Poetry
Ny anay
Not translated into English
Ny Avana Ramanantoanina · 1912
Synopsis
The poem sings of a love that has nothing of tranquil bliss: it strains towards a perfection that remains a matter of desire and that life scarcely allows to be fulfilled. Its first lines, quoted by a Malagasy study, hail this love adorned with colours and fulfilled. The text belongs to the love-poetry vein of its author's youth, in which there already shows the dissatisfaction with existence that will mark the whole of his work.
Context
The poem appeared on 26 April 1912 in the journal Lakolosy volamena, more than three years before the colonial administration dismantled the secret society to which its author belonged and sent him to Mayotte. It therefore long precedes the texts of exile and the commitment that made his reputation. The Poetawebs study quotes its first lines from the 1912 issue and already reads in it the dissatisfaction that runs through his love poems.
Who it is for
In Malagasy, never translated; the complete text remains hard to access, only its first lines being quoted online.
Prizes and reception
Cited as an example of the love poetry of his youth, before the poems of exile that made his reputation.