Tag: Chaucer

Nowruz Mubarak! Announcing Chaucer’s Persian Translation

by Candace Barrington

I’ve been sitting on this announcement for a few weeks so that I could make it on Nowruz, the Persian new year. I simply could not resist the proximity in 2024 of Nowruz, Ramadan, and “Whan-that-Aprill” Day.

Alireza Mahdipour’s 2023 translation of The Canterbury Tales

After many years of diligent translation following by years of patience, Alireza Mahdipour’s complete translation of The Canterbury Tales has been published by Cheshmeh, an Iranian publishing house known for its editions of both contemporary Iranian authors and translated global authors.

Without a doubt, Mahdipour’s massive undertaking is a milestone in Chaucer’s international reception.

In the opening lines of the General Prologue, Mahdipour evokes the wonders of spring’s arrival: “In the spring, the breath of the rain came down / to the dry soil of England and washed it until the / root was clean…./ Eid has come….” (my back translation using Google translate).

Mahdipour’s essay, “The Translator Writes Back,” was featured in a 2018 special issue of Literature Compass, Chaucer’s Global Compaignye. As Jonathan Hsy and I describe in our editors’ introduction, His essay reflects on translation’s potential to reveal affinities between Chaucerian mentalities and facets of contemporary Iranian culture. Rather than associating Iran with a pejorative sense of the term “medieval,” Mahdipour’s work attends to rich continuities in social and religious frameworks in Iranian culture that mitigate the apparently radical alterity of the past. In bridging the gap between Chaucer’s environment and contemporary Iranian cultural frameworks, Mahdipour eschews the impulse to produce a prose translation and crafts a poetic idiom that is simultaneously Chaucerian and Persian. Without overtly making a claim for shared sources, Mahdipour argues that similarities between medieval English culture and aspects of modern Persian society contribute to the vitality of his translation. The most significant parallels are found in the circumstances shared by Mahdipour’s and Chaucer’s pilgrim-narrator: both found themselves traveling in a group, free “from social, official, occupational, and even familial bonds, [and] eager for the freedom of speech and expression” otherwise denied them. As Mahdipour explains, Chaucerian sensibilities so dovetailed with Iranian ones that his audiences learned he was reciting a translation “only when we came to foreign elements such as ‘Caunterbury,’ ‘Tabard,’ and ‘Southwerk.’ ”

If you’ve been fortunate to visit the Bodleian Library’s “Chaucer: Here and Now” exhibit, you’d would have seen a copy on display with other translations.

My copy of the Mahdipour’s translation took a circuitous route to Connecticut. Because Alireza was unable to ship it directly to me from Iran, he enlisted the help of a former student, Raziyeh J, who now lives in Ottawa but was visiting Iran at the end of the year. She brought it back to Canada and then mailed it to me. Whew! Another fine Chaucerian pilgrimage!

I look forward to working with Raziyeh in the near future as she helps me understand what Mahdipour’s translation can teach us.

Troilus and Criseyde in Afrikaans: Progress Report

by Candace Barrington

One of the joys of each new year is receiving updates from friends, especially our Global Chaucers colleagues. This year, most of the translators we work with relayed that they are working on new projects, generally outside of Chaucer and medieval literature. John Boje, Chaucer’s Afrikaans translator in Pretoria, South Africa, wrote with slightly different news: he has begun translating Troilus and Criseyde. At the end of December 2023, he had translated 715 of the poem’s 1171 stanzas, and he projects completing the translation by October 2024.

I’m proud to possess number 16 of 20 copies of Die Pelgrimsverhale van Geoffrey Chaucer, his translation 60 years in the making. I’m also pleased that he continues to translate.

When he translates into Afrikaans, he allows us to see what Chaucer’s language might have looked and sounded like if William of Normandy had stayed home in 1066.

Most of all, his insights into translation as well as Chaucer’s Middle English text have been invaluable in my own thinking. I’m eager to learn what he has to teach us about T&C.

He has shared with me the proem to T&C Book II, from which I now share a bit with you.

