GR translation: angels of exaltation, of languid surrender

[J Tracy]

To my thinking the” of..., of...” construction  followed by the dash means both terms refers  " the steel angels” as you suggest.  The entire sequence is referring to what has long worked at his face,  with the Us at the underground station and whatever their magnetism brings down  being the final item in that list . I don't  see “others”  being  directly affected in this description of Saure and the things that have aged and affected ( worked at) his face.. Indirectly, others by seeing his face, may be affected by what is there, but that is not directly indicated in the sentence.








On Mar 23, 2025, at 1:27 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> V437.25-34, P444.35-445.4   Säure is on his side, quite still, a shrunken
> child, face long worked at by leaps from second-story windows, “first
> rubdowns” under gloved and womanish sergeants’ fists in the precinct
> stations, golden light in the afternoons over the racetrack at Karlshorst,
> black light from the pavements of boulevards at night finely wrinkled like
> leather stretched over stone, white light from satin dresses, glasses
> stacked shining in front of bar mirrors, sans-serif Us at the entrances to
> underground stations pointing in smooth magnetism at the sky to bring down
> steel angels of exaltation, of languid surrender—a face that in sleep is
> awesomely old, abandoned to its city’s history. . . .
> 
> Do "exaltation" and "languid surrender" describe the angels themselves? The
> published translation interpreted this as their effect on others, which I
> don't think is quite correct.
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