PREFACE.
In laying before the British public an English reproduction
of such a poem as Faust, the author of
this translation is quite aware, that he is venturing
upon a very hazardous undertaking. In a work of
such depth of feeling, and variety of delineation, the
vehement overboiling of youthful enthusiasm, is in as
great danger of going beyond the mark, as the correct
chasteness of a taste, formed on mere French and
Italian models, is of falling within it. A man may
be sweet with Petrarch, and brilliant with Voltaire,
and yet be very unfit to sympathize with the many-sided
nature of Goethe. The consciousness of the
difficulty of the task would, long since, have deterred
me from attempting it, had not a secret and deep-felt
sympathy unconsciously drawn me on, and had I not
been encouraged in my first attempts by the favourable
opinion of a friend, of whose sincerity I could
have as little reason to doubt, as I was perfectly convinced
of his fitness to pronounce a judgment on such
a subject.
I am prefectly aware how very far any thing, that
I can produce, must always fall beneath what a translation
of Faust ought, according to my ideas, to be.
But we might wait long enough before an English
Goethe should arise, who would be fitted to do perfect
justice to such a work; and, in the mean time,
if the present attempt shall but serve to draw public
attention, in some degree, to what still remains to be
done in the wide domain of German literature, I shall
have had my reward. The honesty of my intentions
will be a sufficient excuse for their apparent presumption;
and whatever the judgment of severe critics
may be, I shall still be able to plead, in the language
of my poetical master—
“So treib's ein jeder wie er kann,
Ein kleiner Mann ist auch Ein Mann.”
With those who have preceded me in this career,
I enter into a friendly rivalry, not an envious competition.
That man has very little ground to stand
upon, who must first trip up the heels of his neighbour,
in order to get a footing; and it sounds more
like quackery than true science to trumpet forth the
value of one's own productions, by declaiming against
the merits of those who have gone before us.
It is for these reasons that I have purposely abstained
from all mention of former translations, either
in the notes, or in the introductory remarks. My
own translation was made altogether independently
of any of them;—it was to me a re-echoing of a solemn
sound, that had long been vibrating in my inmost
soul, and become very part and parcel of my
intellectual existence. I might, therefore, in all honesty,
have subjected my predecessors to a rigid
criticism, and exposed what I conceived to be their
errors; but would it have been just, would it have
been honourable, to do so, while I refrained from all
mention of their excellencies, and those useful hints,
which he who follows can never fail to receive, either
directly or indirectly, from the labours of those who
have preceded him?
To the public at large, it is my duty to state the
principle on which this Translation is formed, and
the manner in which it has been executed.
The great principle on which the excellence of a
poetical translation depends, seems to be, that it
should not be a mere transposing, but a recasting, of
the original. On this principle, it has been my first
and chief endeavour to make my Translation spirited
—to seize, if possible, the very soul and living
power of the German, rather than to give a careful
and anxious transcription of every individual line, or
every minute expression. A poetical translator must,
to a certain extent, aspire to the honour of original
composition. He must stand on his own feet, and flap
his own wings, else will his motions never fail to be
stiff and artificial, and give any thing but a true
idea of the living spring of the original; with this
proviso, however, that, though each motion be his
own, it preserve spontaneously a complete sympathy
and harmony with each motion of the author, whose
work he endeavours to reproduce. A man may make
a stuffed bird the same in every feather, in every tint,
as the natural bird from which it is copied; but the
question always comes to be, Is it alive?
I make these remarks by the way of protest against
those petty verbal criticasters, who seem to think that
a translation is made for no other purpose than to
enable them to bring to light their linguistical lore,
in pointing out how each individual word of the original
differs from each individual word of the translation.
I hope, however, that the critics of philosophy
and of feeling will not find my Translation wanting
even in that minute accuracy which the reverence
due to such a genius as Goethe demands. At least,
I am conscious to myself of having wrestled with an
honest persevering striving, to give, as far as possible,
an exact transcript of the expression, style, and measure,
as well as of the spirit of the original. Indeed
these two things are so intimately connected, that,
like soul and body, they cannot be separated; only
we must beware of falling into poetical materialism,
by making the spirit bend to the form, instead of allowing
the matter to be kneaded and moulded into
shape, by the plastic power of the indwelling spirit.
With regard to the versification, I am afraid many
of my readers may be inclined to say of it, as the
Edinburgh Reviewer said of Sir Walter Scott's Lay,
that it is “in the highest degree irregular and capricious.”
