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Often appears with: history and the writing of history · books, libraries, and learning · language, naming, and meaning · religious persecution and toleration · fate, destiny, and necessity · poetry and the poets · education and the training of the young · rhetoric and persuasion · censorship and the press · fable, romance, and storytelling · myth and the gods of the nations · logic, method, and demonstration
Usually: curiosity (185) · detachment (184) · commentary or gloss (145) · skepticism (118) · argument (100) · reflection (67) · narrative (54) · wonder (38) · exhortation (30) · letter or document (25)
“These little rites, a stone, a verse, receive, 'Tis all a father, all a friend can give.” Gaius Valerius Catullus (translated by Robinson Ellis), The Poems and Fragments of Catullus · insight
“It was not sufficient to reproduce the ancient metres, unless the ancient quantity was reproduced also.” Gaius Valerius Catullus (translated by Robinson Ellis), The Poems and Fragments of Catullus · insight
“Sparrow, favourite of my own beloved, Whom to play with, or in her arms to fondle, She delighteth, anon with hardy-pointed Finger angrily doth provoke to bite her:” Gaius Valerius Catullus (translated by Robinson Ellis), The Poems and Fragments of Catullus · vivid
“They are then, so far as they relate to you, the law of the land, for the king is the Legislator of the Colonies.” Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin · observation
“He said, and wept; then spread his sails before The winds, and reach’d at length the Cumaean shore:” Virgil, The Aeneid · vivid
“The public highways, which had been constructed for the use of the legions, opened an easy passage for the Christian missionaries from Damascus to Corinth, and from Italy to the extremity of Spain or Britain;” Edward Gibbon, History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire · vivid
“History of Don Quixote of La Mancha, written by Cid Hamete Benengeli, an Arab historian.’ It required great caution to hide the joy I felt when the title of the book reached my ears” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · observation
“And no history can be bad so long as it is true.” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · insight
“it is the business and duty of historians to be exact, truthful, and wholly free from passion, and neither interest nor fear, hatred nor love, should make them swerve from the path of truth, whose mother is history, rival of time, storehouse of deeds, witness for the past, example and counsel for the present, and warning for the future.” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · insight
“Books that have been printed with the king’s licence, and with the approbation of those to whom they have been submitted, and read with universal delight, extolled by great and small, rich and poor, learned and ignorant, gentle and simple, in a word by people of every sort, of whatever rank or condition they may be—that these should be lies!” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · wit
“These days past, when sending Your Excellency my plays, that had appeared in print before being shown on the stage, I said, if I remember well, that Don Quixote was putting on his spurs to go and render homage to Your Excellency.” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · observation
“A second introduction took place about the middle of the thirteenth century, at the time of the flourishing of the Hanseatic League, when the story was introduced together with other popular German epics.” Unknown (Middle High German epic tradition), The Nibelungenlied · observation
The introduction argues that Muhammad’s originality lay mainly in reusing Jewish, Christian, and Arabian traditions with a distinctive manner, and that the Qur’an helped launch medieval philosophical and literary movements.
later on, frequently descended to deliberate invention and artful rhetoric. He, in fact, accommodated his moral sense to the circumstances in which the r\oc\le he had to play involved him. On the question of originality there can hardly be two opinions now that the Koran has been thoroughly compared with the Christian and Jewish traditions of the time; and it is, besides some original Arabian legends, to those only …
Margoliouth defends the Qur’an’s style by claiming it reflects an untutored but fervent Arab prophet, while noting Muslims see it as a miracle and that Rodwell’s translation best preserves the Eastern rhythm.
has in fact been penned by the prophet's greatest British admirer, Carlyle himself; and there are probably many now who find themselves in the same dilemma with that great writer. The fault appears, however, to lie partly in our difficulty to appreciate the psychology of the Arab prophet. We must, in order to do him justice, give full consideration to his temperament and to the condition of things around him. We are…
A bibliography lists English translations of the Qur’an and related scholarship, then includes a dedication to Sir William Martin by the translator.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS. From the original Arabic by G. Sale, 1734, 1764, 1795, 1801; many later editions, which include a memoir of the translator by R. A. Davenport, and notes from Savary's version of the Koran; an edition issued by E. M. Wherry, with additional notes and commentary (Tr\du\ubner's Oriental Series), 1882, etc.; Sale's translation has also been edited in the Chandos Classics, and a…
The preface explains that Qur’an chapter order in manuscripts is non-chronological, that early successors Abu Bakr and Zaid compiled fragments after Muhammad’s death, and that Uthman later standardized the text by burning other copies.
