How important is the translation selected for a fine press book?

Over time in this group and in others I have noticed scattered references to the question of translation (from a non-English original to English) when it comes to fine press books. I’m curious how important translation quality and selection is to members of this group when they purchase or evaluate editions, whether from Easton Press or other fine book presses.

My own fine press book purchases tend to be older books (pre-20th-c), in which case a translation can make a big difference. For example, I was willing to replace Easton Press’s beautiful 1976 edition of Zola’s Nana (a huge book bound in sky blue leather with a lovely text block and illustrations from a 1948 George Macy edition) for Franklin Library’s less glamorous, but still pretty, 1981 edition. The reason was translation: FL used George Holden’s 1972 translation, whereas EP used Ernest Alfred Vizetelly’s translation from the 1890s. Not only is the language more archaic, but Vizetelly bowdlerized some of the racier parts of the novel in an effort to evade British obscenity laws.

My reason for trading a very pretty for just a pretty book is that I thought the reading experience would be inferior if I went with the older translation. For this same reason I avoid the FL, EP, and Folio Society editions of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky—they all use the 19th-c Garnett or Maude translations (the latest FS edition of War and Peace is an exception). Likewise with the EP/FL Aeneid and Plutarch. By contrast, a company like Arion Press seems anxious to advertise the hipness of the translations they use, sometimes working closely with the translator for their special editions (with very special prices).

But I realize that not everyone feels this way. For some collectors, an especially beautiful exterior makes up for an archaic translation. Perhaps, for some people, a text with an archaic feel is what they’re looking for in a fine press book? I notice, for example, that for its DLE collection Easton Press sometimes flaunts the fact that it is using an older translation, as with Tristan and Iseult and The Count of Monte Cristo. These translations tend to sound clunky to 21st-c ears, but maybe for some collectors that gives the book a sense of authenticity?

However, I have noticed that translation selection does sometimes affect selling price on the secondary market. EP’s editions of Greek literature/history/philosophy featuring 19th-c translations tend to sell for only a fraction of the price of their editions featuring modern, post-WWII translations.

>1 Eumnestes: I have limited edition of FS Aeneid and it has modern translation by Robert Fagles. So get FS limited edition if you scan afford secondary market prices.

>1 Eumnestes: for me, critical.

But it is very dependent upon the particular work and translation. For some works, I prefer older translations, for others new.

For example, I prefer the Garnett translations of Dostoevsky over P&V. But John Wood's translations of Thomas Mann's works are an improvement over the earlier translations.

I didn't buy the Folio Master & Margarita because I much prefer the Glenny translation.

For Nietzsche, I prefer Hollingdale, though Kaufmann is okay. The recent Folio edition of Zarathustra uses a new translation, by Parkes from just a few years ago, which is actually quite good. Thomas Common's translation, unfortunately, was what the Limited Editions Club used, and it is not good, so despite the nice printing and binding, I have no interest.

The recent Rabelais Folio LE uses a new translation, which is supposedly pretty good (though I haven't read it yet).

For Cervantes, both Ormsby (old) and Grossman (new) are good, but there's another commonly used translation (name escapes me at the moment) that I don't care for.

Kafka has had a number of new translations over the past 30 or so years, but none of them have improved on Willa and Edwin Muir from what I have read (which is most of them, I think). This preference might partly be nostalgia, I admit.

>1 Eumnestes:
Translations are a subject of frequent disagreements on this and other forums. Some members want a 19th century book to sound 19th-centurish while others prefer it to be modernized. Personally, I pay a lot of attention to “experts” when I can find reliable reviews.

One thing I won’t tolerate is a translation that leaves out or rewrites significant portions of the text to satisfy “Victorian sensibilities,” and very many of the late 19th century translators did exactly that. Unfortunately, EP loves to use those translations either because they are free and in the public domain or because many of their reproductions contain numerous and often splendid illustrations. In several instances I have purchased these reproductions just for the illustrations but read the novel in an unabridged translation from Folio Society or some other publisher.

>1 Eumnestes: I do not have the linguistic education to tell what is a superior translation since I cannot read original languages.

