HEINE'S " REISEBILDER."
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—I should not have troubled you with any defence of my translation of Heine, had not your reviewer brought against me what is tantamount to a charge of plagiarism :—" He has not only adopted a number of mistakes made by Mr. Leland, but he has considerably increased them by blunders of his own." This is indeed "a very severe stricture," and, passing over the latter part of it, I feel bound to defend myself against the moral censure implied. Call me "unscientific, unpoetical, wooden, absurd, guiltless of numerous translation-blunders," but at least let me be an honest bungler. I have not wittingly borrowed one phrase or one word from Mr. Leland.
To substantiate his charge, your reviewer adduces "gross mistakes which the translator has thoughtlessly borrowed from Mr. Leland." Three only are given.
1. "Bin abgekappter Kegel is absurdly rendered by both translators ' a decapitated ninepin !'" I fail to see either the blunder or the absurdity. I turn to Sachs's standard dictionary, and find for the first meaning assigned to Kegel," quille" (nine- pin), and I recall Schiller's " Soll ich diesen Kerl wie einen Kegel aufsetzen ?" I still prefer my version to your reviewer's " truncated cone," or the similar version given in Dr. Buchheim's notes to the passage, " the lower part of a cone cut by a plane parallel to the base."
2. " On p. 59 [read p. 51] both translators boldly connected that word [Schierke] with Schurke ; but Schierke is no German word, and has as much to do with Schurke as with (hake." Your reviewer has suppressed the context. Heine says that he found in the face of his fair fellow-traveller more attractive regions than Elend and Schierke. The pun may be bad, but it is surely obvious.
(While on the subject of philology, I may be allowed to enter a mild protest against the odium etymologicum with which the reviewer attacks my proposed derivation of Buckling. " How is it possible . to make such a blunder ! Moreover, Bock means ' he-goat,' and not a goat' only." The derivation thus scouted is not mine, but Kluge's, and the by-form Bockling seemed to me to supply the missing link. As to the gender, I left my readers to supply for themselves olentis 'mores nutria.) 3. " The terms Nachbeter and Nachfrevler Byron's are translated by 'Byron-worshipper ' and Byron-blasphemer' respectively. The American translator has a similar render- ing." My translation (the hyphens are an addition of the reviewer's) may be inadequate, but I am conceited enough to prefer it to the reviewer's paraphrase—fifteen English words to two German—or his alternative suggestion that I should have incorporated the German words in the text. On referring to Mr. Leland's book in the British Museum (I have never possessed a copy, and believe that it is out of print), I find he translates, " I am no worshipper, or at least no bigoted admirer of Byron." I leave your readers to judge whether this or the two previous instances, I will not say substantiate, but give any colour to the charge of borrowing from Mr. Leland. In disclaiming any "malicious intent," methinks the reviewer doth protest too much.
I have been compelled in self-defence to trespass largely on your space. I must further ask your indulgence to explain how I fell into " a far graver, almost unaccountable, and certainly unpardonable misstatement, in Appendix IV.," viz., the re- ferring to Heine what was said by Goethe of Platen. My error is easily accounted for, though it may not be pardoned. It arose from trusting Strodtmann (Heine's " Leben," I., 344), and not verifying the reference. It may be monstrous to suppose that Goethe could ever have said of Heine that he lacked love, but it is some consolation to find oneself in the same pillory as Strodtmann and Mr. Matthew Arnold (" Essays in Criticism," p. 185).
I purposely refrained from passing any opinion on the work of my American predecessor, though for other reasons than those which my reviewer is pleased to suggest, and I will not now be tempted to break silence ; but when he questions the raison d'Ore of the present publication, I am content to answer that one-half of my work is not included in Mr. Leland's, and
that Mr. Leland's work includes " Die Bader von Lucca," a sketch which I, like the reviewer, consider " abominable."—I am,
[1. The translation of ein abgekappter Kegel by " a decapitated ninepin " is indefensible. There was no necessity for recurring to Sachs's " standard dictionary," or for quoting Schiller, to prove that Kegel also means a "ninepin." All German scholars will agree that in this case it can only be translated by " a truncated cone." If Mr. Storr will refer to Sanders's dictionary, he will find the passage in question quoted sub voce " Regel," and the definition of the latter as a geometrical term.
2. The places of Elend and Schierke are in themselves un- attractive, more especially the latter ; hence Heine's assertion that the pretty face of his fellow-traveller was more pleasant to look at than those villages. We fail to see here the shadow of a pun.
3. " Byron-worshipper " and " Byron-blasphemer " are, in themselves, handy expressions ; but then they convey wrong meanings of Nachbeter and Nachfrevler. We merely gave a paraphrase of the words ; but it is for the translator to find exact equivalents, or, leaving them untranslated, to explain their meaning in a footnote.
Mr. Storr protests against the charge of having copied several blunders from Mr. Leland. Be it so. The strange coincidence that the same unusual mistakes occurred in both versions naturally misled us.—En. Spectator.]
Previous page