PREFACE It is necessary that some brief explanation should be given with reference to the arrangement of the Suras, or chapters, adopted in this translation of the Koran. It should be premised that their order as it stands in all Arabic manuscripts, and in all hitherto printed editions, whether Arabic or European, is not chronological, neither is there any authentic tradition to shew that it rests upon the authority…
It argues that the standardized Qur’an text did not follow strict chronology because Zaid largely placed longer well-known suras first, leaving a patchwork arrangement with cross-period mixing and embedded verses.
readings. Copies of the text formed were thus forwarded to several of the chief military stations in the new empire, and all previously existing copies were committed to the flames. Zaid and his coadjutors, however, do not appear to have arranged the materials which came into their hands upon any system more definite than that of placing the longest and best known Suras first, immediately after the Fatthah, or openi…
Margoliouth argues Muhammad likely lacked access to full Christian scriptures, notes only one direct Qur'anic quotation from scripture, and compares Qur'an wording with biblical phrases while stressing later recasting of borrowed material.
of the Zodiac, oil, the winds, etc.), which we find adopted in the Koran. These points of contact with Islam, knowing as we do Muhammad's eclecticism, can hardly be accidental. We have no evidence that Muhammad had access to the Christian Scriptures, though it is just possible that fragments of the Old or New Testament may have reached him through Chadijah or Waraka, or other Meccan Christians, possessing MSS. of th…
He claims Arabic translations of Old and New Testaments are late, argues Muhammad could learn biblical histories from Arab Jews and Christian informants, and says Qur'an materials were unified, recast, and shaped into Suras.
not that of the Koran-and these versions appear to have been made from the Septuagint, the Vulgate, Syriac, Coptic, and Greek; the four Gospels, says Tischendorf6 originem mixtam habere videntur. From the Arab Jews, Muhammad would be enabled to derive an abundant, though most distorted, knowledge of the Scripture histories. The secrecy in which he received his instructions from them, and from his Christian informant…
Margoliouth describes his translation practices and sources, discussing how Arabic text and earlier European translations were collated, and then provides a specimen translation of Qur'an Sura al-‘Alaq (Clots of Blood).
6 Prol. in N.T. p. lxxviii. 7 The date of the Bab. Gemara is A.D. 530; of the Jerusalem Gamara, A.D. 430; of the Mischina A.D. 220; See Gfrörer’s Jahrhundert des Heils, pp. 11- 44. 8 Sura xlvi. 10, p. 314. 9 Sura vi. 20, p. 318. Sura ii. 13 (p. 339), verse 98, etc. 10 Sura xxv. 5, 6, p. 159. 11 Sura. vii. 156, p. 307; xxix. 47, p. 265. 12 See Dr. Sprenger’s “Life,” p. 101. 13 Or, epileptic. 14 A line…
This passage is largely editorial footnote material explaining rabbinic parallels (e.g., Noah) and then lists multiple interpretive notes tying Qur’anic stories to Jewish legends and historical guesses about peoples like Ad and Themoud.
The Rabbins in like manner describe the mission of Noah. Comp. Sanhedr. 108. Midr. Rabbah on Gen. par. 30, 33; and on Eccl. 9, 14. See Sura [lxxv.] xi. 40. 16 The two tribes of Ad and Themoud-the latter of whom is mentioned by Diod. Sic. and Ptolemy-lay to the north of Mecca in the direct line of traffic between the countries to the north and to the south, and both probably disappeared with its cessation, when the A…
A 1893 editor explains that Pepys’s Diary was only partially printed in 1825, that later editions expanded it, and that this edition publishes everything except a few unprintable passages while marking omissions.
THE DIARY OF SAMUEL PEPYS M.A. F.R.S. CLERK OF THE ACTS AND SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY MAGDALENE COLLEGE CAMBRIDGE BY THE REV. MYNORS BRIGHT M.A. LATE FELLOW AND PRESIDENT OF THE COLLEGE (Unabridged) WITH LORD BRAYBROOKE'S NOTES EDITED WITH ADDITIONS BY HENRY B. WHEATLEY F.S.A. LONDON GEORGE BELL & SONS YORK ST. COVENT GARDEN CAMBRIDGE DEIGHTON BELL & CO. 1893 PREFACE Although the …
Butcher and Lang argue that translation is always relative to each age’s tastes, so Homer can’t have a final English rendering; verse translators inevitably add period-style “tags,” while prose can preserve Homer’s historical truth and avoid unnecessary modern ornament.
