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A Floresta da língua / The Forest of language

Há tantas palavras para aprender. Algumas centenas que agarrei cedo, mas para além destes há esta vasta floresta de palavras mais ou menos especializadas e mais ou menos úteis ...

Estou a ler um livro (em português) para crianças. Cada frase tem pelo menos uma palavra que eu não sei. Algumas delas posso ignorar, mas quando encontro 'resmungar', paro o agradável movimento da historia e utilizo o dicionário. Dá a tradução 'to grumble'. Mas eu já conheço os verbos 'zangar-se' e 'ralhar'. Preciso de 'resmungar' também? Irei alguma vez usá-lo?

O estranho é que, quase sempre que conscientemente aprendo uma nova palavra, pouco depois ela vem ao meu encontro nalgum outro contexto. 

Um exemplo: a mulher que dá aulas de cerâmica à nossa criança mais velha tem um gato de um olho chamado Filly.  Perguntámos de onde vinha o nome. De 'Filarmónica'. Ele morava atrás do edifício de Filarmónica. É um abandonado. Esta palavra foi nova para mim. Depois começou a aula de cerâmica e eu sentei-me lá fora e li o meu livro. É um pouco acima do meu nível de leitura. Na primeira página que li, apareceu uma nova personagem, um cão que se apresentou como 'abandonado'. Esta repentina reaparição da palavra foi estranho. 

Outro exemplo: Estou a ler uma história de Sophie de Mello Breyner Andresen com um capitão de um navio que é de aspecto rude, pele queimada pelo sol. Encontrei a palavra 'queimada' no meu dicionário. Logo na manhã seguinte, ao ajudarmos a nossa filha mais nova a fazer os trabalhos de casa antes da escola, encontramos um cognato de 'queimada', num poema sobre uma estrela do mar:

Tem forma de estrela, 
 Não arde nem queima. 

Já tive tantos encontros que seguem esta narrativa. Ou é uma coincidência extraordinária, ou a palavra tem estado sempre lá, perto de mim, falada na minha audição ou presente em textos, mas mantida indetectável pela minha ignorância. 

A floresta tem olhos. Eles observam-me a errar ao longo dos caminhos entre pontos familiares. Esperam por mim para se aventurarem mais longe. 

There are so many words to learn. A few hundred you grab early on, but beyond that there’s this ever-receding forest of more-or-less specialised more-or-less useful words …

I’m reading a children’s illustrated story. Every sentence has at least one word that I don’t know. Some of them I can slide over, but when I meet 'resmungar', I halt the pleasing momentum of reading and deploy the dictionary. It gives the translation as grumble, mutter or nag. But I already know the verbs ‘zangar-se’ (to get angry) and ‘ralhar’ (to nag or scold). Do I need to remember ‘resmungar’? Will I meet it again? Will I ever use it?

The strange thing is, almost every time I consciously acquire a new word, soon afterwards it comes to meet me in some other setting. 

An example: the woman who gives our eldest child ceramics lessons has a one-eyed cat called Filly. We asked where the name came from. From 'Filarmónica'. He was living behind the place they rehearse. He’s a stray, um abandanado. The word was a new one for me. Then the ceramics lesson began so I sat outside and read my book. It’s slightly above my reading level. On the first page that I read a new character appeared, a dog who introduced himself as ‘abandanado.’ This sudden reappearance of the word was uncanny. 

Another example: I read a story by Sophie de Mello Breyner Andresen where a ship’s captain is described as ‘de aspecto rude, pele queimada pelo sol’. The dictionary translates ‘queimada’ as ‘burnt’, so ‘queimada pelo sol’ means ‘sunburnt’. The very next morning, as we’re helping our youngest daughter rush through her homework before school, we meet a cognate of ‘queimada’, in a poem about a starfish:

Tem forma de estrela, 
 Não arde nem queima. 

(You’re the shape of a star,
 You don’t burn or scorch.)

I’ve had so many encounters that follow this narrative. Either it’s an extraordinary coincidence, or the word has been there all along, close to me, spoken in my hearing or present in texts that my eyes pass over, but held undetectable by my ignorance. 

The forest has eyes. They watch me blunder along the paths between familiar points. They wait for me to venture further in. 

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Location: Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal

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