Jean de La Fontaine: Fables
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Authors
Pirie, Gordon
Issue Date
2008
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This book presents several surprises. First, I am surprised to discover, fifteen years later, yet another translator of La Fontaine. Secondly, I believe that this is our collection's first book printed in Jordan. Thirdly, it is quite unusual for a bilingual book to offer its readings entirely first in one language and then entirely in another. Here, all 37 fables are first presented in English. Fourthly, it is unusual for a shorter book like this to have two introductory elements written by different authors other than the translator himself. Finally, it is surprising to have a book of translations that lists not its translator but its foreword-writer on the cover! I enjoyed reading several of Pirie's first fables. GA involves some fascinating decisions by the translator, starting with the commitment to rhymed quatrains in abab form. Pirie presents the female grasshopper's request well, I find, but makes the ant masculine and his him looking her up and down. Their final interchange misses for me one element from both. "A tout venant" gets lost: the grasshopper was singing for listeners, as La Fontaine does in these fables. The ant's reply of "you'd better dance instead" weakens the French imperative "Dansez maintenant." FC is as lively and quick as the original. One wonders again why "Monsieur le Corbeau" has become female and whether it is good for the fox to disparage the cawing of other crows. The fast movement of the fable through its final elements is, I believe, well done. Again in TMCM, Pirie is able to match La Fontaine's quick movement. He preserves the anonymity of the intruder, as does La Fontaine. He puts together well the rejection-speech of Timmy-Willie to Johnny Town-Mouse. I will look to Pirie the next time I need La Fontaine translations!
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Hesperus Press
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13451 (Access ID)