| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Professor by Charlotte Bronte: aristocratic brains, form of the sort of moral kicking I have,
ready packed in my carpet-bag, destined to be presented to you
immediately on my arrival.
"Meantime I know all about your affairs, and have just got
information, by Brown's last letter, that you are said to be on
the point of forming an advantageous match with a pursy, little
Belgian schoolmistress--a Mdlle. Zenobie, or some such name.
Won't I have a look at her when I come over! And this you may
rely on: if she pleases my taste, or if I think it worth while
in a pecuniary point of view, I'll pounce on your prize and bear
her away triumphant in spite of your teeth. Yet I don't like
The Professor |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Apology by Xenophon: inquire into and learn every good thing in my power? And that I
laboured not in vain, what more conclusive evidence than the fact that
so many of my fellow-citizens who make virtue their pursuit, and many
strangers also, choose my society in preference to that of others?[33]
And how are we to explain the fact that though all know well enough
that I am wholly unable to repay them in money, so many are eager to
present me with some gift?[34] And what do you make of this--while no
one dreams of dunning me for benefits conferred, hosts of people
acknowledge debts of gratitude to myself? And what of this, that
during the siege,[35] while others were pitying themselves[36] I lived
in no greater straits than when the city was at the height of her
The Apology |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: often be compelled to substitute one for another, or to paraphrase them,
not giving word for word, but diffusing over several words the more
concentrated thought of the original. The Greek of Plato often goes beyond
the English in its imagery: compare Laws, (Greek); Rep.; etc. Or again the
modern word, which in substance is the nearest equivalent to the Greek, may
be found to include associations alien to Greek life: e.g. (Greek),
'jurymen,' (Greek), 'the bourgeoisie.' (d) The translator has also to
provide expressions for philosophical terms of very indefinite meaning in
the more definite language of modern philosophy. And he must not allow
discordant elements to enter into the work. For example, in translating
Plato, it would equally be an anachronism to intrude on him the feeling and
|
