Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Hence a sort of despair, the refuge of indolence on the one hand, or the excuse for frustrated attempts on the other, has obtained for the translator a vague sort of toleration, under cover of which he ventures often to change places with his author, and to deal in expressions and sentiments born and bred in his own brain. Johnson himself,* too strongly, perhaps, impressed with the perplexities of the translator's duty, has laid down a principle, which authorizes every addition capable of being engrafted on the original writer, provided "nothing is taken away;" thus throwing open the folding-doors to every license and innovation, however wild and extravagant.

It by no means follows, however, that the merely verbal translator is at all nearer to his original. It is the spirit and genius of a writer that addresses us in his compositions. His dry words, rendered by a proportionate number of English equivalents, can impart to us no adequate notion of either. Strict verbal fidelity will be an imitation as heavy and as lifeless as casts taken from a dead countenance. Here, then, is the difficulty of the translator: he occupies a narrow space between two opposite dangers; he must neither confine himself within the precincts of merely verbal meaning, nor wander into the wilderness of imitation and paraphrase. But this is not all. The manner of an ancient author is often so peculiarly his own, and is so identified with the language in which he writes, as to elude the grasp of the most skilful translator.

It is obvious, also, that it is the sentiment, and the sentiment alone of an ancient author, which is capable of transfusion into a living tongue: but it not unfrequently happens that the sentiment has no separate and independent existence; that is, it is represented to the mind by the original word, and by that word alone. Its very existence is incorporated into it; and no dexterity of management can persuade it to migrate, as it were, from its residence. This is a peculiarity which has been seldom observed, and it is principally from an inattention to this unyielding and obstinate quality in the ancient dialects, that so many translators have failed, whether they have been of that daring class who have leaped beyond, or of the timid race who have crept behind their originals.

We will not attempt in this place to adjust the controversies that have arisen as to the power of words over the affections. The prevailing notion seems to be, that it is derived from a correspondent and simultaneous representation of the ideas for which they stand; yet this is far from being universally true. There are many general words which convey no real essences to the mind; those, for instance, which belong to moral qualities. These are sometimes used with very vigorous effect, without bringing before us the particular course of action which they imply; but their power over the affections is not on this account the less. An indistinct sentiment of love or abhorrence is excited the instant the words are presented to us: it is plain, therefore, that the mind is influenced by some law wholly independent of a precise picture on the imagination. The readiest solution, perhaps, of the problem, is that principle of association which, developing itself with the first efforts of our understandings, conjoins with certain words, not exact images, but corresponding sensations. Indeed, so

* Life of Pope.

little do poetry and eloquence owe their effect to the power of raising exact images, that it not unfrequently happens that no small part of their charm arises from the indistinctness of their impressions. There is also a mysterious fascination in many words, either singly, or in combination with others, and which are, for that reason, called poetical, which, upon a slight reflection, we must pronounce to be independent of all picturesque effect whatever. They excite sentiments, not as pictures of sensible, nor as symbols of intellectual objects, but as words and as words only. There is a sympathy which vibrates upon the feelings occasioned by mere sounds or intonations; and, agreeably to this law, words describe the influence of things, and their properties, on the passions of the writer or speaker, instead of presenting distinct images of the things themselves.

How many passages are there in poetry which convey no image whatsoever? Take the magnificent description, for instance, in the Eneid, of the formation of thunder: it is clear that no similar combination of sensible images could exist in nature: if the words conveyed them to the imagination, they would disgust, rather than please, by their incongruity and confusion; and, translated into English equivalents, would be a mere unintelligible chaos of sounds and images. In the original, however, who can deny them that majesty and elevation which all admirers of Virgil have attributed to them?-a majesty and elevation, nevertheless, which resides in the words, and the words only. The same may be said of the highly figurative passage in which Claudian shadowed out the cave of eternity. It is not pretended that it conveys no image, but the effort to convey that image by equivalent words in any other language would be vain.

Est ignota procul, nostræque impervia menti,
Vix adeunda Deis, annorum squalida mater,
Immensi spelunca Evi: quæ tempora vasto
Suppeditat, revocatque sinû.

