Читать книгу English Translations from the Greek: A Bibliographical Survey - Finley Melville Kendall Foster - Страница 6

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The Growth of Greek Translation. The solid line is original and reprinted translations; the dashed line is original translations only.

The history of English translation from the Greek is almost coincident with the history of English printing. In 1477 William Caxton set up his press in London and from that press in 1484 he issued his own translation of Aesop's Fables. The real beginning of serious translation, as is very evident from the chart accompanying this section, was made in the decade 1530-1540. From that time until the time of the Civil War and the Protectorate there was a steady output of translations, not many as compared with our day, but a proportion consistent with the size of the reading public of the time.

In the one hundred and thirty years between 1520 and 1650, one hundred and seventy-nine translations were published. Of these one hundred and fourteen were new translations and sixty-five were reprintings. That two-thirds of the total number are new translations is not surprising; for with the awakening of interest in Greek which took place during these years, men could not turn to translations made in former years. For this reason they had to satisfy the demand for knowledge of Greek literature in the English language by producing their own translations and reprinting these as the demand required. That the reprints amounted to one-half of the production of original translations is interesting as showing that the demand for translations was not equalled by a supply of new ones and that translations must have been popular. Printers have never [pg xiv] been inclined to be sentimental in regard to publishing books and any over-enthusiasm a translator may have in regard to his author is sure to be checked by the monetary standards of the publisher. For this reason I would suggest that the publishers during the latter part of the sixteenth and the first part of the seventeenth century evidently found Greek translations a paying proposition; if they had not, they would not have ventured to place so many translations before a very limited reading public. All this seems to add one more evidence to the already established dictum that the Renaissance readers in England were much interested in Greek literature.

During the one hundred and fifty years following the Civil War English literature was partly under the domain of those principles which are generally known as neo-classical. For this reason the facts of Greek translation are very interesting and to a certain degree provide an index of the importance of Greek literature during these years. At least five hundred and four translations of Greek authors were published, of which two hundred and thirty-nine were reprintings of those previously printed. The average number published per annum between 1530 and 1650 was 1.30 +; whereas for these one hundred and fifty years the annual average is 3.36 +. This increase may be due to the fact that the reading public of these later years was larger than that of the preceding age; but I doubt if it was almost three hundred per cent larger. I would much rather attribute the increase to an equal growth of interest in Greek literature encouraged by the principles of literary art which were flourishing at that time and fostered by the steady development of Greek scholarship through those years. Aristotle's Poetics was one of the sources of criticism during these years and, as I shall show in the next section, the interest in Greek philosophy was predominant throughout [pg xv] the period. The authority of the classics and the classics themselves were uppermost in the current of literary thought; hence it seems plausible that Greek translation should show a positive reaction at this time.

Before leaving this period I desire to point out one or two matters which have become evident upon a study of the chart at the beginning of this section. The curve as it passes through the decades after 1650 rises gradually to a peak in 1720. It is interesting to note that this was the hey-day of Pope: his Iliad was published volume by volume between 1715 and 1720. Through the latter years of Pope's life the curve declines, reaching its lowest point four years before his death. Shortly after his death Doctor Johnson began to exert his influence on English literature, an influence which was powerfully classical. This continuation of the neo-classical principles raised the curve again; and Doctor Johnson himself assisted in producing that result by reprinting a number of translations in his Works of the English Poets, 1779-81. The decline of the last twenty years of this period, 1780-1800, is synchronous with the fading of the supreme authority of neo-classical principles; for with the death of Johnson in 1784 the last star of the first magnitude in the neo-classical firmament had set. The curve would go much lower but for the reprinting of a number of translations in Anderson's Poets of Great Britain, 1792-94. As appears from the chart Greek translation was waiting for the tide to turn and come forth into the nineteenth century with renewed vigor.

The nineteenth century, quantitatively at least, is the most important period in the history of Greek translation, for more than half of the total number of translations printed between 1484 and 1916 were published during these years. As the chart indicates the great numerical advance came after 1860, although the preceding sixty years had been [pg xvi] far ahead of the previous centuries in the work produced. The reasons suggested for this great advance in the nineteenth century are: first, a new interest in Greece itself; secondly, the rise of classical libraries and the subsequent cheapness of translations; and thirdly a large output, mainly in the latter part of the nineteenth century, of schoolboy helps.

