Hilda Dresen
Hilda Dresen (11. V 1896 – 5. II 1981) was a translator to and a poet in Esperanto.
She was trained and worked as a radio-telegraphist who learnt Esperanto in 1913. Dresen collaborated in Literatura Mondo, La Nica Literatura Revuo, Norda Prismo, Monda Kulturo, Heroldo de Esperanto, La Praktiko, La Nova Epoko, La Suda Stelo, Fontoand other periodicals. A number of translations for Estona Antologio: I (‘Estonian Anthology: I’, 1932) were done with her sister, Helmi (1892-1941), who was murdered by the Nazis.
Although Hilda Dresen dedicated herself mainly to translation, eleven of her original poems were selected for Dekdu Poetoj (‘Eleven Poets’, 1934). Her own collection of poetry, Norda Naturo (‘Northern Nature’), appeared in 1967. Dresen is above all a poet of nature contemplated through ’the innocent eyes of a child’. Georgi Mihalkov comments that her poems seem to radiate the silence and tranquillity of the North. ’Dresen paints the concrete details that characterize northern nature with delicacy and emotion. … the silver birch, the bird cherry, the northern lakes.’ Mihalkov also considers Dresen to be the first Esperanto poetess to enrich the literature ’with typically female tones, motifs, emotions’. He remarks that, although Dresen’s themes are not very varied or her ’spectrum of senses’ very wide, she nevertheless succeeds in displaying the lyricalness and tender emotion of the female spirit. On the other hand, Dresen’s poetry is ruled by harmony and the outside world. She ’avoids meditation on the thoughts and feelings of the female soul’. Tazio Carlevaro classifies Dresen’s work as being on the periphery of influence from the Budapest School of writers (cf. Kalocsay, Baghy). He considers her the first outstanding female poet in Esperanto. Dresen’s themes principally concern nature and emotional movements, which she develops with a somewhat melancholy, although never sentimental, tone. Kálmán Kalocsay also commented on the melancholy in Dresen’s poetry, as did Lajos Tárkony, although William Auld does not share the same opinion, finding her ’positive, courageous, diligent’. Auld picks out her poem Vento (‘Wind’) as exemplifying her philosophy of life. ’… how unconventional Hilda’s mind was to the end’, he wrote.
Dresen has translated to Esperanto some 122 poems from Estonian – parts of Kalevipoeg, Marie Under, Juhan Liiv, Johannes Barbarus, Juhan Smuul, Vladimir Beekman, Henrik Visnapuu, Debora Vaarandi, Enn Uibot etc. Dresen translated poetry to Esperanto also from Russian, Ukrainian and German.
Source: Geoffrey Sutton. The Third Period 1931-1951. – Concise Encyclopedia of the Original Literature of Esperanto, 1887-2007. New York: Mondial, 2008, pp 193-195.
