The translation is strikingly off in places. Flaubert's wonderful metaphor for emotional blockage caused by domestic torpor, "Elle ne savait pas que, sur la terrasse des maisons, la pluie fait des lacs quand les gouttières sont bouchées" does have some problems anyway in English translation, as very few English or Irish houses have "terrasses" (in America the word "porch" would just about cover it, but this side of the Atlantic "porch" generally means a smaller enclosed area). However, this becomes in English "She did not know that on the terrace of houses it makes lakes when the pipes are choked" - it actually sounds more cod-French than the original, by bafflingly dropping explicit reference to rain, thus leaving us uncertain about what "it" is. I am sorry to say that the translator was Karl Marx's daughter Eleanor.
May Books 22) Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert
The translation is strikingly off in places. Flaubert's wonderful metaphor for emotional blockage caused by domestic torpor, "Elle ne savait pas que, sur la terrasse des maisons, la pluie fait des lacs quand les gouttières sont bouchées" does have some problems anyway in English translation, as very few English or Irish houses have "terrasses" (in America the word "porch" would just about cover it, but this side of the Atlantic "porch" generally means a smaller enclosed area). However, this becomes in English "She did not know that on the terrace of houses it makes lakes when the pipes are choked" - it actually sounds more cod-French than the original, by bafflingly dropping explicit reference to rain, thus leaving us uncertain about what "it" is. I am sorry to say that the translator was Karl Marx's daughter Eleanor.
- Post a new comment
- 0 comments
- Post a new comment
- 0 comments
