The Unseen World and Other Essays [112]
he with his teeth, Which, as a dog's, upon the bone were strong."[60]
[60] "Quand' ebbe detto cio, eon gli occhi torti Riprese il teschio misero coi denti, Che furo all' osso, come d'un can, forti." Inferno, XXXIII. 76.
That is in the grand style, and so is the following, which describes those sinners locked in the frozen lake below Malebolge:--
"Weeping itself there does not let them weep, And grief that finds a barrier in the eyes Turns itself inward to increase the anguish.[61]
[61] "Lo pianto stesso li pianger non lascia, E il duol, che trova in sugli occhi rintoppo, Si volve in entro a far crescer l' ambascia." Inferno, XXXIII. 94.
And the exclamation of one of these poor "wretches of the frozen crust" is an exclamation that Shakespeare might have written:--
"Lift from mine eyes the rigid veils, that I May vent the sorrow which impregns my heart."[62]
[62] "Levatemi dal viso i duri veli, Si ch' io sfoghi il dolor che il cor m' impregna." Ib. 112.
There is nothing in Mr. Cary's translation which can stand a comparison with that. The eighteenth century could not translate like that. For here at last we have a real reproduction of the antique. In the Shakespearian ring of these lines we recognize the authentic rendering of the tones of the only man since the Christian era who could speak like Shakespeare.
In this way Mr. Longfellow's translation is, to an eminent degree, realistic. It is a work conceived and executed in entire accordance with the spirit of our time. Mr. Longfellow has set about making a reconstructive translation, and he has succeeded in the attempt. In view of what he has done, no one can ever wish to see the old methods of Pope and Cary again resorted to. It is only where he fails to be truly realistic that he comes short of success. And, as already hinted, it is oftenest through sheer excess of LITERALISM that he ceases to be realistic, and departs from the spirit of his author instead of coming nearer to it. In the "Paradiso," Canto X. 1-6, his method leads him into awkwardness:--
"Looking into His Son with all the love Which each of them eternally breathes forth, The primal and unutterable Power Whate'er before the mind or eye revolves With so much order made, there can be none Who this beholds without enjoying Him."
This seems clumsy and halting, yet it is an extremely literal paraphrase of a graceful and flowing original:--
"Guardando nel suo figlio con l' amore Che l' uno e l' altro eternalmente spire, Lo primo ed ineffabile Valore, Quanto per mente o per loco si gira Con tanto ordine fe', ch' esser non puote Senza gustar di lui ehi cio rimira "
Now to turn a graceful and flowing sentence into one that is clumsy and halting is certainly not to reproduce it, no matter how exactly the separate words are rendered, or how closely the syntactic constructions match each other. And this consideration seems conclusive as against the adequacy of the literalist method. That method is inadequate, not because it is too REALISTIC, but because it runs continual risk of being too VERBALISTIC. It has recently been applied to the translation of Dante by Mr. Rossetti, and it has sometimes led him to write curious verses. For instance, he makes Francesca say to Dante,--
"O gracious and benignant ANIMAL!"
for
"O animal grazioso e benigno!"
Mr. Longfellow's good taste has prevented his doing anything like this, yet Mr. Rossetti's extravagance is due to an unswerving adherence to the very rules by which Mr. Longfellow has been guided.
Good taste and poetic genius are, however, better than the best of rules, and so, after all said and done, we can only conclude that Mr. Longfellow has given us a great and noble work not likely soon to be equalled. Leopardi somewhere, in speaking of the early Italian translators of the classics and their well-earned popularity, says, who knows but Caro will live
[60] "Quand' ebbe detto cio, eon gli occhi torti Riprese il teschio misero coi denti, Che furo all' osso, come d'un can, forti." Inferno, XXXIII. 76.
That is in the grand style, and so is the following, which describes those sinners locked in the frozen lake below Malebolge:--
"Weeping itself there does not let them weep, And grief that finds a barrier in the eyes Turns itself inward to increase the anguish.[61]
[61] "Lo pianto stesso li pianger non lascia, E il duol, che trova in sugli occhi rintoppo, Si volve in entro a far crescer l' ambascia." Inferno, XXXIII. 94.
And the exclamation of one of these poor "wretches of the frozen crust" is an exclamation that Shakespeare might have written:--
"Lift from mine eyes the rigid veils, that I May vent the sorrow which impregns my heart."[62]
[62] "Levatemi dal viso i duri veli, Si ch' io sfoghi il dolor che il cor m' impregna." Ib. 112.
There is nothing in Mr. Cary's translation which can stand a comparison with that. The eighteenth century could not translate like that. For here at last we have a real reproduction of the antique. In the Shakespearian ring of these lines we recognize the authentic rendering of the tones of the only man since the Christian era who could speak like Shakespeare.
In this way Mr. Longfellow's translation is, to an eminent degree, realistic. It is a work conceived and executed in entire accordance with the spirit of our time. Mr. Longfellow has set about making a reconstructive translation, and he has succeeded in the attempt. In view of what he has done, no one can ever wish to see the old methods of Pope and Cary again resorted to. It is only where he fails to be truly realistic that he comes short of success. And, as already hinted, it is oftenest through sheer excess of LITERALISM that he ceases to be realistic, and departs from the spirit of his author instead of coming nearer to it. In the "Paradiso," Canto X. 1-6, his method leads him into awkwardness:--
"Looking into His Son with all the love Which each of them eternally breathes forth, The primal and unutterable Power Whate'er before the mind or eye revolves With so much order made, there can be none Who this beholds without enjoying Him."
This seems clumsy and halting, yet it is an extremely literal paraphrase of a graceful and flowing original:--
"Guardando nel suo figlio con l' amore Che l' uno e l' altro eternalmente spire, Lo primo ed ineffabile Valore, Quanto per mente o per loco si gira Con tanto ordine fe', ch' esser non puote Senza gustar di lui ehi cio rimira "
Now to turn a graceful and flowing sentence into one that is clumsy and halting is certainly not to reproduce it, no matter how exactly the separate words are rendered, or how closely the syntactic constructions match each other. And this consideration seems conclusive as against the adequacy of the literalist method. That method is inadequate, not because it is too REALISTIC, but because it runs continual risk of being too VERBALISTIC. It has recently been applied to the translation of Dante by Mr. Rossetti, and it has sometimes led him to write curious verses. For instance, he makes Francesca say to Dante,--
"O gracious and benignant ANIMAL!"
for
"O animal grazioso e benigno!"
Mr. Longfellow's good taste has prevented his doing anything like this, yet Mr. Rossetti's extravagance is due to an unswerving adherence to the very rules by which Mr. Longfellow has been guided.
Good taste and poetic genius are, however, better than the best of rules, and so, after all said and done, we can only conclude that Mr. Longfellow has given us a great and noble work not likely soon to be equalled. Leopardi somewhere, in speaking of the early Italian translators of the classics and their well-earned popularity, says, who knows but Caro will live