My wife has become quite the avid reader, devouring on average a book a week. Other than my early edition of Sinclair Lewis' Dodsworth, all her choices have been modern fiction, with a strong tendency towards female authors.

We have a branch county library close by and she has run the shelves and now finds herself in a bit of a funk. I suggested classic literature, since books which are not reading simply do not endure over decades and centuries (the sole exception being Cervantes' Don Quixote, which I have long contended that no one has ever read completely without the necessity of a literature class).

It occurred to me that a good place to start would be Flaubert's Madame Bovary, since it appeared (1857) quite close to the demarcation between Romanticism and Literary Realism, of which Bovary is a prime example of the latter. Coincidentally, the 1949 Hollywood production of the novel, directed by Vincent Minelli, is airing on TCM right now)

The problem, though, is that Flaubert's novel was written in French, and any time there is a translation, there is room for interpretation of the original text. There should be no need to further explain why carefully choosing a translation is critical to experiencing the author's intent.

A quick search shows that there have been no less than sixteen English translations of Madame Bovary.

George Saintsbury, 1878 (translated by Eleanor Marx-Aveling; introduction by George Saintsbury)

Eleanor Marx (1886)

Henry Blanchamp (1905)

J. Lewis May (1928)

Gerard Hopkins (1948)

Joan Charles (abridged, 1949)

Alan Russell (1950)

Francis Steegmuller (1957)

Mildred Marmur (1964)

Paul de Man (1965)

Merloyd Lawrence (1969)

Geoffrey Wall (1992)

Margaret Mauldon (2004)

Lydia Davis (2010)

Christopher Moncrieff (2010)

Adam Thorpe (2011)

Seeking advice on which of these might be most faithful to Flaubert's original text, I found this, which the publisher found necessary to divide into two(!) parts:

What’s the best translation of Madame Bovary? (Part 1)

What’s the best translation of Madame Bovary? (Part 2)

Of particular note, and a matter of prime trivia is this tidbit about the first person to translate Bovary:

Who was Eleanor Marx-Aveling?

She was the youngest daughter of Karl Marx, a socialist, a writer, and a translator. As translator and editor, she worked with her father and Friedrich Engels on Das Kaptital. She also translated some of Henrik Ibsen’s plays from Norwegian to English.

Interesting, no? One might think that this should automatically preclude this version as a choice, but, no, not as far as I'm concerned. This translation has endured the longest, and even though the translator is kin to a dyed-in-the-wool troublemaker. it is not really possible to alter the text in any meaningful way from the original with the intent of interjecting one's own political POV. For all we know, Ms. Marx-Aveling was a true professional, dedicated to doing the best job of which she was capable. Fluent in at least four languages (Russian, French, Norwegian and English), clearly she was quite intelligent.

However, consider the following from Part 1 of the comments on translation:

About the Marx-Aveling translation of Madame Bovary

The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation edited by Peter France
“Her plain version, though not attempting to match Flaubert’s style, stands comparison with several of the later versions.”

“Eleanor Marx and Gustave Flaubert” by Faith Evans
“It was the first English translation to appear and remained the only English version for many years, and although several more have been undertaken in the past half-century it remains among the most readable. Yet for reasons that I believe were sometimes unconnected with the translation itself, it has often suffered harshly at the hands of the critics. Vladimir Nabokov, for instance, in his reading of Madame Bovary, rages against translators in general – ‘ignorant, treacherous and philistine’ – and Marx in particular. Lectures on Literature, published after his death, reproduces a page from his teaching notebook in which he lists what he considers to be some of her mistakes.”

Paul de Man, whose edited version was published in 1965, says in his introduction: “[T]he Marx Aveling text has advantages and drawbacks. One of its main virtues is the relatively high degree of fidelity in rendering the cadence of Flaubert’s sentence… [but] Mrs. Aveling often loses track of the meaning in the meditative, inward passages and renders the already obscure original altogether opaque.”

From Marx-Aveling’s introduction to the 1886 and 1892 editions reproduced on the blog Exotic and Irrational Entertainment:
“Certainly no critic can be more painfully aware than I am of the weaknesses, shortcomings, the failures of my work; but at least the translation is faithful. I have neither suppressed a line, nor added a word. That often I have not found the best possible word to express Flaubert’s meaning I know; but those who have studied him will understand how impossible it must be for any one to give an exact reproduction of the inimitable style of the master. . . My work, then, I know is faulty. It is pale and feeble by the side of the original. Yet, if it induces some readers to go to that original, if it helps to make known to those who cannot thus study this work of the greatest of French novelists after Balzac, I am content. . . I do not regret having done this work; it is the best I could do.”

Perhaps I'll buy my wife a copy of Tom Sawyer...

