1718. EBB to Robert Shelton Mackenzie
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 9, 144–145.
50 Wimpole Street
17 Sept. 1844.
Dear Sir
If you think it necessary to mention the translation, I will not oppose it obstinately,—although, being the work of twelve days, printed without a name & never advertised nor reviewed, few persons, I believe, ever heard of it, & still fewer ever read it. To prove to you how thoroughly I repudiate & am ashamed of it, I will tell you that I have half finished a new version of the same tragedy, [1] in order to wipe off the blot on my poetical escutcheon. I love poetry too well & Æschylus too reverently, not to see as clearly as you must see, if you know the version, all its stiffness, baldness, coldness, & general inadequacy. But my object was a wrong one .. the attainment of a literal rendering, .. besides the immaturity of power. The only review which noticed the attempt, was I think the “Gentleman’s”—& I think it was, there, recommended to the junior idle scholar as a literal-translation-cramming book. [2] Inglorious glory! But the version is in fact, tolerably close & accurate,—&, for the rest, intolerable.
As to scholastic & anonymous matters, I do not know whether such a trifle as my papers “On the ‘Greek Christian Poets’[”] which appeared in the Athenæum of either last year or the year before (I fancy last year) would meet your purpose to hear of. [3] They are in plain prose, with poetical translations from the poets, & are without my name, .. but they drew some attention, & have been referred to in general reviews of my writings–
I thank you much for what you kindly & encouragingly say of America,—& indeed the Americans have been very kind to me, & not only at New York & I felt it to be a kind as well as honorable concession when a New York bookseller [4] agreed to print in the best types & paper (paying for the privelege) a work which might be snatched out of his hand by the bookseller next door & printed as a tract. For if they took liberties with your ‘Titian,’ [5] dear Sir, you must consider the state of the copyright there, & how the trade is surrounded by temptations to piracy, & undefended in its attempts at honesty. In fact, if the wrong is to English authors, the ruin is to American authors, who behold themselves superseded at their own hearthstones.
I am taking a great liberty in writing more than a simple answer to your questions—I return to them.
It gave me too much pleasure to receive Mr Leigh Hunt’s gracious praise, for me to object to your referring to it. [6] I was born in the county of Durham, but spent the greater part of my life, & from my infancy, at Hope End, Herefordshire, close to Malvern– As to dates, I never could remember one in my life—I am constantly forgetting the Annus Domini, & doubting myself into the middle ages. I am afraid I must be past thirty by three or four years [7] —but your readers will not care “too curiously to enquire” [8] which, .. and your “living authors” of the feminine gender, in general, will not, I fancy, on such a point, combine to afford you information of such unlimited frankness–
You will decide, as you see best, on the mention of the ‘Prometheus.’ I am ashamed of this abundance of light words, & beg to remain, dear Sir, with much esteem,
very faithfully yours
Elizabeth Barrett Barrett.
Publication: Studies in Bibliography, Vol. 14 (1961), pp. 247–248.
Manuscript: Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
1. EBB included this revised translation of “Prometheus Bound” in Poems (1850). In the advertisement of this edition, EBB stated: “One early failure, a translation of the Prometheus of Æschylus, which, though happily free of the current of publication, may be remembered against me by a few of my personal friends, I have replaced by an entirely new version, made for them and my conscience, in expiation of a sin of my youth, with the sincerest application of my mature mind.”
2. The Gentleman’s Magazine for June 1833 (pp. 610–611) reviewed EBB’s translation of Prometheus Bound. The reviewer stated “that every reader of the Prometheus, who wants a crib-book, would do well to bind up this translation with the Greek text, in lieu of the literal prose Latin or English versions usually put into the hands of their pupils by teachers of the March-of-Intellect æra.” A brief comment on this work appeared in The Athenæum during the same month (for the text of this review, see vol. 3, p. 338).
3. “Some Account of the Greek Christian Poets” was published in four issues of The Athenæum, beginning 26 February 1842.
4. i.e., Henry G. Langley (see letter 1640).
6. See SD825.1, vol. 3.
7. EBB was born 6 March 1806.
8. Cf. Hamlet, V, 1, 206.
___________________
