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John Dryden, The Preface to Ovid's Epistles (page 2)
The Preface to Ovid's Epistles (1680) - 2
Concerning the first of these Methods, our Master Horace has given us this Caution,
Nec verbum verbo curabis reddere, fidus
Interpres
Nor word for word too faithfully translate.
As the Earl of Roscommon has excellently render'd it. Too faithfully is indeed pedantically: 'tis a faith like that which proceeds from Superstition, blind and zealous: Take it in the Expression of Sir John Denham, to Sir Rich. Fanshaw, on his Version of the Pastor Fido.
That servile path, thou nobly do'st decline,
Of tracing word by word and Line by Line;
A new and nobler way thou do'st pursue,
To make Translations, and Translators too:
They but preserve the Ashes, thou the Flame,
True to his Sence, but truer to his Fame.
'Tis almost impossible to Translate verbally, and well, at the same time; For the Latin, (a most severe and Compendious Language) often expresses that in one word, which either the Barbarity, or the narrowness of modern Tongues cannot supply [but] in more. 'Tis frequent also that the Conceit is couch'd in some Expression, which will be lost in English.
Atque ijdem Venti vela fidèmq; ferent.
what Poet of our Nation is so happy as to express this thought Literally in English,
Préface aux épîtres d'Ovide - 2
Pour ce qui concerne la première méthode, Horace, notre maître, nous a mis en garde en ces termes:
Nec verbum verbo curabis reddere, fidus
Interpres [1]
« Et ne traduis pas trop fidèlement le mot pour le mot », selon l'excellente version du Comte de Roscommon[2]. Car qui traduit trop fidèlement traduit en pédant: et sa fidélité est de celles qu'engendrent la superstition et son zèle aveugle. Voyez ce que dit John Denham à Sir Richard Fanshawe, à propos de sa traduction du Pastor Fido:
Évitant noblement le servile chemin
qui retrace mot pour mot et vers après vers,
tu ouvres une voie nouvelle, et plus noble,
pour traduire et pour engendrer des traducteurs.
Eux préservent les cendres, toi, la flamme,
fidèle à sa pensée, mais plus fidèle encore à sa renommée.[3]
Il est presque impossible de traduire mot à mot tout en traduisant bien : car le latin, langue des plus strictes et des plus denses, exprime souvent en un mot ce que les langues modernes, soit du fait de leur origine barbare, soit par leur nature étriquée, ne peuvent rendre que par plusieurs. Il est fréquent également que le sens soit exprimé par quelque tournure subtile impossible à garder en anglais :
Atque iidem Venti fidemque ferent[4]
est-il en ce pays poète assez heureux pour exprimer cette pensée en une version littérale, et que le tour en soit spirituel, ou presque même simplement intelligible en anglais?
Notes 2
Ars Poetica, 133-134
as the Earl of Roscommon has excellently render'd it] In his 1680 version of the Ars Poetica (Horace's Art of Poetry, p. 11). Dryden often presents Roscommon as an authority on translation: see below, and the preface to Sylvae (1685) where Dryden claims to have been spurred by Roscommon's Essay of Translated Verse (1684).
from Superstition, blind and Zealous] Compare with Nicolas Perrot d'Ablancourt's criticism of "those who idolize all the words and thoughts of the Ancients (ceux qui sont idolâtres de toutes les paroles et de toutes les pensées des anciens)" in the dedication of his translation of Lucian (1654)
Dryden quotes from Denham's prefatory verses to Sir Richard Fanshawe's Il Pastor Fido/ The Faithfull Shepherd (1647), "To the Author of this Translation", 15-16 and 21-24.
[but in] more] But our addition: the 1680 text has it more and the 1681 edition in more.
Heroides VII, 8: "the same winds will bear away your sails and your loyalty". Dryden's own translation reads: "you, with loosen'd sails and vows..." ("Dido to Aeneas", 9). Dryden also comments on Ovid's witticisms earlier in the preface: "the Copiousness of his Wit was such, that he often writ too pointedly for his Subject, and made his persons speak more Eloquently than the violence of their Passion would admit."
Notes
1. Et tu ne t'attacheras pas à rendre mot pour mot, en interprète fidèle ». Horace, Art Poétique, v. 133-134.
«
Of tracing word by word and Line by Line;
A new and nobler way thou do'st pursue,
To make Translations, and Translators too:
They but preserve the Ashes, thou the Flame,
True to his Sence, but truer to his Fame ». John Denham, « To the Author of this Translation », dans Il Pastor Fido...Translated by Richard Fanshawe
Mis en ligne le 1/7/2011
mise à jour le 6 juillet 2011
