The translation The one that reads as if english were his native

My personal recommendations

Notes from Underground: Katz
Crime and Punishment: Ready
The Idiot: Myers
Demons: Katz
The Brothers K: Avsey

For Dante, Binyon for poetry and Sinclair for prose.

Every single day

>>9942457
don't and i mean DON'T read the fucking Divina Commedia in translation
just accept the fact that you're a fucking monolingual anglo pleb and enjoy exploring the vast landscape of english literature
but don't (and i mean DON'T) read poetry in translation
NEVER

>>9942475
Maybe someone should add translation comparisons (not just an opinion, but full page comparisons) in the Sticky.
Translations makes the whole book.

>>9942469
Does Sinclair use "ye" instead of "you"?
Would want it to be written in modern English.

>>9942500
I'm (((Swedish))).
Thereby bilingual, and I'm not gonna read it in fucking Swedish.

>>9942509
He does, get singleton then

I want to know who translates the great French playwrites the best. Molière, Corneille, and Racine (though he's apparently "untranslatable." Je ne sais pas le Français.)

>>9942457

>reading poetry in translation

What's the fucking point?
The plot?

>>9942547
but
>>9942500
says
>thou shan't peruse poetry :^/

>>9942574
If you want to know what happens in the divine comedy, and you dont speak medieval italian, then

>>9942581

Here's what you do idiot
you buy a dual language version
original italian on the left page, english on the right
then you read the italian outloud and then read the english to see what the fuck you just said, then you read the italian again
and by the end you might even have a slight understanding of italian

>>9942500
How do you know whether he is monolingual?
Maybe he doesn't know Russian, but he knows French, Italian and Japanese?

>>9942566
>The plot?
Yes. Exactly.
I read this somewhere:
>Abandon all hope, you who enter here.
I used to know which translation it was.
Most translations uses "ye" or "every" instead of "all". It just feels pretentious to write "ye", and "every hope" is not fucking propah English.

>>9942590
So Robert Pinsky's translation?

>>9942604

Ye/thou/whomst et cetera is not exactly pretentious it depends on what you are trying to do I think it's perfectly appropriate for a sign over the gates of hell it's supposed to sound imposing and serious which antiquated English does to moderns

File: VwPhA8Q.jpg (867KB, 1400x5316px) Image search: [Google]

867KB, 1400x5316px

I'm keen towards Mandelbaum, the everyman's edition

>>9942604
i think there's a slight difference between ye and you, where the former would be "you all" and the latter "you specifically"

inb4 that one fag autistically screeches undying dedication to the "literally who" Esolen

>>9942604

>Abandon all hope, you who enter here

That sounds corny, it's too individualized. Sounds like some kind of protestant pleb experience of hell, like you are about to walk into a halloween fun house.

>Abandon all hope, ye who enter here

THIS sounds legit.
It sounds fucking universal.

>>9942616
Yes, it was Hollander that I read parts of.
But Pinsky seems to be most like Hollander, but apparently he only translated Inferno, as of today.
Guess I can get his Inferno but the others of Hollander's.
>>9942626
>>9942620
Perhaps...
John Ciardi?

>But what about Don Quixote!?

>>9942743
Grossman if you have money
Ormsby if you don't

>>9942457
DFW (the demigod of /lit/) thought Garnett was garbage. Would you betray your savior?

>>9942752
>When Grossman is 29 bucks.
>And Ormsby is 30
>For hardcover.

>>9942762
Dfw didnt know anything about russian translation. Russian scholars have always praised garnett's work. For example, Ralph matlaw was going to do his own brothers k but then decided he couldnt do better than garnett so instead just did a revision of her translation. Gary saul morson wrote an essay tearing down p&v and praising garnett. She's old-fashioned and very English, but good overall.

>>9942515

What do you mean by using those brackets like that?

>>9942778
So this?
https://www.amazon.com/Notes-Underground-Inquisitor-Fyodor-Dostoyevsky/dp/0452285585
Is best?
How well a revision of her translation is it?
Allegedly, Garnett used words, or grammar, that wasn't proper English syntax.

>>9942781
Sweden being (purportedly) a joke country.

>>9942500

what if I read it in French, since it ressembles Italian, side by side with the original?