The early part of the nineteenth century was a time of much interest in Greece on the part of the English public. The travels of Edward Dodwell, H. W. Williams, and William Gell, to say nothing of Lord Byron, made the Greece of that day well known in England. Through all this time, from 1784 to 1818, William Mitford's History of Greece was proceeding in leisurely installments. The immediate popularity of the work is but another evidence of the widespread interest in Greece. I need hardly mention the stress which was laid upon the classics in the educational system of the time, for it is a well known fact. The emphasis which was placed upon Greek was at least equal to that upon Latin. The Classical scholars of the period such as C. J. Bloomfield, J. H. Monk, P. P. Dobree, and P. Elmsley spent the major portion of their lives in carrying on the work of Porson and editing Greek texts rather than Latin. The Reviews from time to time published articles on new classical books; and that the emphasis was on Greek rather than Latin is shown by a survey of the classical reviews in the Edinburgh Review between 1802 and 1836: of a total of thirty-nine articles, twenty-nine were on Greek books. All of these forces encouraged a new interest in Greece and Greek literature, an interest which was not so much the purely literary attitude of the century and a half which had just passed, as a general interest on the part of the whole reading public.

Another agency of supreme importance in bringing Greece before the eyes of the English public at this time was the [pg xvii] removal of the marbles from the Acropolis by Lord Elgin. These marbles, the last of which arrived in England in 1812, were the center of much discussion in England. One has but to call to mind the caustic remarks by Lord Byron on Elgin in The Curse of Minerva and Childe Harold to realize the intenseness of the opposition to taking away from Greece part of the last vestiges of her ancient glory. The coldness of their reception was finally overcome by Visconti and Canova, who pointed out their historical and artistic value. Finally in 1816, after an extensive investigation of their merits, Parliament appropriated £35,000 for their purchase by the government. From that time until to-day they have been preserved for public view in the British Museum. After the Greek Revolution the service which Lord Elgin had rendered not only to England, but to the world, was recognized; for they alone of all the monuments of Greece escaped the ravages of the years of warfare. The importation of these marbles, then, was another cord which fastened English attention on Greece; for they provoked public discussion of the merits of the action, and for those who had access to London, furnished a physical bond of connection with Greece.

The Greek Revolution, which raged from 1821 to 1829, was another factor in deepening the interest which the English public had in Greece. After the outbreak of the revolution, although the government officially ignored the revolt and added its name to those who refused to admit the Greeks to the Congress of Verona, the people of England announced in no uncertain terms their approval of the Greek cause. The grounds for this approval were two: the Greeks were the people who had in the ages long gone by given priceless literature and art to the world for which the world had done nothing in return; secondly, the Greeks were Christians and were to be encouraged to throw off [pg xviii] the yoke of bondage imposed upon them by the Mohammedan Turk. Such sentiments as these are to be found in the magazines of the time and in the various pamphlets which appeared in behalf of the Greeks in the early part of the war. Concretely the interest of the English public was shown by meetings held in various parts of the country, chiefly Edinburgh and London, and in the formation of the London Greek Committee. This committee collected £7,000 by voluntary subscription from the British public, with which to purchase military supplies for the Greeks. At the suggestion of Lord Byron, whom the committee made one of its agents in Greece, the committee assisted in the floating of two Greek loans in England. The battle of Navarino (1827) which, though considered as "untoward" by the government, was a brilliant naval success for the English and French fleets, was heartily welcomed by the English public. And finally at the conclusion of the revolution the English nation became one of the guarantors of the constitutional monarchy established in Greece. Thus through the political events of the decade 1820-1830 Greece was kept in the eye of the British public.

All of these factors, the literary interest in Greece and Greek, the Elgin marbles, and the Greek Revolution, created a desire for things Greek on the part of the English public. Of these three forces the third was of course effective only on the generation then living; but the other two lost none of their power as the century proceeded. In fact the interest in Greek literature as literature, I do not say as a language, was much stronger at the close of the century than at the beginning, largely, I think, because of the efforts of such men as Matthew Arnold, Benjamin Jowett, and Richard Claverhouse Jebb. The work of these men has been ably carried on by Sir Gilbert Murray and J. P. Mahaffy into our own century.

[pg xix]

Consequently when one turns to view the progress of Greek translation through these years, one is not surprised to find an abundant and increasingly large output. The demand for translations grew almost in direct ratio as the study of the Greek language and the reading of the literature in the original declined. The interest in Greece which had been fostered and developed through the century could only be satisfied by an abundance of translations whose range covered the whole of Greek literature.

This interest in and demand for the works of these ancient authors produced a form of publication which was new to the reading public, namely, the classical library. The first of these was The Works of the Greek and Roman Poets, translated into English verse. This work was published in eighteen volumes between the years 1809 and 1812; the volumes were then gathered together and given the uniform date of 1813. The next library to follow this was Valpy's Family Classical Library, published between 1830 and 1834. The works, as was also the case with the Greek and Roman Poets, were reprintings of translations already in existence. The emphasis was placed on Greek rather than Latin literature; for of the twenty-seven authors represented in the collection, sixteen were Greek. Another significant fact in regard to this Library was its price; the books were sold at four shillings and sixpence a volume, a price which placed the translations within the reach of all possible purchasers. The last and probably the most famous library before the turn of the century was Bohn's Classical Library. This collection of books, at five shillings a volume, was published in great part between 1848 and 1863. The aim of the Classical Library was to furnish the British public with cheap translations of all the important classical works. In the accomplishment of this purpose the Library was much extended in scope beyond Valpy's and made more complete [pg xx] by the translation of all the works of many of its authors. While in some cases the translations were reprintings of those already popular, the majority were new translations made for the Classical Library. Of the great popularity of this Library I do not need to speak; for the translations have been on the shelves of almost every educated family in England and America for the last sixty years.

