Newly Recovered English Classical Translations, 1600-1800
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Oxford University Press
Published:22nd Feb '18
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Newly Recovered English Classical Translations, 1600-1800 is a unique resource: a volume presenting for the first time a wide-ranging collection of never-before-printed English translations from ancient Greek and Latin verse and drama of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Transcribed and edited from surviving manuscripts, these translations open a window onto a period in which the full richness and diversity of engagement with classical texts through translation is only now becoming apparent. Upwards of 100 identified translators and many more anonymous writers are included, from familiar and sometimes eminent figures to the obscure and unknown. Since very few of them expected their work to be printed, these translators often felt free to experiment, innovate, or subvert established norms. Their productions thus shed new light on how their source texts could be read. As English verse they hold their ground remarkably well against the printed translations of the time, and regularly surpass them. The more than 300 translations included here, from epigrams to (selections from) epics, are richly informative about the reception of classical poetry and drama in this crucial period, copiously augmenting and sometimes challenging the narratives suggested by the more familiar record of printed translations. This edition will prove to have far-reaching implications for the history both of classical reception and of English translation - a phenomenon central to English literary endeavour for much of this era.
This book represents an extraordinary accumulation of scholarly labour and, as its contents are digested over the coming years, it will change our understanding of the reception of the poetry of antiquity in England during these centuries. * Paul Botley, International Journal of the Classical Tradition *
The groundbreaking book ... complements two related multivolume projects, The Oxford History of Literary Translation in English (OHLTE) and The Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature (OHCREL). ... This collection of newly recovered manuscript texts not only immediately alters the landscape of Classical translation studies, but also suggests that more (indeed, many more) manuscripts remain to be rediscovered. * John Jacobs, CJ-Online *
[Gillespie] is clearly an expert, and has published widely in this area [...]A prodigious amount of scholarly labour has gone into sourcing these manuscripts from far-flung libraries. The editing is of a high quality, especially the brief but useful biographical notes. Without obtruding, [Gillespie] gives us just enough context to appreciate the confident inventiveness of educated Englishmen (and some Scots) of this time, when the study of Greek and Latin formed pretty well the entire school and university curriculum. * Anthony Verity, Classics for All *
this is a book that reveals a hidden world, and Gillespie's editing and annotation are exemplary. Designed as a resource for scholars of literature and literary history, it happens also to be an enjoyable bed-side book. * Richard Jenkyns, Times Literary Supplement *
This book represents an extraordinary accumulation of scholarly labour and, as its contents are digested over the coming years, it will change our understanding of the reception of the poetry of antiquity in England during these centuries ... Gillespies work has now made this familiar landscape immeasurably more varied and complex * Paul Botley, International Journal of the Classical Tradition14/11/2018 *
ISBN: 9780198705574
Dimensions: 240mm x 160mm x 32mm
Weight: 1024g
544 pages