So far as concerns the measure of the original,
I can say, with the whole of Germany, that it is in
the highest degree beautiful and harmonious, and must
appear so to every one, whose musical perception
has not been lulled asleep by the sing-song of the
Popian couplet. Measure is the flexible clothing,
not the clogging fetter, of the poet's song,—it waves
and folds itself in sympathetic obedience to every
motion of his inward man; and, as he is no orator
who makes as little distinction in the intonation of
the different parts of an oration, as a child does when
repeating his catechism, so he understands but poorly
the nature of verse, who does not know that every
feeling and passion, every swelling and falling of
every feeling, has as necessarily its own peculiar and
only proper measure, as every sentence has its peculiar
intonation. But after the examples which Scott
and Southey, Wordsworth and Coleridge, have set
before us in this regard, I think it unnecessary to
detain the reader with any lengthened apology for
the peculiar versification of Goethe's Faust.
I need only state, that I have, except in a very few
cases, faithfully followed the measure of the original;
and, in so far as it is possible in a Translation, endeavoured
to echo back the tones of the Goethian harp.
This, however, is the most trying point of all; and I
beg of the English reader, if he finds the Poem unharmonious,
to lay all the blame on him, to whom alone it
belongs, and who is, at the same time, most willing to
bear it.
One thing I must mention to avoid misconception.
I have frequently, in imitation of the original, introduced
Alexandrines in situations, where, to the English
ear, they appear altogether uncalled for. I am
of opinion, however, that these long lines have a
peculiar beauty in giving a slow and easy undulation
to the verse, and varying the monotony of
the ten-syllabled lines. They are, accordingly, seldom
introduced by our Poet without cause; and
wherever they are manifestly intended to produce
the impression of slowness and ease, I have been
most scrupulous in retaining them. Thus, for instance,
in p. 34, the long line of my Translation,
“And see how down the stream the gay ships softly glide,”
is an exact imitation of the original:
“Und sieht den Fluss hinab die bunten Schiffe gleiten.”
And who is there so deaf to harmony, that does not
perceive instinctively the beauty of this versification?
The two lines spoken into Mephistopheles' ear, by
the old hag of the kitchen (p. 108) are long on the
same principle; and, though not always so distinctly
expressible, there is always an instinctive mental harmony,
that regulates the length of the lines in Goethe's
versification. Even when tortured through the crucible
of a translation, Goethe's measure still retains a
great portion of its wondrous music; and I shall be
much disappointed, indeed, if I have not been able to
convey some faint idea, even of this peculiar beauty,
to the English ear.
With regard to the mere mechanics of this Translation,
I have rhymed, because the original rhymes;
and because I cannot see how rhyme can be separated
from the aesthetical form of the poem. The difficulties,
which this peculiar mode of translation is
supposed to present, exist more in the indolence of
the Translator, than in the nature of the thing; and
a man who is in love with his work, will not be deterred
by a mere mechanical impediment, which a
little perseverance, and a little dexterity, will, in a
short time, altogether remove. Some rhymeless lines
the reader will find, here and there; for this procedure
I had peculiar reasons, known only to him who
has experienced the difficulty of producing a translation,
at once accurate, easy, and spirited.
A strong desire to give as close a transcript as
possible of the original, has also induced me, on one
or two occasions, to admit rhymes, which would have
been altogether inexcusable in the freedom of original
composition; but these impure rhymes will, I
hope, be found to be comparatively few, in proportion
to the length of the poem; and the reader may
be assured that they never occur, except from perhaps
an over-anxious striving to keep as nearly as
possible to the German text.
To attempt to imitate the double endings, whereever
they occur in the original, would shew a great
misconception of the capabilities of the two languages.
Lord Leveson Gower, whose powers of English versification
are, on many occasions, so favourably exhibited
in his translation of Faust, would, in my opinion,
have given a much better version, both of
the prologue-hymn, and of the dedication, had he
not imposed upon himself the necessity of repeating
the alternate trochaic rhymes of the original. Even
Shelley's exquisite translation of the above hymn,
has, I think, suffered somewhat from the same cause;
and, warned by these two examples, and in order to
give as literal a transcript as possible of this beautiful
piece of composition, I have retained the trochaic
ending of the first and third lines in these stanzas,
but only rhymed the second and fourth.
Having thus rendered an account of my stewardship,
I leave Goethe and myself, with all good cheer,
in the hands of a discriminating public. Let me not,
however, close these remarks, without returning publicly
my thanks to those learned and talented gentlemen,
who have assisted me with their advice and
encouragement in the prosecution of this work. I
am under especial obligations to Sir William Hamilton,
Bart., Professor
Wilson, and
George Moir,
Esq. Advocate, who have either revised my manuscript,
corrected my proofs, or furnished me with assistance
in collecting the Notes, which to such a poem
as Faust were indispensable: nor should I forget to
mention the names of Mr
Repp and Dr
Nachot,
whom I have consulted as to the meaning of some
German phrases, in regard to which I was doubtful;
—and last, not least, be my thanks paid to Mr
D.
Haig, Librarian of the Advocates' Library, who gave
me every facility in bringing to the light of day those
musty old tomes on the black art, of which I have
made so copious use in my notes.
J. S. B. Edinburgh, February 1834.