      Daarom verwag ek ook nie blaam of dank
      vir hierdie werk, maar ek wil nederig vra
      om verskoon te word indien my woorde mank
      voorkom – ek volg maar net my bronteks na. (II.15-18)

Wherfore I nyl have neither thank ne blame
Of al this werk, but prey yow mekely,    
Disblameth me if any word be lame,    
For as myn auctour seyde, so sey I.     .

I like thinking of John, working in his Pretoria garden abloom with hyacinths, agapanthus, dahlias and amaryllis, letting the pleasure of his work provide the reward “vir hierdie werk.”

Chaucer Here and Now: New exhibit at the Bodleian Library

by Candace Barrington

Detail of a modified medieval woodcut illustration of Chaucer's pilgrims seated around a table. The tabletop and pilgrims are in shades of yellow set against bright lime green background.

by Candace Barrington

After the initial flurry of publicity announcing the Bodleian Library’s Chaucer: Here and Now exhibit, it seems fitting to remind those in and around Oxford this spring that the exhibit will remain up until 28 April 2024. Just right for your April pilgrimage itinerary!

For those of us unable to absorb the exhibit in person, the accompanying collection of essays is a treat. From among the many great essays, I draw your attention to Jonathan Hsy’s fabulous “Chaucerian Multilingualism Past and Present.” Besides being a fascinating read, Jonathan’s essay features images and analysis of Global Chaucers that have appeared on this site over the past decade.

New Digital Resource for Chaucerians Everywhere

by Candace Barrington

A 16th-century portrait of Geoffrey Chaucer, Add MS 5141, f. 1r

The British Library has digitized its entire collection of pre-1600 manuscripts containing Chaucer’s works. The following is taken from the library’s online announcement.

The British Library holds the world’s largest surviving collection of Chaucer manuscripts, and this year we have reached a major milestone. Thanks to generous funding provided by The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, the Peck Stacpoole Foundation, and the American Trust for the British Library, we have completed the digitisation of all of our pre-1600 manuscripts containing Chaucer’s works, over 60 collection items in total. We have digitised not only complete copies of Chaucer’s poems, but also unique survivals, including fragmentary texts found in Middle English anthologies or inscribed in printed editions and incunabula.

You can download the full list of pre-1600 manuscripts containing Chaucer’s works here, together with accompanying links to the digitised versions on our Universal Viewer. There you can view the manuscripts in full, study them in detail, and download the images for your own use. Thanks to the IIIF-compatible viewer, you can also view these manuscripts side-by-side in digital form, allowing close comparison between the volumes, their texts, and scribal hands:

PDF: Download Chaucer_digitised_vols_Oct_2023

Excel: Download Chaucer_digitised_vols_Oct_2023 (this format cannot be downloaded on all browsers).

Go to the announcement for a complete list and illustrated descriptions of the now digitized manuscripts and incunabula.

“Patient and Impatient Griselda”

by Candace Barrington

Though this production skips over The Clerk’s Tale, I already have my free ticket to watch this double reading of the Griselda story, first as told by Boccaccio (14th century) and then by Margaret Atwood (21st century). Tickets to the streamed, dramatic reading are free.

Date: Saturday, 30 September. Time: 5:00p-7:00p (eastern)

Here’s the blurb from Theater of War Productions:

Theater of War Productions and Margaret Atwood return to the Toronto International Festival of Authors with an exciting new collaboration exploring power and control, domestic violence, and family dynamics by way of two versions of the same story, one written by Giovanni Boccaccio in 1348 during the bubonic plague and the other by Atwood in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic. In Boccaccio’s version, a woman named Griselda remains in an abusive and controlling relationship, showing great patience and forbearance in the face of her husband’s sadism and cruelty. In Atwood’s version, Griselda takes matters in her own hands and, with the help of her sister, turns the tables on her husband. 

This free, public event will feature a live, dramatic reading of the “Patient Griselda” story from Boccaccio’s Decameron by Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network, Fleishman is in Trouble), Maev Beaty (Beau is Afraid, Mouthpiece), and Araya Mengesha (Tiny Pretty Things, Nobody). Then, in response, Margaret Atwood will perform “Impatient Grisleda,” a story that is narrated to a group of humans in quarantine by an alien that looks like an octopus. The readings of both texts will be followed by immediate responses by community panelists and will culminate in a guided audience discussion, facilitated by Bryan Doerries (Artistic Director, Theater of War Productions).

