The Two Lovers of Heaven: Chrysanthus and Daria Part 26

"IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD". Alas!

The first line stops me: how shall I proceed?

"The word" cannot express the meaning here.

I must translate the pa.s.sage differently, If by the spirit I am rightly guided.

Once more,--"IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE THOUGHT".-- Consider the first line attentively, Lest hurrying on too fast, you lose the meaning.

Was it then Thought that has created all things?

Can thought make matter? Let us try the line Once more,--"IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE POWER"-- This will not do--even while I write the phrase, I feel its faults--oh! help me, holy Spirit, I 'll weigh the pa.s.sage once again, and write Boldly,--"IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE ACT".

Anster's "Faustus", Francfort ed., 1841, p. 63.

5. The same line of argument is worked out with wonderful subtlety of thought and beauty of poetical expression by Calderon, in one of the finest of his Autos Sacramentales, "The Sacred Parna.s.sus". Autos Sacramentales, tom. vi. p. 10.

6. The metre reverts here again to the asonante form, which is kept up for the remainder of this act. The vowels here used are e, e, or their equivalents.

7. "This Clytie knew, and knew she was undone, Whose soul was fix'd, and doted on the sun".

OVID, Metamorphoses, b. iv.

8. In the whole of this scene the asonante vowels are a-e, or their equivalents.

9. The asonante in e-e, recommences here, and continues until the entry of Chrysanthus.

10. The metre changes to the asonante in a-e for the remainder of this Act.

11. The asonante in this scene is generally in o-e, o-o, o-a, which are nearly all alike in sound. In the second scene the asonante is in a-e, as in "scAttEr", etc.

12. See note referring to the auto, "The Sacred Parna.s.sus", Act 1, p.

21.

13. The asonante changes here into five-lined stanzas in ordinary rhyme. Three lines rhyme one way and two the other. Poems in this metre are called in Spanish 'Versos de arte mayor,' from the greater skill supposed to be required for their composition.

14. The asonante is single here, consisting only of the long accented o, as in "ROme", "glObe", "dOme", etc.

15. Champion, or combater, the name generally given the Cid.

16. The metre changes to an irregular couplet in long and short lines.

17. The metre changes to the double asonante in e-e, which continues to the end of the drama.

18. Baptism by blood and fire through martyrdom. Calderon refers here evidently to the words of St. John the Baptist: "He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire"--St. Matth., c. iii. v. ii. The following pa.s.sage in the Legend of St. Catherine must also have been present to his mind:

"Et c.u.m dolerent, quod sine baptismo decederent, virgo respondit: Ne timeatis, quia effusio vestri sanguinis vobis baptismus reputabitur et corona". Legenda Aurea, c. 167.

THE SPANISH DRAMA.

CALDERON'S DRAMAS AND AUTOS,

Translated into English Verse BY DENIS FLORENCE MAC-CARTHY.

From Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature. London: 1863.

"Denis Florence M'Carthy published in London (in 1861) translations of two plays, and an auto of Calderon, under the t.i.tle of 'Love, the greatest Enchantment; the Sorceries of Sin; the Devotion of the Cross, from the Spanish of Calderon, attempted strictly in English Asonante, and other imitative Verse', printing, at the same time, a carefully corrected text of the originals, page by page, opposite to his translations. It is, I think, one of the boldest attempts ever made in English verse. It is, too, as it seems to me, remarkably successful.

Not that asonantes can be made fluent or graceful in English, or easily perceptible to an English ear, but that the Spanish air and character of Calderon are so happily preserved. Mr. M'Carthy, in 1853, had published two volumes of translations from Calderon, to which I have already referred; and, besides this, he has rendered excellent service to the cause of Spanish literature in other ways. But in the present volume he has far surpa.s.sed all he had previously done; for Calderon is a poet who, whenever he is translated, should have his very excesses, both in thought and manner, fully produced, in order to give a faithful idea of what is grandest and most distinctive in his genius. Mr. M'Carthy has done this, I conceive, to a degree which I had previously considered impossible. Nothing, I think, in the English language will give us so true an impression of what is most characteristic of the Spanish drama; perhaps I ought to say, of what is most characteristic of Spanish poetry generally".--tom. iii. pp. 461, 462.

