Part 3 (2/2)

As when the billow gathers fast With slow and sullen roar, Beneath the keen north-western blast, Against the sounding sh.o.r.e.

First far at sea it rears its crest, Then bursts upon the beach; Or with proud arch and swelling breast, Where headlands outward reach, It smites their strength, and bellowing flings Its silver foam afar-- So stern and thick the Danaan kings And soldiers marched to war.

Each leader gave his men the word, Each warrior deep in silence heard, So mute they marched, them couldst not ken They were a ma.s.s of speaking men; And as they strode in martial might Their flickering arms shot back the light.

It is, however, in dealing with poetry which is neither didactic nor descriptive that the difficulty--indeed often the impossibility--of reconciling the genius of the two languages becomes most apparent. It may be said with truth that the best way of ascertaining how a fine or luminous idea can be presented in any particular language is to set aside altogether the idea of translation, and to inquire how some master in the particular language has presented the case without reference to the utterances of his predecessors in other languages. A good example of this process may be found in comparing the language in which others have treated Vauvenargues' well-known saying: ”Pour executer de grandes choses, il faut vivre comme si on ne devait jamais mourir.”

Bacchylides[37] put the same idea in the following words:

??at?? e??ta ??? d?d???? ???e??

???a?, ?t? t' a????? ??ea?

????? ????? f???, ??t? pe?t????t' ?tea ???? a??p???t?? te?e??.[38]

And the great Arab poet Abu'l'Ala, whose verse has been admirably translated by Mr. Baerlein, wrote:

If you will do some deed before you die, Remember not this caravan of death, But have belief that every little breath Will stay with you for an eternity.

Another instance of the same kind, which may be cited without in any way wis.h.i.+ng to advance what Professor Courthope[39] very justly calls ”the mean charge of plagiarism,” is Tennyson's line, ”His honour rooted in dishonour stood.” Euripides[40] expressed the same idea in the following words:

?? t?? ??? a?s???? ?s??? ??a??e?a.

To cite another case, the following lines of _Paradise Lost_ may be compared with the treatment accorded by Euripides to the same subject:

Oh, why did G.o.d, Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven With spirits masculine, create at last This novelty on Earth, this fair defect Of Nature, and not fill the World at once With men as Angels, without feminine; Or find some other way to generate Mankind?

Euripides wrote:

? ?e?, t? d? ??d???? ?????p??? ?a???, ???a??a? ?? f?? ????? ?at???sa?; e? ??? ??te??? ??e?e? spe??a? ?????, ??? ?? ???a???? ???? pa?as??s?a? t?de.[41]

Apart, however, from the process to which allusion is made above, very many instances may, of course, be cited, of translations properly so called which have reproduced not merely the exact sense but the vigour of the original idea in a foreign language with little or no resort to paraphrase. What can be better than Cowley's translation of Claudian's lines?--

Ingentem meminit parvo qui germine querc.u.m Aequaevumque videt consenuisse nemus.

A neighbouring wood born with himself he sees, And loves his old contemporary trees,

thus, as Gibbon says,[42] improving on the original, inasmuch as, being a good botanist, Cowley ”concealed the oaks under a more general expression.”

Take also the case of the well-known Latin epigram:

Omne epigramma sit instar apis: sit aculeus illi; Sint sua mella; sit et corporis exigui.

It has frequently been translated, but never more felicitously or accurately than by the late Lord Wensleydale:

Be epigrams like bees; let them have stings; And Honey too, and let them be small things.

On the other hand, the attempt to adhere too closely to the text of the original and to reject paraphrase sometimes leads to results which can scarcely be described as other than the reverse of felicitous. An instance in point is Sappho's lines:

?a? ??? a? fe??e?, ta???? d???e?, a? d? d??a ? d??et', ???a d?se?, a? d? ? f??e?, ta???? f???se?

???? ??????sa.

So great a master of verse as Mr. Headlam translated thus:

The pursued shall soon be the pursuer!

Gifts, though now refusing, yet shall bring Love the lover yet, and woo the wooer, Though heart it wring!

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