meaning, that can be rendered in English verse. There still, however, seems an aspect Homeric poems, and a demand in connection with Homer to be recognised, and to be satisfied. Sainte-Beuve says, with reference probably to M. Leconte de Lisle’s prose version of the epics, that some people treat the epics too much as if they were sagas. Now the Homeric epics are sagas, but then they are the sagas of the divine heroi…
They further claim there can be no final English Homer translation because each must mix Greek truth with modern, temporary elements; their prose aims to be “plain and old,” retaining even double and recurring epithets.
the student of the age of Anne, looks for in verse; and without tags of this sort, a translation of Homer in verse cannot well be made to hold together. There can be then, it appears, no final English translation of Homer. In each there must be, in addition to what is Greek and eternal, the element of what is modern, personal, and fleeting. Thus we trust that there may be room for “the pale and far-off shadow of a p…
Athene arranges Odysseus’s next step by visiting the Phaeacian princess Nausicaa in her sleeping chamber and impersonating Dymas’s daughter to instruct Nausicaa to wash clothes and prepare for marriage.
Nausicaa, going to a river near that place to wash the clothes of her father, mother, and brethren, while the clothes were drying played with her maids at ball; and Odysseus coming forth is fed and clothed, and led on his way to the house of her father, King Alcinous. So there he lay asleep, the steadfast goodly Odysseus, fordone with toil and drowsiness. Meanwhile Athene went to the land and the city of the Phaeaci…
Darwin concludes by saying that classification, morphology, embryology, larval forms, and rudimentary organs all make sense as genealogical and modified through natural selection rather than as independently created kinds.
from presenting a strange difficulty, as they assuredly do on the ordinary doctrine of creation, might even have been anticipated, and can be accounted for by the laws of inheritance. *Summary*.—In this chapter I have attempted to show, that the subordination of group to group in all organisms throughout all time; that the nature of the relationship, by which all living and extinct beings are united by complex, radi…
This passage presents editorial and structural notes for an English Bible edition, stating Tyndale’s Pentateuch translation was published in 1530, with the text retaining wording but modernizing spelling and noting variants from Coverdale or Matthew’s Bible.
The Pentateuch first translated from Hebrew to English by William Tyndale, published in 1530. This edition has the same wording, but modernized spelling. Words found in {[Braquets]} are variants from either Coverdale 1535 or Matthew's Bible 1537. CONTENTS TO GO STRAIGHT TO The First Book of Moses, called Genesis The Second Book of Moses, called Exodus The Third Book of Moses, called Leviticus The Fourth Book of M…
Tyndale introduces the English New Testament translation and begins the prologue, urging learned translators to amend errors and explaining that the work aims at spiritual edifying and consolation.
"The king came in, to visit the guests, and spied there a man which had not on a wedding garment, and said unto him: friend, how camest thou in hither, and" The rest of the New Testament is from the Worms octavo edition of 1526; Also with some few variants [in] {brackets} from W.T. 1534 edition. {Editor's notes at bottom.} (Proloque from the Cologne quarto 1525.) The Prologue. I have here translated (brethren an…
Tyndale asks learned Christians to consider the work’s limitations, explains it was produced amid necessity, promises future revisions and aids for readers, and ends with a request to pray for him.
and be negligent) and all threatenings shall be forgiven thee for Christ's blood's sake to whom commit thyself altogether without respect either of thy good deeds or of thy bad. Them that are learned Christianly I beseech forasmuch as I am sure, and my conscience beareth me record, that of a pure intent, singly and faithfully I have interpreted it, as far forth as God gave me the gift of knowledge and understanding …
Editor’s notes argue for spiritual guidance over modernizing textual revisions, stresses careful study of scripture, and praises Tyndale as a translator whose English phrasing influenced later English Bible versions, quoting biblical phrases.
thing is this? Notwithstanding by all manner ways, whether it be by occasion or of truth, yet Christ is preached: and therefore I joy. Yee and will joy." (Philippians j.) Even so, thorow much research and thanks to the guidance of the spirit of God who leads to truth, that is, His son Christ Iesu our health; firstly asking God by prayer and fasting, for wisdom in Iesus name; it must be said in desire of the pure Wor…
The editor continues listing famous English Bible phrases traced to Tyndale, then recounts Tyndale’s martyr-legend reply about making a ploughboy know scripture, explaining how translation was considered heretical and dangerous in the early printing age.
