66 66 "It was the turn political affairs took that made me relinquish the work. At one time the flame was expected to "break out over all Italy, but it only "ended in smoke, and my poem went 66 out with it. I don't wonder at the en"thusiasm of the Italians about Dante. "He is the poet of liberty. Persecution, "exile, the dread of a foreign grave, could "not shake his principles. There is no "Italian gentleman, scarcely any well-edu"cated girl, that has not all the finer passages of Dante at the fingers' ends,particularly the Ravennese. The Guiccioli, for instance, could almost repeat 66 any part of the Divine Comedy;' and, "I dare say, is well read in the Vita Nuova,' that prayer-book of love. 66 " is unfavourable to writing, from its su"periority to all possible compositions. "Whether he be the first or not, he is certainly the most untranslatable of all "poets. You may give the meaning; “but the charm, the simplicity—the clas"sical simplicity,-is lost. You might as "well clothe a statue, as attempt to trans"late Dante. He is better, as an Italian said, 'nudo che vestito.' 66 66 "There's Taafe is not satisfied with what Carey has done, but he must be "traducing him too. What think you of "that fine line in the Inferno' being ren dered, as Taafe has done it ? I Mantuan, capering, squalid, squalling.' "There's alliteration and inversion enough, surely! I have advised him to frontis 66 piece his book with his own head, Capo "di Traditore, the head of a traitor; then "will come the title-page comment "Hell!" I asked Lord Byron the meaning of a passage in 'The Prophecy of Dante.' He laughed, and said: "I suppose I had some meaning when "I wrote it: I believe I understood it then." * "If you insist on grammar, though I never think about it in a heat Don Juan, Canto VII. Stanza 42. "I don't pretend that I quite understand My own meaning when I would be very fine." That," said I, "is what the disciples of Swedenberg say. There are many people who do not understand passages in your writings, among our own countrymen: I wonder how foreigners contrive to translate them." 66 "And yet," said he, "they have been translated into all the civilized, and many uncivilized tongues. Several of "them have appeared in Danish, Polish, "and even Russian dresses. These last, "being translations of translations from "the French, must be very diluted. The 'greatest compliment ever paid me has "been shewn in Germany, where a trans"lation of the Fourth Canto of 'Childe "Harold' has been made the subject of a 66 66 University prize. But as to obscurity, "is not Milton obscure? How do you 66 explain Smoothing The raven down of darkness till it smiled!' "Is it not a simile taken from the elec 66 'tricity of a cat's back? I'll leave you "to be my commentator, and hope you "will make better work with me than "Taafe is doing with Dante, who perhaps "could not himself explain half that vo"lumes are written about, if his ghost 66 were to rise again from the dead. I am sure I wonder he and Shakspeare have "not been raised by their commentators long ago!" People are always advising me," said "he, "to write an epic. You tell me |