Extracts from Continental Reviews.

From "Blaeater fuer Literarische Unterhaltung". 1862. Erster Baude, 479 Leipzig, F. A. Brockhans.

"Erwaehnenswerth ist folgender Kuehne versuch einer Rachdildung Calderon' scher stuecke in Englishchen a.s.sonanzen.

"Love, the greatest enchantment; The Sorceries of Sin; The Devotion of the Cross, from the Spanish of Calderon, attempted strictly in English Asonante, and other imitative verse. By Denis Florence Mac-Carthy".

Diese Uebersetzung ist dem Verfa.s.ser der "History of Spanish Literature", George Ticknor, zugeeignet, der in einem Schreiber au den Uebersetzer die Arbeit "marvellous" nennt und dam fortfaehrt:

"Richt das sie die a.s.sonanzen dem englischen Ohr so h.o.e.rbar gemacht haetten, wie dies mit den Spanischen der Fall ist; unsere widerhaarigen consonanten machen dies unmoeglich; das Wunderbare ist nur, das sie dieselben ueberhaupt h.o.e.rbar gemacht haben. Meiner Meinung nach nehme ist Ihre a.s.sonanzen so deutlich wahr, wil die Von August Schlegel oder Gries und mehr als diejenigen Friedrich Schlegel's. Aber dieser war der erste, der den versuch dazu machte, und ausserdem bin ich Kein Deutscher. Wurde es nicht l.u.s.tig sein, wenn man einmal ein solches Experiment in franzoeschicher Sprache wolte?"

"Ohne zweifel wuerde MacCarthy Ohne den vorgaug deutscher Nachbilder des Calderon ebenso wenig darauf gekommen sein englische a.s.sonanzen zu versuchen, als man ohne das ermunternde Beispiel deutscher Dichter und Uebersetzer darauf gekommen sein wurde, in Uebersetzungen und originaldichtungen unter welchen letztern wol besonders Longfellow's 'Evangeline', zu nennen ist, englische Hexameter zu versuchen, was in letzter zeit gar nicht selten geschehen ist".

From "Boletin de Ferro-Carriles". Cadiz: 1862.

"La novedad que nos comunica de la existencia de traducciones tan acabadas de nuestro grande e inimitable Calderon, ostendando, hasta cierto punto, las galas y formas del original, estamos seguros sera acogida con favor, si no con entusiasmo, per los verdaderos amantes de las letras espanolas. A ellos nos dirijimos, recomendandoles el ultimo trabajo del Senor Mac-Carthy, seguros de que partic.i.p.aran del mismo placer que nosotros hemos experimentado al examinar su fiel, al par que brillante traduccion; y en cuanto a la dificil tentativa de los asonantes ingleses, nos sorpende que el Senor Mac-Carthy haya podido sacar tanto parido, si se considera la indole peculiar de los dos idiomas".

Extracts from Letters addressed to the Author.

From Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Esq.

Cambridge, near Boston, America, April 29, 1862.

"I thank you very much for your new work in the vast and flowery fields of Calderon. It is, I think, admirable; and presents the old Spanish dramatist before the English reader in a very attractive light.

"Particularly in the most poetical pa.s.sages you are excellent; as, for instance, in the fine description of the gerfalcon and the heron in 'El Mayor Encanto'.--11 Jor.

"Your previous volumes I have long possessed and highly prized; and I hope you mean to add more and more, so as to make the translation as nearly complete as a single life will permit. It seems rather appalling to undertake the whole of so voluminous a writer. Nevertheless, I hope you will do it. Having proved that you can, perhaps you ought to do it.

This may be your appointed work. It is a n.o.ble one.

"With much regard, I am, etc., "HENRY W. LONGFELLOW.

"Denis Florence Mac-Carthy, Esq.".