at the top Danish national newspaper at the time, Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten, where she mainly focused on in-depth investigative journalism. Aside from a couple hundred smaller articles she wrote, Katrine’s internship ended with a record of eleven cover stories that became major news stories. However, this experience strengthened her desire to work directly with literature “in pursuit of the meaning of language” she says.
“Translating H.C. Andersen is a mathematical equation. In order to imitate his poetry in English, one has to fit meter and rhyme into the poems. Many translators ignore either meter or rhyme because it cannot possibly fit without jeopardizing the meaning. And that is the great challenge. It requires an intense mental process in order to arrive at the true flavor and structure of the text.”
“For me this is as much a writing exercise. I am reinventing the language. Of course some of the writing can be straight forward, but in the case of H.C. Andersen, it is more complicated. Actually my problem with him is that he has a very naive way of writing. Danish is a much simpler language. When translating directly to English, the richness of a Danish word often falls flat. So when I translate I have to make a choice – I have to choose from a pallet of maybe five English synonyms for that one word in Danish, to keep the specificity and fullness of the original text.”
Katrine is currently pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing and Literary Translation at Columbia University. She originally came to America for one semester in 2011 to study painting, filmmaking, and creative writing at State University of New York at New Paltz. She decided to stay and write her BA project in journalism on the Occupy Wall Street movement. She began studying for her MFA in creative writing in 2013.
“I started at Columbia University with the generous support of TTS. With the degree I am currently pursuing, the goal is not only to write a great novel of my own, but to promote Danish literature – which is why I am also translating authors from Denmark that I feel should be more known.”
Katrine’s working model is: She works non-stop! At Columbia University she has three different jobs – the most prominent one being her position as the Editor-in-chief of Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art. She also works as the Director of Columbia Artist/Teachers – a program that connects Columbia University’s writing students with NYC public schools to offer free creative writing classes, taught by the MFA writers. Finally she works as the Program Assistant for the Literary Translation Program at Columbia (LTAC), run by the esteemed literary translator Susan Bernofsky.
Aside from Katrine’s work at Columbia University, she works as an editor of Asymptote –an international literary magazine which features literature in 65 different languages, from 93 different countries. She is also a judge for the prestigious Best Translated Book Award, hosted by Three Percent.
Katrine is excited by what she sees as an awakened interest in Danish literature in New York. This is clearly aligned with her goals, in particular that of a continued bridging of the Danish and American literary traditions.