To piggyback on that regarding women authors I like. I can recommend Louise Penny a Canadian who writes great mystery in the Armand Gamache series and Viveca Sten a Swede who also writes great mystery in the Sandham murder series.

I try to read a classic every other book. I read the Edith Grossman translation of Don Quixote in 2021. I’m just trying to tackle as many classics from “must read” lists as possible; I wouldn’t have had access to a dedicated examination of what is widely considered “the first novel.” As you describe, I do a search and try to locate the translations of highest regard, then gauge the reviews against my own criteria.

I have not tackled Madame Bovary as yet. Truth be told, I have read but a few novels written by women, e.g. Mary Shelley, Harper Lee, Willa Cather.

quote:

Originally posted by TMats:
I have not tackled Madame Bovary as yet. Truth be told, I have read but a few novels written by women, e.g. Mary Shelley, Harper Lee, Willa Cather.

Gustave Flaubert was male.

So much to learn, so little time.

I think my two favorites from classic literature read in he last few years are, Of Human Bondage (even though I detested the character, ‘Mildred’), and The Count of Monte Cristo (Lowell Bair translation), which I liked considerably more than The Three Musketeers (Richard Pevear translation).

This is the one thing I find Reddit useful for.

If I'm considering a book, say by Dostoevsky, I'll go on Reddit and look for threads on 'best translation of "Crime and Punishment"'. I always find one or more threads with no shortage of opinions on translations. But, usually, after wading through, there's a consensus on a recommended translation.

quote:

Originally posted by 6guns:
To piggyback on that regarding women authors I like. I can recommend Louise Penny a Canadian who writes great mystery in the Armand Gamache series and Viveca Sten a Swede who also writes great mystery in the Sandham murder series.

I've recently donated the entire set of Gamanche stories to our town library. They are a a great read, either in isolation, or in chronological order. As are the odd detective stories by Anne Zouroudi - they are the seven sins, and must be read in the order they appear on biblical sequence in order to make perfect sense. Well-worth the bother of doing so.

Has she read “Brave New World” by Huxley? In some ways, very close to what we are currently experiencing in our society now.
I remember my lit classes including that, Madame Bovary, Fahrenheit 451 among other books.

I do believe that English and French are fairly faithful in translation in classics.

I’d also suggest the Odyssey and the Iliad..

Knowning absolutely nothing about this subject or translating in general, my first thought would be to stick with the closest in time (as words meaning change over time) and closest in language as expressions will not translate properly or will not respect context quite often. As the french remain painfully chauvinistic, they despise anything english related with pasion so someone brave enough to translate french to english must likely feel the opposite. I cast my vote for the french translator. Likely the first translation, the earliest, is from someone who’s first language could be german, not french nor english. Quite a cultural obstacle. She sounds exquisitely refined though.

My uneducated opinion comes from being a native spanish speaker, pretty much self taught in english (once an avid reader) and learned french on the fly after joining a french speaking university in Belgium.Minimum survival skills in German and slightly better in Italian and Portuguese.

If available, will always do my best effort in the original language.

0-0

I hear you haven’t experienced Shakespeare until you’ve read him in the original Klingon.

-Rob

quote:

Originally posted by BurtonRW:
I hear you haven’t experienced Shakespeare until you’ve read him in the original Klingon.

-Rob

As you obviously prefer to read your literature in its original format, give the 'Mabinogion' a try.

Ever read 'The Canterbury Tales'?

At least most of Shakespeare is recognisably English.

Walter Kaufman does a good job with German.

I liked his Russian translations too, but I don’t know Russian so I never read the same works in the original.

I don’t know how to evaluate something this way, for a language you don’t speak, but Kaufman translates Kafka and Mann about how I would. (I tried Nietzche in German, but he didn’t make anymore sense than he did in English)

There are some translations by pompous morons.

quote:

Originally posted by tacfoley:

Ever read 'The Canterbury Tales'?

At least most of Shakespeare is recognisably English.

I had to memorize and recite the first part of 'The Canterbury Tales' prologue. It has a lovely rhythm.

Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote,
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,
And bathed every veyne in swich licóur
Of which vertú engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours y-ronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open ye,
So priketh hem Natúre in hir corages,
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes,
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially, from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blisful martir for to seke,
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.

para, FWIW, my wife and daughter both read at roughly the same rate as your wife—and primarily women authors. My wife started a book club that’s been active for a couple years now. It sounds like it’s gotten a little too big (10 women), and it’s hard to stay focused at monthly meetings. Additionally, a smaller group makes it easier to choose books that everyone is interested in reading. Oddly enough, my wife is expanding her horizons too, she’s currently reading “The Scarlet Letter.”