Conclusion: The most faithful translations are those of Longfellow, Singleton, Mandelbaum, and Sinclair. Esolen, Carson, Binyon, and Ciardi are the worst.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Popular posts
-
I checked the Duckstack today and read the latest, " Comb Tomb ." One bit is about crime: Most nonviolent crime is a crime of oppo... -
Following up on the idea that the pecked are no longer alone in their bodies , reader Ben Pratt has brought to my attention these remarks by... -
I post at Winking Back from the Dark , but only to make a terrible pun. Don't say you weren't warned!
-
But Men shall remember Atlantis's name Come hell or high water! Sith both of them came, It rests unforgotten, and what we now tell Skill...
-
I've been dreaming about books again . I remember the blurb on the back cover said, "One of the most horrifying books of the d... -
At the moment, the last post in the algorithm-generated "Poplar posts" list at the bottom of this blog is " Chubby Checker, g...
-
The juxtaposition of a hermit with a hart, sometimes merged into a single "humanoid deer creature," has been a sync theme recently... -
After work this evening, I checked America's flagship meme post and saved this one: I've never seen the 1987 Arnold Schwarzenegger m... -
I had had a meeting scheduled for this afternoon, but the client called to ask if we could reschedule it to 7/22. Minutes later, I was readi...
-
Since my post " A white hart and a portal to a parallel world " (June 10), the Hermit card of the Tarot of the Divine, which inclu...
8 comments:
Do you have a comment on which are the best 'reading experience' - in terms of this being poetry?
I haven't read Dante's Comedy, but have glanced through Longfellow (which we own) and I thought it read convincingly as a poem - albeit in blank rather than rhyming verse. (Longfellow happens to be a favourite poet of mine.)
Sayers has been, I believe, the best-seller since it came-out - and she tries to reproduce the rhyme scheme of the original - and I don't doubt that sacrifice of linguistic fidelity was needed to achieve this.
I haven't actually read most of these; I just looked up the sample passage. The only translations I have read in their entirety are Ciardi, Mandelbaum, and Sayers.
I don't recommend Ciardi at all. He tries to approximate Dante's terza rima (not quite) but lacks the technical skill, leading to lots of terrible forced rhymes. And it's one of the least semantically faithful versions as well.
Sayers does full terza rima, a bit better than Ciardi, but a lot of it is still awkward and unpoetic. Sayers's Dante is valuable primarily for its notes, which are very informative and insightful.
Mandelbaum is mostly blank verse, adding rhymes opportunistically when it can be done unobtrusively, and I think it works very well. (English is just too rhyme-poor for terza rima to be anything other than a gimmick, except perhaps in the hands of a Byron-caliber virtuoso.) Mandelbaum is a top-notch interpreter of Virgil and Homer as well, and just generally one of my all-time favorite translators.
I have Esolen's but it's on the "to-read" tower still.
I enjoy his writing, have seen good reviews and his politics suit me. I speak enough Italian to compare things should I need to (though old fashioned Italian poetry is outside my comfort zone).
@Sam
Keep in mind that my only criterion in this analysis is strict, literal fidelity. I want to be able to quote even the shortest passages and feel confident that I am quoting Dante. Of course that is not the only desideratum in a translation.
William,
Interesting the number 19.
Sorry to disappoint, Debbie, but I've already added another translation, so it's an even 20 now!
William,
Hmmmm........
William,
I meant to say that I'm not disappointed, just curious ;-)
Post a Comment