Perhaps the best illustrations of the same phenomenon might be found in those odes of Pindar, where he claims that full absolution from distinct intelligence so liberally conceded to him by Horace. Is it possible to translate those passages? There are lines also in Aristophanes which are untranslateable for a similar reason. Take the magnificent words which he puts into the mouth of the clouds in praise of the aerial beings whom he denominates the clouds :

Υγραν νεφελαν στρεπταιγλαν δαιον ορμαν

Πλοκαμές θ' εκατονκεφαλα τυφώ, πρεμαινέσαςτε θυελλας.

An undefinable grandeur is perceptible in these words; yet, as soon as they are rendered into corresponding words in English, the mere English reader would necessarily infer, as many readers of the original, who have mistaken the drift of the poet, and ill appreciated the taste of an Attic audience, have also inferred, that they were mere fustian, like that of Bottom in the Midsummer Night's Dream.

The raging rocks,

And shivering shocks,
Shall break the locks, &c.

Herein then consists what may be correctly called the untranslateable quality of the ancient languages. So far from the thought or sentiVOL. I. No. 1.-Museum.

E

ment being transferable from the original word into its English substí tute, according to the common notion, that thought or sentiment is locked up as an imprisoned essence in the word itself. With this view of the case, we shall be better able to explain much of the difficulty incident to the translation of Catullus; and we may collaterally to this part of our subject, elicit, not an excuse for certain phrases and expressions, which are gross indecencies when translated; but some mitigation, at least, of the sentence which virtuous minds must pass on that poet, and on many other of the great ornaments of antiquity, for employing them: for, it behoves us to recollect that they are, in some sort, exempt from the jurisdiction by which we try them, unless we regard them as liable to an ex post facto law, or convention, which did not exist, at least not in the same force when the offence was committed. We must not be misunderstood. We are no apologists for that unqualified grossness, which, in ancient compositions, reveals, with shameless bardihood, the worst deformities of our fallen nature, and exhibits the rankest sensualities of our passions, with all the offensiveness of reality; yet there are many considerations which may be admitted to temper this virtuous disgust.

In the first place, it is but reasonable to keep in mind the great revolutions which language has undergone in the gradual progress of two thousand years. Our own language, in a cycle still more contracted, exhibits many transitions and changes, which are by no means, in reference to our present subject, unworthy of our attention. Amongst these, none is more striking than the banishment, by universal consent, from the saloon or drawing-room to the kitchen or stable, of certain words, the utterance of which a century ago did not shock the delicacy of fashion, nor even pollute the lips of beauty. But a still more singular

a part of the phenomenon is this, that while those phrases are condemned to the exclusive use of the low and vulgar, they are replaced by others, which are supposed to be more intrinsically delicate, though conveying the same image, or, at least, standing conventionally for the same thing; it is needless to explain our meaning with more minuteness. To such an extreme has this delicacy been carried, that a rustic in our remote counties would even now find some difficulty in understanding the substitutions which have gradually taken place in the sterling English of his isle, and would probably reply in his own patois as Martine* in hers:

Tout ce que vous prêchez est, je crois, bel et bon,

Mais je ne saurois, moi, parler votre jargon. This is, however, a singular problem, since every combination of sounds and syllables being arbitrary and conventional, it is obvious that little is gained to delicacy, nothing certainly to morals, by the mere use of one sound or combination for another.

Now the same revolution which our own language has undergone with respect to itself, it has also, in common, we believe, with all the languages built upon the ruins of the Roman, undergone with refer"ice to the languages of the ancients. Words which the polite and egant were not ashamed to use,—words which illustrated the reanings of the philosopher, which either Aspasia or Socrates would

а

Les Femmes Savantes.

*

have uttered without hesitation, cannot be translated without the violation of all decency into modern tongues. The explication of this circumstance would lead us too far; it is not enough to say that our improved state of morals will adequately account for it. There is no necessary connexion between a refined and fastidious delicacy of language, and an unblemished purity of public morals. It may, however, put us into better humour with the plain speaking of the ancients, if we refer ourselves to that law or principle in all languages, concerning which we have already said so much; namely, the independence of words upon the exact pictures or images of the things for which they nominally stand. Will not this half absolve them from the hasty reproaches with which we are apt to visit them upon every supposed violation of decorum? Try many of the most offensive words, in ancient authors, by this test. In strictness, they are conjoined with foul and loathsome images; but this law of language interposes and separates the word from the image. The word, at least, whether from some secret melody, or from whatever charm, was retained in use long after it had ceased to conjure up the impure image, and thus became, in alliance with others, symbols of certain passions, sentiments, and emotions of the higher kind. Now, if this word be translated, that is, replaced by another belonging to another dialect, it is ten to one against our getting a particle of the sentiment or passion which dictated its original use; but we shall be sure of the unmixed impurity of the image, which, in its primitive application, it was intended to convey.

