Background
I am making a Chinese singable version of a Sicilian song called "Si maritau Rosa" (Rosa has gotten married). I have three questions about how to best render the last verse. Here are the lyrics of said verse:
Siđđu n'atturna pòrtunu | If people bring an atturna*
Nta lu quartèri miu, | In my quarter,
M'affaccia 'nu disiu, | A desire is born in me,
Nun pozzu cchiù durmì. | I can no longer sleep.
Alleggiu alleggiu apru | I quietly open
'A porta a vvaniđđuzza, | The door, making a little slit,
Vidu ca è p' Annuzza | I see it's for Annuzza
E ttornu a llacrimà. | And go back to crying.
The asterisk is on a part that will be explained in one of the questions.
Here is my current translation:
如果在我四等分
有人来唱小夜曲,
心里长大了愿望
就不再能睡觉.
悄悄地将我的门
来打开得裂缝啊,
看是为了小婷婷
就回到流眼泪.
Question 1: 四等分 | quarter
I found 四等分 via Google, I guess, and have just noticed it's under "verb", so how do I translate "quarter" in the sense of "part of a city" (sense 2.1 here)?
Question 2: atturna
One version of the song is the above, another one reads «Siddu a nutturna portunu», other versions have «Quannu» for «Siddu». I prefer "siddu" (if) to "quannu" (when), but that is just me. As for "a nutturna" vs. "n'atturna", I choose the latter because it uses an indefinite article (n') vs. the definite "a" of the former. Both seem to be a reference to the Siracusan festival of Our Lady the Immaculate Conception, which starts with the band going around the roads playing cheerfully and waking everyone up. I thus interpret this "to bring an atturna" as a group of people with instruments going up and down a road playing love songs for someone living in that road. This needs confirmation, but it's going to be hard to find it.
Admitting the above interpretation is the correct one, what is the best way to render this in Chinese? Is there a similar Chinese custom I could refer to?
Question 3: vanidduzza
This word is a diminutive of "vanedda", which is found online to mean either "slit" or "country road". The latter interpretation is what gave my very first traslation 我就悄悄来打开 / 小路上的那扇门. I prefer the former, however, because:
- I prefer the furtivity of the slit rather than the specification of where the door goes;
- Another version of the song has «Tegnu la porta aperta / La mettu a padiduzza» which suggests this is the meaning of "apru / a porta a vanidduzza";
- Sicilian Wiktionary has the expression "chiùdiri a vanedda", "close into a slit" (horrible translation but you get the picture), so if that exists, I'm betting that with "to close" it means the door is open and you almost-close it, only leaving a slit between it and the wall, whereas with "to open" (as in the song) the door is closed, and you open it a little.
With that, how do I render this "apru / a porta a vvanidduzza" into Chinese? Is my above attempt OK?
Extra
Full lyrics and translation here, if anyone's curious about this song. Any comments are welcome. It should be noted that you can find wildly varying lyrics online (the "padiduzza" quote above is from here and is an example of the "wildly varying" part.
