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A bit like retranslating the Bible - theres a lot to be said for it. the Bible andShkespeare heldthe English language steady for longer than natural, then it burst away and changed very fast in 20th c. Sally Evans http://www.poetryscotland.co.uk http://groups.msn.com/desktopsallye ----- Original Message ----- From: "Max Richards" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 1:06 PM Subject: rewriting shakespeare Stumbling on this just now, my first response was negative, but as his example is a few lines of Thersites which most would stumble over, I begin to feel O'Connor has a case for his offering... Max in Melbourne "William Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida: A Modern English Translation Imagine that you are playing Shakespeare's Thersites, and another character has just invited you to "Come in and vituperate" (Act 2, scene 3 of Troilus and Cressida). Which of these two speeches would you rather deliver? ... You! if I had space in my mind's purse for a fake gold coin, you'd never have slipped my memory. No matter. I'll tack on a curse for you: Yourself upon yourself!. . . May the itch in your blood be your guiding star through life! Then if the old woman who lays you out thinks you make a pretty corpse, I'll be sure she's only done lepers. Amen. [translation] OR: If I could `a rememb'red a gilt counterfeit, thou wouldst not have slipped out of my contemplation: but it is no matter; thy self upon thy self! . . .Let thy blood be thy direction till thy death! then if she that lays thee out says thou art a fair corse, I'll be sworn and sworn upon't she never shrouded any but lazars. Amen. [original] Mark O'Connor writes: "My aim is translation, not adaptation. I translate prose with prose, blank verse with blank verse, a couplet with a couplet (though not necessarily the same rhyming words), and an outdated pun or joke with a comparable modern one. The aim is to keep open the ambiguities and multiple possibilities of the original text, while removing the accidental obscurities caused by linguistic change." australianpoet.com is the offical web site of the Australian poet Mark O'Connor - © Mark O'Connor 2008 contact Mark O'Connor on email [log in to unmask]; tel +61 2 6247 3341 ------------------------------------------------------------ This email was sent from Netspace Webmail: http://www.netspace.net.au