We will explain ourselves shortly by referring to the very poet who is now under our consideration. Catullus, in verses which breathe his loftiest, and, we might say, his most virtuous disdain of the abandoned profligates of his day, uses words which elude all literal translation, but which, it abundantly appears, from the sense and context of the passages where they occur, were words which had lost their primitive pollution, by having ceased to be conjoined with the matter or image for which they stood. It will be unnecessary to dwell upon this topic. Every classical scholar will immediately apprehend us, although we are prohibited from minuter explanations. The Hendecasyllables to Aurelius and Furius, and those to Cæsar upon Mamurra, will be sufficient keys to our meaning. We do not contend for the absolute purity of the Latin poet; but we deem it no more than common equity to extend to him the privileges of his country and his language, while we are fully prepared to admit, that, when he has had the full benefit of this mitigatory plea, there will remain much offence against modesty and decorum, that must for ever rise up in judgment against him.

Be this as it may, it is certainly not the least of the difficulties of translating him, inasmuch as it alike involves the translator in a conflict with his own language, and that from which he translates. But there is also another peculiarity, though of a widely different quality, in Catullus, which augments still more the peril and perplexity of his translator;—it is that characteristic which has hardly a name but in one language; aλ, perhaps the classic would call it; that ineffable grace, that unaffected and negligent beauty, which, seeming to be art, no art can imitate; breathing, as it were the unperfumed sweetness of nature, yet smelling of nothing, and least of all of the lamp. His

ment being transferable from the original word into its English substítute, according to the common notion, that thought or sentiment is locked up as an imprisoned essence in the word itself. With this view of the case, we shall be better able to explain much of the difficulty incident to the translation of Catullus; and we may collaterally to this part of our subject, elicit, not an excuse for certain phrases and expressions, which are gross indecencies when translated; but some mitigation, at least, of the sentence which virtuous minds must pass on that poet, and on many other of the great ornaments of antiquity, for employing them: for, it behoves us to recollect that they are, in some sort, exempt from the jurisdiction by which we try them, unless we regard them as liable to an ex post facto law, or convention, which did not exist, at least not in the same force when the offence was committed. We must not be misunderstood. We are no apologists for that unqualified grossness, which, in ancient compositions, reveals, with shameless hardihood, the worst deformities of our fallen nature, and exhibits the rankest sensualities of our passions, with all the offensiveness of reality; yet there are many considerations which may be admitted to temper this virtuous disgust.

In the first place, it is but reasonable to keep in mind the great revolutions which language has undergone in the gradual progress of two thousand years. Our own language, in a cycle still more contracted, exhibits many transitions and changes, which are by no means, in reference to our present subject, unworthy of our attention. Amongst these, none is more striking than the banishment, by universal consent, from the saloon or drawing-room to the kitchen or stable, of certain words, the utterance of which a century ago did not shock the delicacy of fashion, nor even pollute the lips of beauty. But a still more singular part of the phenomenon is this, that while those phrases are condemned to the exclusive use of the low and vulgar, they are replaced by others, which are supposed to be more intrinsically delicate, though conveying the same image, or, at least, standing conventionally for the same thing; it is needless to explain our meaning with more minuteness. To such an extreme has this delicacy been carried, that a rustic in our remote counties would even now find some difficulty in understanding the substitutions which have gradually taken place in the sterling English of his isle, and would probably reply in his own patois as Martine* in hers:

Tout ce que vous prêchez est, je crois, bel et bon,
Mais je ne saurois, moi, parler votre jargon.

This is, however, a singular problem, since every combination of sounds and syllables being arbitrary and conventional, it is obvious that little is gained to delicacy, nothing certainly to morals, by the mere use of one sound or combination for another.

Now the same revolution which our own language has undergone with respect to itself, it has also, in common, we believe, with all the languages built upon the ruins of the Roman, undergone with reference to the languages of the ancients. Words which the polite and elegant were not ashamed to use,-words which illustrated the reasonings of the philosopher, which either Aspasia or Socrates would

* Les Femmes Savantes.

« AnteriorContinuar »