times nonsense in another, it would be unreasonable to limit a translator to the narrow compass of his author's words: it is enough if he choose out some expression which does not vitiate the sense. I suppose he may stretch his chain to such a latitude; but by innovation of thoughts, methinks, he breaks it. By this means the spirit of an author may be transfused, and yet not lost and thus it is plain, that the reason alleged by Sir John Denham has no farther force than to expression: for thought, if it be translated truly, cannot be lost in another language; but the words that convey it to our apprehension, which are the image and ornament of that thought, may be so ill chosen, as to make it appear in an unhandsome dress, and rob it of its native lustre. There is therefore a liberty to be allowed for the expression; feither is it necessary that words and lines should be confined to the measure of their original. The sense of an author, generally speaking, is to be sacred and inviolable. If the fancy of Ovid be luxuriant, it is his character to be so; and if I retrench it, he is no longer Ovid. It will be replied, that he receives advantage by this lopping of his superfluous branches; but I rejoin, that a translator has no such right. When a painter copies from the life, I suppose he has no privilege to alter features, and lineaments, under pretence that his picture will look better: perhaps the face which he has drawn would be more exact, if the eyes or nose were altered; but it is his business to make it resemble the original. In two cases only there may a seeming difficulty arise, that is, if the thought be notoriously trivial or dishonest; but the same answer will serve for both, that then they ought not to be translated: et quæ Desperes tractata nitescere posse, relinquas. Thus I have ventured to give my opinion on this subject, against the authority of two great men, but I hope without offence to either of their memories; for I both loved them living, and reverence them now they are dead. But if after what I have urged, it be thought by better judges that the praise of a translation consists in adding new beauties to the piece, thereby to recompense the loss which it sustains by change of language, I shall be willing to be taught better, and to recant. In the mean time it seems to me, that the true reason why we have so few versions which are tolerable, is not from the too close pursuing of the author's sense, but because there are so few who have all the talents which are requisite for translation; and that there is so little praise and sa small encouragement for so considerable a part of learning. To apply in short what has been said to this present work: the reader will here find most of the translations, with some little latitude or variation from the author's sense. That of Enone to Paris, is in Mr. Cowley's way of imitation only. I was desired to say, that the author, who is of the fair sex, For my own part, I am ready to acknowledge, that I have transgressed the rules which I have given, and taken more liberty than a just translation will allow. But so many gentlemen, whose Thurinames wit and learning are well known, being joined in shhan it, I doubt not but their excellencies will make you ample satisfaction for my errours. ' 4. Mrs. Aphra Behn. "The affluence and comprehension of our language (says Dr. Johnson) is very illustriously displayed in our poetical translation of Ancient Writers; a work which the French seem to relinquish in despair, and which we were long unable to perform with dexterity. Ben Jonson thought it necessary to copy Horace almost word by word; Feltham, his contemporary and adversary, considers it as indispensably requisite in a translation to give line for line. It is said that Sandys, whom Dryden calls the best versifier of the last age, has struggled hard to comprise every book of his English Metamorphoses in the same number of verses with the original. Holyday had nothing in view but to shew that he understood his author, with so little regard to the grandeur of his diction, or the volubility of his numbers, that his metres can hardly be called verses; they cannot be read without reluctance, nor will the labour always be rewarded by understanding them. Cowley saw that such copiers were a servile race; he asserted his liberty, and spread his wings so boldly, that he left his authors. It was reserved for Dryden to fix the limits of poetical liberty, and give us just rules and examples of translation. "When languages are formed upon different principles, it is impossible that the same modes of expression should always be elegant in both. While they run on together, the closest translation may be considered as the best; but when they divaricate, each must take its natural course. Where correspondence cannot be obtained, it is necessary to be content with something equivalent. Translation therefore, says Dryden, is not so loose as paraphrase, nor so close as metaphrase. 3 "All polished languages have different styles; the concise, the diffuse, the lofty, and the humble. In the proper choice of style consists the resemblance which Dryden principally exacts from the translator. He is to exhibit his author's thoughts in such a dress of diction as the author would have given them, had his language been English rugged magnificence is not to be softened: hyperbolical ostentation is not to be repressed, nor sententious affectation to have its points blunted. A translator is to be like his author: it is not his business to excel him. "The reasonableness of these rules seems sufficient for their vindication; and the effects produced by observing them were so happy, that I know not whether they were ever opposed but by Sir Edward Sherburne, a man whose learning was greater than his powers of poetry; and who, being better qualified to give the meaning than the spirit of Seneca, has introduced his version of three tragedies by a defence of close translation. The authority of Horace, which the new translators cited in defence of their practice, he has, by a judicious explanation, taken fairly from them ; but reason wants not Horace to support it." Sir Edward Sherburne, in his Life of Seneca, prefixed to his translation of three of that writer's tragedies, 8vo. 1702, after quoting from Horace the lines referred to by our author in p. 15, 66 Publica materies privati juris erit, si Nec circa vilem patulumve moraberis orbem, Interpres― observes, that these "verses duly read and considered, are so far from admitting the sense these men would put upon them, that they clearly infer a quite different and contrary meaning, which yet I would not have them take from me, but from the illustrious Huetius, in his excellent Discourse de optimo genere interpretandi, remarking upon this place: Hujus loci ea mens est; (says he,) in materiam ab aliis occupatam, et publici juris, non ita esse involandum, ut verbum verbo reddatur, quasi fidi interpretis officium exequatur poeta; sed ut argumentum et rerum descriptionem exprimat, tum insignia delibet ornamenta, verba prætermittat: i. e. The mind of which place is this,-As to the matter already assumed and published by others, a poet may yet justly make the subject his own, if he fall not so upon it, as to render it word for word, by executing the part of a faithful interpreter, but endeavour to adorn the argument with new embellishments of fresh invention, and pass by the words of the first writer.-This is the exposition the learned Huetius makes of this place; and it will be more than difficult to find an interpretation given thereof by any commentator, (from Acron and Porphyrio to the last that ever animadverted upon Horace,) dissonant from that he hath here delivered. "By this passage of Horace, thus truly explained, the reader may clearly perceive, first, that Horace gave no rules for translation, and therefore cannot be said (as some have styled him) to be of that art the great lawgiver: for doubtless he thought it below him. Next, that according to the judgment of Horace himself, it is the duty of a faithful interpreter to translate what he undertakes, word for word illud ergo ex Horatii sententiâ fidi interpretis munus est, verbum verbo referre; quod calculo suo confirmat Helenius Acron, says the said judicious Huetius." |