'They made light of it, and went their ways: one to his firm place, another about his merchandise,' (Matthew xxij.) 'And he put forth a similitude unto them saying: The lands of a certain man brought forth fruits plenteously, and he thought in himself saying: what shall I do? because I have no room where to bestow my fruits? And he said: This will I do. I will destroy my barns, and build greater, and therein will I …
It narrates Tyndale’s flight to Germany (1524), his printing efforts at Cologne then Worms, a copy surviving in the British Museum, efforts to buy and burn copies, and his later imprisonment in Vilvorde/Brussels with surviving letters about his conditions.
"If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough to know more of the Scripture than thou dost." (Foxe, Book of Martyrs) At that time, printing had just been invented, although translating the Bible was considered heretical. These were dangerous times for Scripture translations. Even still, Tyndale said, "It is impossible to establish the lay people in any truth, except the Scriptures …
This editor section lists the circumstances of Tyndale’s martyrdom, then explains how later Bibles in England drew from Tyndale’s translation through a chain of revisions (Coverdale, Matthew, Taverner, Bishops’, Geneva, and later echoes).
'Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God, thorow your traditions?' Matthew xv. also see Mark vij.}. At last, after much reasoning, when no reason would serve, although he deserved no death, he was condemned by virtue of the emperor's decree, made in the assembly at Augsburg. Brought forth to the place of execution, he was tied to the stake, strangled by the hangman, and afterwards consumed with fire, at the…
The editor justifies keeping Tyndale’s archaic spellings and typography and then explains word-level renderings (e.g., “como,” “gospel,” “lowse,” “thorow”) plus the significance of “ye/you” vs “thee/thou” for meaning.
this lamb was offered at the first passover in egypt. (also pascha : or paschal lamb; that Christ the Lord fulfilled by shedding his precious blood for us at calvary) c.) IESUS, IESU : "J" was not used in the original W.T. English for words (although is used as a 1 roman numeral .j.) William Tyndale like most early translators were very accurate in rendering the name of the Lord from the original tongue. The name of…
The passage continues the revised definitions, detailing “Shew,” “Pith,” “nay,” “Yee,” and the pronoun forms “Thou/Thine/Ye,” then ends with a concluding blessing signed by Mario Valente.
xxxiv. 6. 2. Unwilling to give pain; compassionate. A merciful man will be merciful to his beast.—Old Proverb. Syn: Compassionate; tender; humane; gracious; kind; mild; clement; benignant.— Mer\"ci*ful*ly, adv.—Mer\"ci*ful*ness, n. SHEW, v. t. [It is sometimes written shew, shewed, shewn, shewing.] gr. to mark, perceive, hear 1. To exhibit or present to vjew; to place in sight; to display;—the thing exhibited being …
After Syracuse’s fall, Marcellus transports Grecian artworks to Rome, prompting admiration that later backfires on Roman temples; meanwhile in Sicily, conflicts at Agrigentum involve Generals Epicydes, Hanno, and Mutines sent by Hannibal.
continued for a considerable time in a tranquil state in Spain, as both parties, after giving and receiving such important defeats, hesitated to run the hazard of a general battle. 40. During these transactions in Spain, Marcellus, after the capture of Syracuse, having settled the other affairs in Sicily with so much honour and integrity as not only to add to his own renown, but also to the majesty of the Roman peop…
The games expand into ceremonial cavalry displays led by Ascanius and other Trojan youths, followed by a fleet of performances whose choreography later becomes a Roman inherited tradition.
envied him the prize, Tho’ he transfix’d the pigeon in the skies. Who cut the line, with second gifts was grac’d; The third was his whose arrow pierc’d the mast. The chief, before the games were wholly done, Call’d Periphantes, tutor to his son, And whisper’d thus: “With speed Ascanius find; And, if his childish troop be ready join’d, On horseback let him grace his grandsire’s day, And …
Aeneas reaches Cumae, enters the Sibyl’s cave and golden temple, where the Sibyl’s storyline and images of earlier myths frame Aeneas’s descent to meet Anchises.
THE ARGUMENT. The Sibyl foretells Aeneas the adventures he should meet with in Italy. She attends him to hell; describing to him the various scenes of that place, and conducting him to his father Anchises, who instructs him in those sublime mysteries, of the soul of the world, and the transmigration; and shows him that glorious race of heroes, which was to descend from him and his poste…
Rodwell’s preface explains his chronological arrangement of Qur’anic suras, recounting how Abu Bakr collected fragments after Muhammad’s death (on Omar’s suggestion), how Uthman later standardized the text to prevent disputes, and how suras are reordered by subject and inferred life events.