>>9942777
Ormsby is free in eform

>>9942796
I wasnt recommending matlaw or saying hes the best. Hes just an example of a russian scholar who liked garnett. Personally I was turned off by matlaw's notes as soon as I got to the word "beans." I'm not a russian scholar so who knows if that's a reasonable reaction, but it turned me off. I recommend katz for notes.

>>9942806

I've never heard that before about Sweden, nor that meaning behind those brackets. Certainly not on this wretched site

>>9942457
Constance Garnett is great, probably my favourite. P&V is also good.

>>9942500
>>9942566
>literature board
>people literally telling you not to read

>>9942509
>Translations makes the whole book.
Not really. I've read abysmal translations and enjoyed them quite a lot, because not every writer is Joyce or Pynchon.

>>9942590
If he doesn't speak Italian how is he supposed to read it out loud?

Mother of fuck, this board is dumb.

>>9942811
Owning a physical copy of a book is 30% of the dopamine I'll get out of it.

>>9942828
oh
might as get Grossman then. Its the most critically acclaimed afaik but that might just be hype because its the most recent one

Ormsby is better than grossman. Get the "restless classics" edition that came out not too long ago, if you want a physical copy. Grossman is a hype translation, Ormsby is a classic.

>>9942616
The whole problem with that pic is it doesn't properpy compare the work to the original italian.
If it did you'd understand that both free verse ones are cancerous and lose meaning for no good reason.
To exemplify with the opening line, to translate 'ché la via diritta era smarrita', che meaning that for just about all purposes and every now and then because, la being the, via being path, diritta meaning correct, straight, right, era roughly being was, smarrita being lost, it can be rought directly translated to 'that the right path had been lost'. Instead, Mandelbaum gives us 'for I had lost the path that does not stray'. This has several problems that are just idiotic. The original says that the right path was lost rather than lost to Dante to generalize the position he was in. Also translating 'the straight path' to 'the path that does not stray' is bad taste and might lead to incorrect interpretations. But hey, it's blank verse, so it passes.
The Free verse one jarrs me for translating 'me ritrovai' as 'I came to myself', when it's closer to 'I found myself'.

>>9942852
you should make a new chart then, you seem to know what you're talking about

>>9942814
Unfortunately I can't find Katz translation on the site that I order books from.
>>9942836
Everyday I may rise and see these glorious stacked arrays of great works, and then bring visitors to marvel at my collection. One day, my very own library.
>>9942849
Let it be so.
>>9942852
Hollander and Pinsky confirmed for best translations?

>>9942876
Katz is the norton critical edition, if that helps

>>9942880
aha!

>>9942876
>Everyday I may rise and see these glorious stacked arrays of great works, and then bring visitors to marvel at my collection. One day, my very own library.
thats cool unless you're a faggot and don't read them

>>9942553
Anyone?

>>9943038
Just get whatever is published by "Oxford".

>>9942457
The Dante's translation to Italian

>>9942762
P&V say Garnett was the best Russian translator. Who would you believe? Award winning translators or some English teacher?

File: malcolm_2-062316.jpg (1MB, 1600x2248px) Image search: [Google]

1MB, 1600x2248px

>>9943102
Oh, and I would just like to clarify, Garnett had a team who worked for her and did a lot of rough translations that she revised and improved upon. It wasn't a one man (woman) job.

Barely relevant, but Douglas Hofstadter wrote a wonderful book on literary translation titled Le Ton beau de Marot.

>>9942457
just read garnett C & P... it was excellent

>>9942752
avoid grossman at all costs... buy the rutherford penguin version

File: don-quixote[1].jpg (11KB, 201x320px) Image search: [Google]

11KB, 201x320px

>>9943186
Is this Rutherford?
Anyone know?

>>9943186
why

>>9943281
when i undertook Quixote last year i did extensive research comparing the main translations... rutherford retained the most comedy- i was laughing out loud- and while grossman isnt unreadable it just doesnt come off right reading Quixote in millenial english. i felt grossman was tedious and the jokes didnt land as well...

in all honesty just read the book in whatever translation you can get your hands on- its a very important work

>>9943453
What about Tobias Smollett?
It apparently keep all jokes.