Subject: (urth) Translator/Author

From: m.driussi <m.driussi at genie.com>
Date: Wed, 07 May 1997 19:03:00 +0000

[Posted from URTH, a mailing list about Gene Wolfe's New Sun and other works]

Reply:  Item #0776694 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET#

Joel,

Interesting point re: Fitzgerald as cited source of quote.  I never
noticed that, but of course you are right and it does play some
mirrors-that-look-at-mirrors tricks, as you suggest.

For your question about Wolfe's possible strong ideas about the
nature of translation, I confess my ignorance.  But to add a few
tokens to your pile, here are some observations: one of Wolfe's
favorite authors is Proust, yet he has "only" read Proust translated
into English; likewise Wolfe read all his ancient Greek authors in
English translation (he did study the language of ancient Greece with
the aid of a private tutor, but this was in the 1980s and I suppose
that it was only after his interest in ancient Greece had been so
developed by reading translations).

I myself have not heard of any Omar Khayyam convention, new or old,
that attributes his work to another.  The convention of listing a
translator =and= the author is quite handy (for praise or blame) since
both are acknowledged; the listing of only a translator verges upon
criminal <g>, and were it not for the loop-the-lupine-loop aspect you
addressed, I might suspect that it was a mistake or error on the part
of the copy editor, punishable by death or public humiliation.  (I
urge myself to refrain from throwing glass stones at the mighty rock
--yet Tor has had some trouble with front matter of late. Witness Jack
Vance's listed novel TO LOVE FOREVER in the front of the PLANET OF
ADVENTURE omnibus.  Hmmm.  Vance reputedly hated the original published
title, bestowed by the publisher, and I sense that he would like this
one even less.)

=mantis=

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From: Joel Priddy <jpriddy at saturn.vcu.edu>
Date: Wed, 07 May 1997 14:52:27 +0000

Just a couple of quick comments...

Wolfe begins _The_Urth_of_the_New_Sun_ with the quote:
Awake! for morning in the bowl of Night
Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to Flight:
 And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught
The Sultan's Turrent in a Noose of Light.

This is from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, but Wolfe credits
Fitzgerald. Edward Fitzgerald translated the Rubaiyat. This of
course reflects the New Sun series where the author presents
himself as a translator, but (if this conversation is possible
without getting too far off track) does anyone know if Wolfe has
some strong ideas about the nature of translation that he would
consider the translator of a stanza to be more the stanza's
author than the original poet? Or is there something specific to
the Rubaiyat that would lend itself to this distinction (the way
some people have started listing Bacon as the credit for
Shakespeare quotes, or the way you would consider the translator
to be the key identifier/author of any given edition of the
_Arabian_Nights_?).

Also, has it struck anyone else that Gene Wolfe's description of
synergenic time travel in _Free_Live_Free_ is an excellent
description of the proccess of reading a Wolfe book? Everytime
you go back and visit the same place, you're a little better at
it, surer on you feet, able to do more with the clues presented
to you.

JOEL

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From: Jim Jordan <jbjordan at gnt.net>
Date: Thu, 08 May 1997 01:37:28 +0000

I think Fitzgerald is regarded as having so paraphrased the Rubaiyat that
he is virtually the author of his "translation." That may be all that Wolfe
had in mind.
	Of course, at the front of Shadow-Torturer is a quotation from Isaac Watts
that is actually just a paraphrastic translation of Psalm 90.

Nutria

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From: Richard Horton <rhorton at mdc.com>
Date: Thu, 08 May 1997 08:47:18 +0000

>>> Joel Priddy <jpriddy at saturn.vcu.edu> 05/07/97 09:52am >>> writes

> Or is there something specific to the Rubaiyat that would lend itself to this
>distinction (the way some people have started listing Bacon as the credit
>for
>Shakespeare quotes, or the way you would consider the translator to be
>the key identifier/author of any given edition of the
>_Arabian_Nights_?).

A little more like the latter: IIRC, Fitzgerald's translations (he did several,
often quite different, editions) are very "free": it is quite common to regard
him as in a considerable sense at least a "co-author" of the English version
of the Rubaiyat.  This is rather unique to the Rubaiyat, though, in very few
other cases of translation would this be done.

I'm a little puzzled by the attributions to Bacon of Shakespeare quotes. 
This implies, I guess, an authorship question.  Bacon is not, I believe,
anymore taken seriously as a potential writer of Shakespeare's plays. 
Beside Shakespeare himself, the only serious candidate these days seems
to be Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford.  In any case, even if William
Shakspere of Stratford did not write Shakespeare's plays, it would seem to
me to make sense to accept "Shakespeare" as the desired pseudonym of
the acutal author.  At any rate, I'm not aware of any controversy about
Omar Khayyam's authorship of the Rubaiyat.

Tusk

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From: m.driussi <m.driussi at genie.com>
Date: Thu, 08 May 1997 16:04:00 +0000

Reply:  Item #0985746 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INTERNET#

(Whoops.  I said "TO LOVE FOREVER" was listed in front of PLANET OF
ADVENTURE; I was mistaken--it is listed in Vance's most recent NIGHT
LAMP.  Or so I believe.)

Nutria is right.  NEW COLUMBIA ENCYCLOPEDIA: "FitzGerald, Edward . . .
His masterpiece, a translation of THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM, appeared
anonymously in 1859 . . . has long been one of the most popular English
poems.  Although actually a paraphrase rather than a translation of a
poem by the 11th-century Persian poet Omar Khayyam, it retains the spirit
of the original in its poignant expression of a philosophy counseling
man to live life to the fullest while he can."

Note spelling: FitzGerald.  Copy editor must die! <g>

=mantis=

---

From: Jim Jordan <jbjordan at gnt.net>
Date: Thu, 08 May 1997 12:32:37 +0000

WAKE! for the Golden Cat has put to flight
The Mouse of Darkness with his Paw of Light:
Which means, in Plain and simple every-day
Unoriental Speech -- The Dawn is bright.

The say the Early Bird the Worm shall taste.
Then rise, O Kitten! Wherefore sleeping, waste
The fruits of Virtue? Quick! the Early Bird
Will soon be on the flutter -- O make haste!

-- from The Rubaiyat of a Persian Kitten, by Oliver Herford (NY: Gramercy,
1993; facsimile reprint of 1904).

NUTRIA