PREFACE It is necessary that some brief explanation should be given with reference to the arrangement of the Suras, or chapters, adopted in this translation of the Koran. It should be premised that their order as it stands in all Arabic manuscripts, and in all hitherto printed editions, whether Arabic or European, is not chronological, neither is there any authentic tradition to shew that it rests upon the authority…
Rodwell describes his method for ordering suras using traditional lists and scholarly criticism (Weil, Muir, Nöldeke), and he characterizes Qur’an suras by shifting tone from early poetic Mecca admonitions to later Medina legislation and war rhetoric.
and honesty of purpose which forbade him, as it certainly did, in any way to tamper with the sacred text, to suppress contradictory, and exclude or soften down inaccurate, statements. The arrangement of the Suras in this translation is based partly upon the traditions of the Muhammadans themselves, with reference especially to the ancient chronological list printed by Weil in his Mohammed der Prophet, as well as upo…
The translator argues that early traditions about Muhammad were largely unwritten for about a century, later colored by sectarian interests, and judges later historians’ reliability as “highly uncritical.”
15, p. 339, and v. 246, p. 365, and the constant mention of guidance, direction, wandering, may have been suggested by reminiscences of his mercantile journeys in his earlier years. It may be considered quite certain that it was not customary to reduce to writing any traditions concerning Muhammad himself for at least the greater part of a century. They rested entirely on the memory of those who have handed them dow…
The work claims Muhammad had limited direct access to Christian scriptures, that Qur’anic similarities to Bible passages reflect indirect acquaintance and recasting, and argues Arabic Bible translations appeared centuries later.
of the Zodiac, oil, the winds, etc.), which we find adopted in the Koran. These points of contact with Islam, knowing as we do Muhammad's eclecticism, can hardly be accidental. We have no evidence that Muhammad had access to the Christian Scriptures, though it is just possible that fragments of the Old or New Testament may have reached him through Chadijah or Waraka, or other Meccan Christians, possessing MSS. of th…
It asserts Muhammad learned distorted Scripture histories from Arab Jews and Rabbis, embedded their legends with his own words, and argues that Qur’anic unity and style imply a single authorial process.
not that of the Koran–and these versions appear to have been made from the Septuagint, the Vulgate, Syriac, Coptic, and Greek; the four Gospels, says Tischendorf6 originem mixtam habere videntur. From the Arab Jews, Muhammad would be enabled to derive an abundant, though most distorted, knowledge of the Scripture histories. The secrecy in which he received his instructions from them, and from his Christian informant…
The translator transitions from authorial character discussion to translation methodology, citing the Arabic text basis (Fluegel), comparing other translators, and explaining choices for names and key Arabic terms.
Koran without argeeing with that motto from St. Augustin, which Sale has prefixed to his title page, "Nulla falsa doctrina est, quæ non aliquid veri permisceat." Qu‘st. Evang. ii. 40. The Arabic text from which this translation has been made is that of Fluegel. Leips. 1841. The translations of Sale, Ullmann, Wahl, Hammer von Purgstall in the Fundgruben des Orients, and M. Kasimirski, have been collated throughout; a…
After Marcellus returns to Rome for a triumph, he brings many Syracusan artistic treasures that re-sensitize Romans to Greek refinement; older men and rivals criticize his display and alleged idleness.
lives, chiefly those of his enemies. Marcellus, relenting, set them all at liberty, and rewarded Nicias with ample lands and rich presents. This history is recorded by Posidonius the philosopher. Marcellus, at length recalled by the people of Rome to the immediate war at home, to illustrate his triumph, and adorn the city, carried away with him a great number of the most beautiful ornaments of Syracuse. For, before…
Faraday compares LU, YBL, and LL, arguing for older eighth/seventh-century origins with later redactions, describes differences in episode order and tone, and discusses how linguistic and manuscript evidence supports a multi-stage composition and transmission history.
and language than in LU or YBL. It is essentially a literary attempt to give a complete and consistent narrative, and is much less interesting than the older LU-YBL recension. In the present version, I have collated LU, as far as it goes, with YBL, adding from the latter the concluding parts of the story, from the Fight with Fer Diad to the end. After the Fight with Fer Diad, YBL breaks off abruptly, leaving nearly …
The introduction argues that versions of the Fer Diad episode differ in length and tone, suggests it may be a later addition due to language and motif recycling, and surveys earlier scholarly work and aims of Faraday’s translation.