Satisfied with the translations published by Bohn, the reading public of the latter part of the century made little demand for any other similar collection of books. The only series of translations of any importance which was published during these years was Ancient Classics for English Readers, and these contained only selections from the authors with a great amount of introductory matter. These works, edited by the Reverend W. Lucas Collins and published by Blackwoods, were sold at two shillings and sixpence a volume. Of the twenty authors translated in this collection twelve were Greek. The series was more educational in its nature than any preceding one and the outlines and analyses in the books were intended for those who had little or no classical knowledge. The next classical library of interest to the general reader was The New Classical Library in which were published translations of Herodotus, Plutarch, and Theophrastus between 1906 and 1909. The last library and one which bids fair to take the place of the Bohn Classical Library is the Loeb Classical Library, which was begun in 1912. Once more an attempt is being made to supply the English reading public with adequate translations of all the classics. Inasmuch as it is at present incomplete little can be said of it at this time; but it seems assured of success.

In addition to the translations published in purely Greek and Latin collections many translations were included in the general collections of books which became popular [pg xxi] in the latter part of the nineteenth century and are still in vogue. In such libraries as the following were published translations from the more popular Greek authors, e.g., Aristotle, Herodotus, Homer, Plato, Plutarch, and the dramatists: Morley's Universal Library (1884), Cassell's National Library (1887), Lubbock's Hundred Best Books (1891), Temple Classics (1897), Golden Treasury Series (1901), World's Classics (1902), New Universal Library (1906), and Everyman's Library (1906). There are a few other sporadic publications in other libraries, which have been noted in the Survey as they occur.

As the publication of “classical libraries” is a nineteenth century development, so the introduction of schoolboy helps began with the early years of the century. The work of T. W. C. Edwards in the twenties and thirties was intended for schoolboy consumption. At the same time one or more persons hid behind the all-inclusive authorship of "Graduate of the University of Oxford" to produce literal translations of the works of the dramatists. In the middle of the century much of the work of Doctor J. A. Giles was done to help the schoolboy over hard places. In 1870 and the following years a new series of translations of the dramatists was brought out by a “First-Class Man of Balliol College.” Roscoe Mongan, whose translations were to a large extent published in Kelly's Keys to the Classics, began his work in 1878. These translations went over the ground covered by his predecessors, and spread out into history, epic and philosophy. Evidently the schoolboys of his time found them very useful, for many of them were reprinted within a few years.

During the early eighties the “First-Class Man of Balliol College” reappeared with a translation of Herodotus book by book. From this time until the outbreak of the present war there was a steady output of these utilitarian translations. [pg xxii] G. F. H. Sykes, J. H. Haydon, A. H. Allcroft, J. A. Prout, F. G. Plaistowe, E. S. Crooke, J. Thompson, B. J. Hayes, H. Hailstone, T. R. Mills, W. H. Balgarnie, J. F. Stout, and others who did only one or two books, made their translations with the student of the language as their reading public. Some of these translations appeared in the University Tutorial Series, a collection of books in which the text, translations, notes, vocabulary, difficult parsings, and test papers were published.

The work of these men, quantitatively at least, is an important factor in the history of Greek translation. Between 1850 and 1870 only eleven translations of this type were published; between the years 1870 and 1910, however, at least two hundred and eleven schoolboy helps were published. The following table gives the minimum figures for this kind of translation during these years.

1870-1879=26

1880-1889=62

1890-1899=86

1900-1909=37

The falling off in the first decade of the twentieth century may be due to two causes: first, the decrease in the number of students of Greek in the schools, which was the result of the great opposition stirred up in the latter part of the nineteenth century by the advocates of a more practical education; and, secondly, the ample production of the decade preceding filled the market and plentifully supplied the demand. I have set forth here these figures in regard to the schoolboy translation because I doubt whether the extent of that type of work has been realized by any except the competing publishers. To no small degree has the total of translations in the latter part of the nineteenth century been increased by this type of publication.

[pg xxiii]

In the preceding paragraphs I have tried to suggest the reasons for the changing fortunes of English translation from the Greek. The quantity of translations produced between 1484 and 1917 is somewhat larger than is generally realized: the total number of translations is 2164, of which 1289 are original translations and 875 are reprintings. For those who wish to see the progress numerically decade by decade I give the following table upon which the chart at the opening of this section was based.