>>Your moving us slightly to one side of the Muse with notions of
translations<<
Well, yes and no, as your example of the Elizabethan poet demonstrates. What
I think thinking about translation in this context does is add a dimension
to the discussion of the relationship between technique and inspiration, and
perhaps it even brings that discussion into focus more clearly, because in
some sense all poetry is translation; it's just that when we're translating
from another language--rather than from the innards of our own experience
(remember, in each case, we're trying to find words that will express
something that is, essentially, inexpressible and approachable through
language only through approximation)--the choices before us, formal and
otherwise, are more explicitly laid out than when we are working from our
own inspiration.
Richard
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