With respect to Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, I have read the translations of the Maude sisters (must be OK if Mortimer Adler approves it), Constance Garnett, and revised Garnett (With EP revisions) but not the new Russian translators P&V (which may have the Oprah effect). Here is a review of the various translations of War and Peace. I enjoyed my multiple reads of War and Peace but have no motivation to try Briggs because I did not find either of my two reads an unsatisfying experience; in short I do not know what I am missing. https://www.tolstoytherapy.com/best-translation-war-and-peace/

How about Les Miserables? Well I read the Hugo approved translation (Wraxlar) in the Famous Edition reprint of the LEC edition as well as the Routledge 5 volume edition with the unknown translator Joseph L. Blamire. Could not discern any difference. My preference was the DLE because I was mesmerized by the 300+ illustrations and I found the DLE physically easier to read.

The same with Count of Monte Cristo. I equally enjoyed the Famous Edition (now part of the EP 100 with no stated translator) and the 5 volume Routledge DLE translated by Joseph L. Blamire. My preference is the DLE because it is physically easier to read and has a whopping 500 illustrations!

My only experience comparing two editions outright paragraph by paragraph was Eugene Sue’s massive Mysteries of Paris:
1. Chapman and Hall first English translation with 700 illustrations.
2. Penguin classics 2015 paperback edition translated by Carolyn Betensky and Jonathan Loesberg with no illustrations.
I was shocked to learn that my Chapman and Hall edition was heavily censored and edited to appeal to Victorian morals. My preference was the modern Penguin translation.

Luckily I have the fabulous Franklin edition of Zola’s Nana. I read the Folio Society Balzac, which I found racy. So I must have read the correct translation, right?

>5 HugoDumas: I thought that you can read in Russian.

Very important for me. I try to sample different translations and pick the one that is best for me. That being said, any translation that is noted for cutting out part of the text or changing it beyond translation needs is a definite no.

>7 RRCBS: how do you sample different translations to pick which one is best for you?

>2 fancythings: Yes, I have seen pictures of this edition, both on this forum and on ebay, Abe's books, etc. It looks absolutely stunning. And the Fagles translation is really solid.

>9 Eumnestes: I loved it. It gave me great reading pleasure

>3 abysswalker: These are really interesting distinctions you're making among translations. I haven't read Wood's Mann, only the 1927 Lowe-Porter (Easton Press, 1999--really nice edition). But the Lowe-Porter still reads fresh and modern to me. I do prefer the McDuff Dostoyevsky over Garnett, having read both. I've only read Kaufmann's Nietzsche, so it sounds like I should give the Parks Folio edition a look, if I can find an affordable copy.

Rabelais has luckily not posed a translation issue for me, since FL has a beautiful 1978 edition with the serviceable translation by John Cohen and illustrations by Walter Brooks, who also did the great illustrations for Franklin's Iliad and Odyssey.

Looking at what I've just written, I think what I'm looking for in a translation is a reasonably modern tone and idiom. Not contemporary slang, but modern-sounding enough that it approximates in English what the original audience experienced in another language when the book was published. I suspect that's why I would prefer most modern translations of Cervantes to Ormsby's version, fantastic Victorian translator though he may have been.

>5 HugoDumas: Well, when it comes to Russian, I do not have linguistic expertise either. I can only go by how the various translations read to me and what Russian-speaking experts say about them. Garnett and the Maudes sound different, to my ears, from P&V, McDuff, and Briggs; they sound like late-Victorians and Edwardians sounded. This does not mean that they sound bad; it's just not what I'm after in a Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky translation. But, different ears, different sound.

I'm sure that you're right: cases exist where a late-19th-c translation does not sound all that different from an English translation done in the 50s. And I should confess that there are fine press books I wanted enough that I make do with early 20th-c translations, such as Easton Press's Interpretation of Dreams.

Glad you have the Franklin Nana; I don't have the FS Balzac, but I have a charming 1978 FL Pere Goriot. Not sure I'll read it, though: the translation is by Jane Minot Sedgewick, 1897.