Week 4 Blog

In class today, someone mentioned the fact that a work is always better in its original language. This seemed to be true after we completed the exercise in class. Although our translations were correct and sent the same message, the translation does not produce the same effect on the reader that the original version can. I did some research on the OSU databases and I found an interesting book review about "The Student of Salamanca", an English translation of the work.

Certainly, one always can quibble with anyone's attempt at verse translation of a poem, and Davies's is not without its defects. His rendering of the dialogue, for example, occasionally strikes me as more wooden and less dynamic than Espron- ceda's original. At other times the specific image Espronceda evokes is sacrificed to salvage a semblance of the original's metre. For example, in the opening lines Espronceda's gothic evocation of the living dead ('los vivos muertos parecen I las tumbas los muertos dejan' is rendered by an attenuated 'Dead men appeared to be living, The living corpselike in slumber' (p. 43). On other occasions Davies's translation moves from Espronceda's colloquial register to a more ethereal tone: 'Ha dado en no responder' becomes 'Her wordless whimsy persists' (p. I5), and at times the demands of the rhyme create some unhappy results ('admiro vuestro candor' becomes 'your faith fills me with amaze' (p. 9I) ). Each lover of the Spanish original will undoubtedly have his or her own list of unfortunate renderings, yet to dwell on them would be to miss the fun of Davies's work taken as a whole. Stanzas such as the following are the norm and may compensate for an occasional lapse: A face of an angel he saw in illusion It came as illusion comes charming the mind, Yet clouding the brow in tense wrinkled confusion, For never may reason its true meaning find. (P.99) Davies's translation generally catches the rhythm and energy of the original, his images are vivid, and his solutions to some difficult passages are often ingenious. The translation, thirty-eight years in preparation, stands on its own as a readable, riveting story, accessible to anyone interested in a good tale. Cardwell's introduction and notes are predictably precise and useful. The introduction is largely a synthesis of material he has published elsewhere, but it is organized in an intelligent and disciplined fashion that makes it an appropriate, though not overwhelming, introduction to the work of Espronceda. At the same time, the commentary and notes provide the specialist with helpful bibliography and useful reminders of the centrality of the poem in Spanish Romanticism. The notes are used judiciously both in number and length, avoiding the excesses of some recent editors who seem intent on supplanting the original work with their own often irrelevant erudition. In short, the Davies-Cardwell team has produced that rare combination in books: a text that is instructive, important, and entertaining.

This is where I found the review:

The Student of Salamanca ('El estudiante de Salamanca'). By JosE DE ESPRONCEDA. Trans. by C. K. DAVIES, with an introduction and notes by RICHARD A. CARDWELL. (Hispanic Classics) Warminster: Aris & Phillips. I991. viii + 152 pp. ?30 (paperbound ?9.95). http://www.jstor.org/stable/3734994?seq=2

In contrast to our discussion, this review thinks that this translation is a good one that is able to evoke similar feelings that the poem did. I put in red some lines that really demonstrate the strong liking that this reviewer took to the translation. When the person doing the review refers to the "lovers of the Spanish original" being able to have a list of things wrong with a translation, I think that he is missing the point, at least how I see it. I think the reason that the reason that people like a work in the original language is because a translation will never capture the word for word, exact meaning and effect of the original. This is what is so unique about literature in different languagues because each language has a different technique and power in works. Translations are made to allow other cultures and people who speak different languages to enjoy, with the best effort to give the full effect, a work that is so powerful in its original language.