(no subject)
Affecting a bad British accent, an unshaven and altogether shabby looking Eldys stands behind his bedpost, situating himself as though he were preparing to lecture at a podium. Speaking into a peculiar statuette of a sailor made out of a coconut (a treasured gift from his sister purchased on one of her many vacations), he pretends to address the American Philological Association's NorthEastern Classicists Convention.
"I was reading through several of the more popular translations of Plato's Symposium earlier today, when I was struck by their overwhelming inadequacy as English representations of that master's brilliant Greek prose. Take the first line, for instance, wherein Apollodorus addresses his companions:
Doko moi peri hon punthanesthe ouk ameleteitos einai.
The contemporary C.J. Gill traslation renders this sentence as, 'In fact, I'm well prepared to answer your question,' whereas the older (and supposedly more literal) Loeb edition translated by W.L.R. Lamb gives us 'I believe I have got the story you inquire of pretty well by heart.' While each translation attempts to make Plato accessible to as wide an audience as possible in the English speaking world, the effect of their efforts is to dumb him down to the point where the diction and grace of his work is lost almost entirely. Let us not forget that Plato was, at his core, an elitist - he never expected the masses to understand his work, nor did he intend for them to; the whole of his political speculation is centered around the idea that in a perfect state a single, benevolent genius would have total control over everything. His sentences in the original Greek are invariably constructed with multiple clauses with the express intent of slowing the pace of literary digestion. In light of this, a more accurate translation of that first line would be 'It seems good to me, concerning that about which you all inquire, not to be unprepared.'"
Imagining uproarious applause at this analysis, he hardly notices the shouts from the other room imploring him to be shut up and clean the kitchen, where he had recently prepared a fantastic (but largely unappreciated) vegan farfalle alfredo (or, as he insists on calling it whenever there is the slightest chance of anyone hearing him, "farfalle al' Eldys"). Five minutes and two slammed doors later, Eldys is washing dishes and scrubbing floors, now imagining himself to be a modern day Cinderella...
"I was reading through several of the more popular translations of Plato's Symposium earlier today, when I was struck by their overwhelming inadequacy as English representations of that master's brilliant Greek prose. Take the first line, for instance, wherein Apollodorus addresses his companions:
Doko moi peri hon punthanesthe ouk ameleteitos einai.
The contemporary C.J. Gill traslation renders this sentence as, 'In fact, I'm well prepared to answer your question,' whereas the older (and supposedly more literal) Loeb edition translated by W.L.R. Lamb gives us 'I believe I have got the story you inquire of pretty well by heart.' While each translation attempts to make Plato accessible to as wide an audience as possible in the English speaking world, the effect of their efforts is to dumb him down to the point where the diction and grace of his work is lost almost entirely. Let us not forget that Plato was, at his core, an elitist - he never expected the masses to understand his work, nor did he intend for them to; the whole of his political speculation is centered around the idea that in a perfect state a single, benevolent genius would have total control over everything. His sentences in the original Greek are invariably constructed with multiple clauses with the express intent of slowing the pace of literary digestion. In light of this, a more accurate translation of that first line would be 'It seems good to me, concerning that about which you all inquire, not to be unprepared.'"
Imagining uproarious applause at this analysis, he hardly notices the shouts from the other room imploring him to be shut up and clean the kitchen, where he had recently prepared a fantastic (but largely unappreciated) vegan farfalle alfredo (or, as he insists on calling it whenever there is the slightest chance of anyone hearing him, "farfalle al' Eldys"). Five minutes and two slammed doors later, Eldys is washing dishes and scrubbing floors, now imagining himself to be a modern day Cinderella...