the *Dinnsenchas*, an eleventh-century compilation of place-legends. The existing collections of *Dinnsenchas* contain over fifty entries derived from the *Tain* cycle, some corresponding with, others differing from those in LU. This version has also embodied a considerable number of glosses in the text. As many of these are common to LU and YBL, they must go back to the common original, which must therefore have be…
The translation methodology is stated: keep close to the original, limit notes, explain omitted rhetorics, and translate certain linguistic features; it also gives a guide to Irish geographical-name elements used throughout the Tain.
lamentation. The older version of the *Tain* is throughout singularly free from pathos of the feebler sort; the humorous side is always uppermost, and the tragic suggestions interwoven with it. But it is still a matter of question whether the whole Fer Diad episode may not be late. Professor Zimmer thinks it is; but even the greatest scholar, with a theory to prove, is not quite free. It will of course be noticed, o…
Paine provides a postscript timeline noting his manuscript copy is sent to Shelburne from headquarters in New York, enclosing a pamphlet addressed to the Abbé Raynal about American principles.
conduct of England, that she exhibits herself in the most dishonorable colors. On the second of August last, General Carleton and Admiral Digby wrote to General Washington in these words: "The resolution of the House of Commons, of the 27th of February last, has been placed in Your Excellency's hands, and intimations given at the same time that further pacific measures were likely to follow. Since which, until the p…
In an appendix, Paine explains publication delays and argues that parts of his tax-reduction plan resemble Mr. Pitt’s parliamentary proposals, narrating how printing was halted and publication rescheduled.
APPENDIX As the publication of this work has been delayed beyond the time intended, I think it not improper, all circumstances considered, to state the causes that have occasioned delay. The reader will probably observe, that some parts in the plan contained in this work for reducing the taxes, and certain parts in Mr. Pitt's speech at the opening of the present session, Tuesday, January 31, are so much alike as to…
It describes Don Quixote’s growing popularity through multiple foreign editions (Brussels, Milan) and Cervantes’ delay in writing a second part, focusing instead on Novelas Exemplares (published 1613) and renewed dramatic ambition.
Saavedra already mentioned, his sister Andrea, now a widow, her daughter Constanza, a mysterious Magdalena de Sotomayor calling herself his sister, for whom his biographers cannot account, and a servant-maid. Meanwhile “Don Quixote” had been growing in favour, and its author’s name was now known beyond the Pyrenees. In 1607 an edition was printed at Brussels. Robles, the Madrid publisher, found it necessary to meet …
It contrasts Cervantes’ humour—based on gravity, incongruity, and keeping the author invisible—with later humourists’ self-conscious jokes, and notes translation difficulties with Spanish comedic gravity.
our latter-day school of humourists, who seem to have revived the old horse-collar method, and try to raise a laugh by some grotesque assumption of ignorance, imbecility, or bad taste. It is true that to do full justice to Spanish humour in any other language is well-nigh an impossibility. There is a natural gravity and a sonorous stateliness about Spanish, be it ever so colloquial, that make an absurdity doubly abs…
The curate and barber continue judging books one by one—sending many into the yard to burn, banishing or preserving others—while debating authors and even comparing translated works to originals.
“This,” said the barber, “is ‘Don Olivante de Laura.’” “The author of that book,” said the curate, “was the same that wrote ‘The Garden of Flowers,’ and truly there is no deciding which of the two books is the more truthful, or, to put it better, the less lying; all I can say is, send this one into the yard for a swaggering fool.” “This that follows is ‘Florismarte of Hircania,’” said the barber. “Señor Florismart…
In the Alcana of Toledo, the narrator buys Arabic pamphlets about Don Quixote, hires a Morisco interpreter to translate them, and obtains the story from “Cid Hamete Benengeli” via a translation completed in about a month and a half.
of an entertainment and pleasure that for a couple of hours or so may well occupy him who shall read it attentively. The discovery of it occurred in this way. One day, as I was in the Alcana of Toledo, a boy came up to sell some pamphlets and old papers to a silk mercer, and, as I am fond of reading even the very scraps of paper in the streets, led by this natural bent of mine I took up one of the pamphlets the boy …
The narrator claims to have translated the “Second Part” and describes a pamphlet illustration of Don Quixote’s fight with a Biscayan, including labels for Don Sancho de Azpeitia and Sancho Panza.
of my hands, I took him to my house, where in little more than a month and a half he translated the whole just as it is set down here. In the first pamphlet the battle between Don Quixote and the Biscayan was drawn to the very life, they planted in the same attitude as the history describes, their swords raised, and the one protected by his buckler, the other by his cushion, and the Biscayan’s mule so true to nature…
The canon’s actor anecdote is extended: the canon insists past Spanish tragedies like ‘Isabella,’ ‘Phyllis,’ and ‘Alexandra’ followed artistic principles and pleased both wise and ignorant.
