Читать книгу English Translations from the Greek: A Bibliographical Survey - Finley Melville Kendall Foster - Страница 4

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This book had its origin in a preliminary study of the attitude of the first thirty years of the nineteenth century toward the classics. A list of the translations which were published during those years seemed so significant, if only from the point of view of quantity, that it was deemed wise to extend that study backward and forward fifty years in order to have the necessary material for a comparative study of the original list. It soon became evident, however, that there were only two possible termini for such a study: the establishment of Caxton's printing press in London in 1476 and the present year. The result of these searchings is embodied in the list of translations which make up the contents of this book.

Certain limitations have, of necessity, been put upon the scope of this work. With a few exceptions, Musaeus for instance, the survey deals with Greek literature to 200 a.d. Josephus, because the interest in his work is mainly religious, has been omitted; and for the same reason the writings of the early Christian fathers have not been listed. Moreover, in stating the reappearances of a given translation, I have made no attempt to distinguish between editions and reprints. To attempt to unravel the tangled skein of second, third, fourth, fifth editions, and the like, would in many cases be the work of a lifetime. I do not feel that the value of this list would be increased by any such attempt. The fact that a particular book was published at a particular time, with the notation of any revision or correction which may have been made, is the matter of prime importance.

[pg viii]

Of the sources of this list I have little to say. The list of translations published in England was gathered largely from the following books: Miss Palmer's bibliography of classical books published before 1640, The Stationers' Register, The Term Catalogues, The British Museum Catalogue of Printed Books, The London Catalogue, The English Catalogue, Watt's Bibliotheca Britannica, Lowndes' Bibliographer's Manual of English Literature, Moss's Classical Bibliography, Engelmann's Bibliotheca Scriptorum, and the book lists published in the Gentleman's Magazine, and The Edinburgh Review.

The list of American translations has been gathered from Evans' American Bibliography, Roorbach's Bibliotheca Americana, The American Catalogue, and The Publisher's Weekly. In two respects the American section is not so complete as might be desired. In a number of cases it is impossible to give the exact date of publication. Roorbach's Bibliotheca dates as many as possible and so do the first volumes of the American Catalogue. Leypoldt in the preface to the first volume of the latter publication regrets his inability to obtain from many of the publishers the dates of their own publications. In all such cases I have given the dates covered by each volume in which the translations occur. By this means nearly all of them can be located within two or three years of the exact date. The other defect I have found in dealing with American bibliography is in the lack of differentiation between importations and reprints. For this reason it is impossible to determine whether a given English translation was reprinted in America or imported and sold by certain publishers. So far as possible I have listed the American reprints of English translations immediately after the original publication or after the English reprints of it. By this arrangement all the available facts concerning each translation are presented in one place.

[pg ix]

A word, perhaps, is necessary in the way of definition of translation. In this list I have aimed to include only such works as profess to be English renderings of Greek writings. In some cases, chiefly before 1700, the English translation was made from a French, Italian, or Latin version of the Greek original. So far as possible, such instances have been noted. I have not included adaptations, paraphrases, and the like; nor have I attempted to record solitary translations of excerpts from Greek literature. A book of translations in the literal sense of the word has been my basis for entering a title in the following list.

The author would be the last one to claim infallibility for this list. One has but to attempt to gather together any considerable number of titles on a given subject to come to a realization of the difficulties of the work. “Here a little and there a little” is a true text in any such undertaking; and two translations in a bushel of books is no rare occurrence. I have listed the facts as I have been able to gather them; but I dare not vouch that in all cases they are complete. I hope some of the more elusive ones will be added at some future time.

The contents of the two introductory sections sum up certain ideas which have occurred to me as I have been working over this material. The sections are intended to suggest rather than to solve the problems which English translation from the Greek presents. A discussion of the introduction of the literature of one nation into that of another by means of translation is not new; but a discussion of such translations as forming a continuous thread of influence is perhaps slightly different from any hitherto set forth. A series of studies of translations into English from various literatures might add something to our present understanding of literary influences. If this book furnishes the basis for some such study of the interrelations between [pg x] Greek and English literatures, the labor spent upon it will not have been expended in vain.

I am especially indebted to Professors Ashley H. Thorndike and William Peterfield Trent of Columbia University, to whom I owe much for their thoughtful advice and assistance. Their continual interest did much to make a lonely task a pleasant one.

F.M.K.F.

Delaware College

Newark, Delaware

February 28, 1918

[pg xiii]