Part 20 (1/2)

_Nature of the Translation._

The translation of _Beowulf_ is written in extremely archaic language.

An imitative measure of four princ.i.p.al stresses is used. Wherever possible, the Old English syntax has been preserved (see line 1242); the word-order of the original is retained. The archaic language is wrought of several different kinds of words. In the first place, there is the 'legitimate archaism,' such as 'mickle,' 'burg,' 'bairn'; there are forms which are more closely a.s.sociated with the translation of Old English, such as 'middle-garth,' 'ring-stem.' There are modern words used with the old signification, such as 'kindly' (in the sense 'of the same kind'), 'won war' (in the sense 'wage war'), 'fret' (in the sense 'eat'). Finally, there are forms which are literally translated from Old English: 'the sight seen once only' from _ans?n_, face, 251; 'spearman'

from _ga.r.s.ecg_, ocean (see extract), 'gift-scat' from _gif-sceatt_, gift of money, 378; 'the Maker's own making' from _metod-sceaft_, doom, 1180.

Romance words are excluded whenever possible. A glossary of 'some words not commonly used now' is included in the book, but none of the words cited above, save 'burg,' is found in it.

EXTRACT.

IX. UNFERTH CONTENDETH IN WORDS WITH BEOWULF.

Spake out then Unferth that bairn was of Ecglaf, And he sat at the feet of the lord of the Scyldings, 500 He unbound the battle-rune; was Beowulf's faring, Of him the proud mere-farer, mickle unliking, Whereas he begrudg'd it of any man other That he glories more mighty the middle-garth over Should hold under heaven than he himself held: Art thou that Beowulf who won strife with Breca On the wide sea contending in swimming, When ye two for pride's sake search'd out the floods And for a dolt's cry into deep water Thrust both your life-days? No man the twain of you, 510 Lief or loth were he, might lay wyte to stay you Your sorrowful journey, when on the sea row'd ye; Then when the ocean-stream ye with your arms deck'd, Meted the mere-streets, there your hands brandish'd!

O'er the Spearman ye glided; the sea with waves welter'd, The surge of the winter. Ye twain in the waves' might For a seven nights swink'd. He outdid thee in swimming, And the more was his might; but him in the morn-tide To the Heatho-Remes' land the holm bore ash.o.r.e, And thence away sought he to his dear land and lovely, 520 The lief to his people sought the land of the Brondings, The fair burg peace-warding, where he the folk owned, The burg and the gold rings. What to theeward he boasted, Beanstan's son, for thee soothly he brought it about.

_Criticism of the Translation._

The Morris-Wyatt translation is thoroughly accurate, and is, so to speak, an official commentary on the text of Wyatt's edition. It is therefore of importance to the student of the _Beowulf_.

As a literary rendering the translation is disappointing. In the first place, it must be frankly avowed that the diction is frequently so strange that it seems to modern readers well-nigh ridiculous. There are certain sentences which cannot but evoke a smile. Such are: '(he) spoke a word backward,' line 315; 'them that in Scaney dealt out the scat,'

line 1686.

Secondly, the translation is unreadable. There is an avalanche of archaisms. One example of the extreme obscurity may be given:--

'Then rathe was beroom'd, as the rich one was bidding, For the guests a-foot going the floor all withinward.'

l. 1975-76.

It would seem that the burden of 'rathe,' 'beroomed,' and 'withinward,'

were sufficient for any sentence to carry, but we are left to discover for ourselves that 'rich one' does not mean rich one, but ruler, that the 'floor' is not a floor but a hall, and that the guests are not guests, but the ruler's own men.

Morris himself was conscious of the obscurity of the work:--

'For the language of his version Morris once felt it necessary to make an apology. Except a few words, he said, the words used in it were such as he would not hesitate to use in an original poem of his own. He did not add, however, that their effect, if slipped sparingly in amid his own pellucid construction and facile narrative method, would be very different from their habitual use in a translation.... As the work advanced, he seems to have felt this himself, and his pleasure in the doing of it fell off.'

--Mackail's _Life_, ii. 284-5.

Finally, the version does not _translate_. Words like 'Spearman' for _Ocean_, and combinations like 'the sight seen once only' for _the face_, can be understood only by the intimate student of Old English poetry, and there is no reason why such a person should not peruse _Beowulf_ in the original tongue rather than in a translation occasionally as obscure as the poem itself.

If one can peer through the darkness of Morris's diction, he will discover a fairly pleasing use of the so-called imitative measure. The verse is not nearly so rough as the original; many of the characteristic subst.i.tutions are avoided. There is evident a tendency toward the 'rising verse' and the anapestic foot. The feminine ending is frequently used. The verse is, therefore, not strictly imitative in that it retains the Old English system of versification, but rather in that it attempts to suggest the Old English movement by the use of four princ.i.p.al stresses and a varying number of unstressed syllables. Morris's verse is the best of all the 'imitative' measures.

[Footnote 1: See Mackail's _Life_, i. 198.]

SIMONS'S TRANSLATION

Beowulf, Angelsaksisch Volksepos, vertaald in Stafrijm, en met Inleiding en Aanteekeningen voorzien door Dr. L. Simons, Briefwisselend Lid der Koninklijke Vlaamsche Academie voor Taal- en Letterkunde, Leeraar aan 't koninklijk Athenaeum te Brussel. Gent, A. Siffer, 1896. Large 8vo, pp. 355.