“‘No doubt,’ replied the actor in question, ‘you mean the “Isabella,” the “Phyllis,” and the “Alexandra.”’ “‘Those are the ones I mean,’ said I; ‘and see if they did not observe the principles of art, and if, by observing them, they failed to show their superiority and please all the world; so that the fault does not lie with the public that insists upon nonsense, but with those who don’t know how to produce somethi…
Don Quixote mocks the canon for calling printed romances lies despite royal licensing, then gives a vivid example of a knight plunging into a lake of pitch and encountering a paradise-like realm and enchanted castle.
OF THE SHREWD CONTROVERSY WHICH DON QUIXOTE AND THE CANON HELD, TOGETHER WITH OTHER INCIDENTS c50a.jpg (160K) Full Size “A good joke, that!” returned Don Quixote. “Books that have been printed with the king’s licence, and with the approbation of those to whom they have been submitted, and read with universal delight, and extolled by great and small, rich and poor, learned and ignorant, gentle and simple, in a word…
The narrator claims he cannot find authentic documents for Don Quixote’s third sally to Saragossa, but reports tradition and a leaden box of Gothic manuscripts, whose deciphered verses are presented.
kept in anxiety and dread lest their uncle and master should give them the slip the moment he found himself somewhat better, and as they feared so it fell out. But the author of this history, though he has devoted research and industry to the discovery of the deeds achieved by Don Quixote in his third sally, has been unable to obtain any information respecting them, at any rate derived from authentic documents; trad…
Cervantes dedicates Volume II to the Count of Lemos, saying Don Quixote now has his spurs “on his way,” and mentions a supposed request from the Emperor of China to send a Don Quixote history for teaching Spanish.
TO THE COUNT OF LEMOS: These days past, when sending Your Excellency my plays, that had appeared in print before being shown on the stage, I said, if I remember well, that Don Quixote was putting on his spurs to go and render homage to Your Excellency. Now I say that “with his spurs, he is on his way.” Should he reach destination methinks I shall have rendered some service to Your Excellency, as from many parts I am…
On the road, Don Quixote questions a humanist cousin who writes books for publication, then discusses his absurdly detailed works, while Sancho jokes about authorship of world firsts like head-scratching and tumbling.
those of the cousin, likewise well filled; and so, commending themselves to God and bidding farewell to all, they set out, taking the road for the famous cave of Montesinos. On the way Don Quixote asked the cousin of what sort and character his pursuits, avocations, and studies were, to which he replied that he was by profession a humanist, and that his pursuits and studies were making books for the press, all of gr…
Don Quixote visits a printing office, learns a translator’s Italian-to-Spanish work is being set in type, debates translation quality and money versus fame, and then leaves displeased about a “Second Part” of his own story.
displaying his folly, made arrangements for a tilting at the ring in six days from that time, which, however, for reason that will be mentioned hereafter, did not take place. Don Quixote took a fancy to stroll about the city quietly and on foot, for he feared that if he went on horseback the boys would follow him; so he and Sancho and two servants that Don Antonio gave him set out for a walk. Thus it came to pass th…
The translator explains why English versions of Don Quixote varied, arguing that Shelton’s early 1600s translation had vitality but later “made English” and comic rewritings often misrepresented Cervantes’ style and humour.
His "Quixote" is not so much a translation as a travesty, and a travesty that for coarseness, vulgarity, and buffoonery is almost unexampled even in the literature of that day. Ned Ward's "Life and Notable Adventures of Don Quixote, merrily translated into Hudibrastic Verse" (1700), can scarcely be reckoned a translation, but it serves to show the light in which "Don Quixote" was regarded at the time. A further ill…
The translator continues by defending Charles Jervas’s Don Quixote as faithful and painstaking, while criticizing its “wooden” stiffness, and contrasting it with later abridgments, patchwork versions, and an “impudent imposture.”
Spanish. He was, in fact, an honest, faithful, and painstaking translator, and he has left a version which, whatever its shortcomings may be, is singularly free from errors and mistranslations. The charge against it is that it is stiff, dry--"wooden" in a word,-and no one can deny that there is a foundation for it. But it may be pleaded for Jervas that a good deal of this rigidity is due to his abhorrence of the lig…
The translator argues there is no real conflict between readers who want only plot and those who want Cervantes’ exact manner, and sets principles for their own translation: avoid affectation, keep familiar names, and be faithful to the spirit and letter.
so far at least as differences of idiom and circumstances permit, and who will give a preference to the conscientious translator, even though he may have acquitted himself somewhat awkwardly. But after all there is no real antagonism between the two classes; there is no reason why what pleases the one should not please the other, or why a translator who makes it his aim to treat "Don Quixote" with the respect due to…
The translator discusses why biographies of Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra were speculative, credits Navarrete for thorough research, and proposes separating fact from conjecture while recounting Cervantes’ ancestry and the historical context of Spain’s political and literary transition.
