International Communication and Translation

I conceive it is a vulgar error in translating poets, to affect being fidus interpres... [for] poetry is of so subtile a spirit, that in the pouring out of one language into another, it will all evaporate; and if a new spirit be not added in the transfusion, there will remain nothing but a caput mortuum, there being certain graces and happinesses peculiar to every language, which give life and energy to the words... therefore if Virgil must needs speak English, it were fit he should speak not only as a man of this nation, but as [a] man of this age.

A good poet is no more like himself in a dull translation than his carcass would be to his living body.

It is frustrating to be translating other people's autobiographies whilst mine is lying unpublished, banned by the Home Office.