II: ABOUT CERVANTES AND DON QUIXOTE Four generations had laughed over "Don Quixote" before it occurred to anyone to ask, who and what manner of man was this Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra whose name is on the title-page; and it was too late for a satisfactory answer to the question when it was proposed to add a life of the author to the London edition published at Lord Carteret's instance in 1738. All traces of the pe…
Cervantes delays the promised second part of Don Quixote, instead publishing Novelas Exemplares in 1613 and pursuing a grand national drama ambition, while “shortly” proves elastic.
the adventures of Don Quixote, he set to work to write more of these "Novelas Exemplares" as he afterwards called them, with a view to making a book of them. The novels were published in the summer of 1613, with a dedication to the Conde de Lemos, the Maecenas of the day, and with one of those chatty confidential prefaces Cervantes was so fond of. In this, eight years and a half after the First Part of "Don Quixote"…
An octavo printed at Tarragona in 1614 presents an unauthorized Second Volume by Avellaneda of Tordesillas, provoking Cervantes’s anger through personal abuse and perceived dull plagiarism.
nay, would have seen every copy of "Don Quixote" burned in the Plaza Mayor, for one such success as Lope de Vega was enjoying on an average once a week. And so he went on, dawdling over "Don Quixote," adding a chapter now and again, and putting it aside to turn to "Persiles and Sigismunda"--which, as we know, was to be the most entertaining book in the language, and the rival of "Theagenes and Chariclea"--or finishi…
He describes how Spanish printings became shabby trade editions, then credits England—especially a 1738 London edition suggested by Lord Carteret—with better text, plates, and editing that shifted attitudes toward seriousness.
read and got by heart by people of all sorts; the children turn its leaves, the young people read it, the grown men understand it, the old folk praise it." But it would be idle to deny that the ingredient which, more than its humour, or its wisdom, or the fertility of invention or knowledge of human nature it displays, has insured its success with the multitude, is the vein of farce that runs through it. It was the …
Durkheim introduces the naturistic school of religious origins as different from animism: its scholars study European and Asian religions, use comparative Indo-European mythology (Grimm, Max Müller, Kuhn), and rely on Vedic evidence to derive primitive religion.
I We have seen that the postulate at the basis of animism is that religion, at least in its origin, expresses no physical reality. But Max Müller commences with the contrary principle. For him, it is an axiom that religion reposes upon an experience, from which it draws all its authority. "Religion," he says, "if it is to hold its place as a legitimate element of our consciousness, must, like all other knowledge, be…
He traces the scholarly history of totemism, from the term’s introduction and its spread from America to Australia, through MacLennan, Morgan, Frazer, and Robertson Smith, highlighting the idea’s ties to clans and comparative research efforts.
one, without the error of too great simplicity. But this error, by its very exaggerations, had at least the advantage, that it put into evidence the historical importance of totemism. Students of American totemism had already known for a long time that this form of religion was most intimately united to a determined social organization, that its basis is the division of the social group into clans.[179] In 1877, in …
Durkheim reviews earlier Australian studies of totemism, notes how Spencer and Gillen’s systematic facts shaped later work, and describes Howitt and Frazer’s efforts to compile and organize totemic and related kinship materials.
exaggerated,[197] we shall see that the observations of Strehlow, though completing, making more precise and sometimes even rectifying those of Spencer and Gillen, confirm them in all that is essential. These discoveries have given rise to an abundant literature to which we shall have occasion to return. The works of Spencer and Gillen especially have exercised a considerable influence, not only because they were th…
Durkheim continues by comparing myths of Bunjil and other gods’ creation acts and providence, noting their inter-tribal recognition, possible borrowing among mythologies, and disputes between Tylor/Lang and his own assessment of indigenous origins.
is the thunder, he is also connected with the rain:[945] it is to him that men address themselves when there is a scarcity of water, or when too much falls.[946] They speak of him as a sort of creator: he is called the father of men and they say that he made them. According to a legend current around Melbourne, Bunjil made the first man in the following manner. He made a little statue out of white clay; then, after …