Co-presented by Theater of War Productions and Toronto International Festival of Authors.

In situ’s 2015 production of The Canterbury Tales

In situ‘s The Canterbury Tales: A Promenade Performance (2015)

by Candace Barrington

Many of our posts alert readers to the latest information about the ongoing global reception of Chaucer’s work. Sometimes, though, we use these posts to record information that we don’t have time to follow up on but don’t want to fall through the cracks. This is one of them.

In situ, a theatrical company based in Cambridge UK, produces and performs site-specific works in non-theatrical spaces. (I confess to being an avid fan of such productions, although I’ve never seen an In situ production.)

In 2015, they developed The Canterbury Tales: A Promenade Performance. Bits of the performance can be viewed on this video from the Brighton Fringe Festival.

Newsflash from Rome: Chaucer in Polish

We were very pleased to hear from Laurence Warner that the Medieval Symposium at last week’s International Association of University Professors of English (IAUPE) conference in Rome included a presentation by Professor Ewa Kujawska-Lis on “Canterbury Tales in Polish.” Of course, we contacted Ewa right away. She kindly provided précis of her paper for us to share with the Global Chaucers community. We look forward to learning more from her as she expands our knowledge of Chaucer’s long and deep presence in Polish translations and scholarship.

by Ewa Kujawska-Lis, Director of the Institute of Literary Studies, Faculty of Humanities,
University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Poland

In Poland, Chaucer’s artistry was first noticed by two outstanding literary figures (poets, writers, and journalists): Ignacy Krasicki (1735-1801) and Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855). Well acquainted with European literature, they offered appreciative comments on the English poet almost a century before any Polish translation was available. Readers needed to wait until 1907 to get the feel of Chaucer themselves. This is when Jan Kasprowicz (1860-1926), a poet, playwright, critic, and translator, included fragments of The General Prologue and a large section of The Friar’s Tale in his anthology Poeci angielscy (English Poets). The translation, consisting of about 20 pages, served as an introduction of Chaucer to the Polish literary system and was based on the edition of The Canterbury Tales by Thomas Tyrwhitt (1775-78) and a German translation by Wilhelm Hertzberg (1866).

Half a century later, in 1956 Przemyslaw Mroczkowski published his monumental study Opowieści kanterberyjskie na tle epoki (The Canterbury Tales against the backdrop of the epoch), originally written in 1951, which was a milestone in introducing Chaucer to Polish scholars in the vein of what would be in the future termed cultural poetics. Subsequently, in 1988, he also translated The Knight’s Tale.

This served as a complement to the first more extensive translation of The Canterbury Tales into Polish that was created by Helena Pręczkowska and published in 1963 (Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy Im. Ossolińskich, 1963; reprinted in 1978 and 1987) (image at left). This volume included The General Prologue and eleven Tales selected by Witold Chwalewik, based on his rather arbitrary decision as to which stories should be translated.

Finally, the complete translation of The Canterbury Tales was published in 2022 as the second volume of a non-commercial series Bibliotheca Translata by the publishing house Biblioteka Śląska (image at top). The translation was done by Jarek Zawadzki, a translator of literature from English and Chinese, based on Walter W. Skeat’s edition of 1894, with illustrations by Maciej Sieńczyk, a graphic artist, illustrator, comic book creator.

The Polyglot Miller’s Tale Returns!

2014 Polyglot Reading, NCS Congress, Reykjavik, Iceland

It’s that time again! We’re rounding up participants for the “Polyglot Miller’s Tale Reading” at the 2022 NCS Congress in Durham, UK.

After some shuffling to accommodate more participants, we’re happy to announce that the reading is now scheduled for Wednesday, 13 July, 7:30p to 8:30p.

Currently, we have volunteers to read in French, Italian, German, Polish, Arabic, Hebrew, Dutch, and (be still my heart!) Lithuanian. We’d still love to add more languages, such as Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, Hindi, Malayalam, Frisian, Romanian, Norwegian, Serbian, Icelandic, Spanish, Turkish, Afrikaans, Portuguese, Finnish, Estonian, Greek, Russian, Ewe, Farsi, Czech, Taiwainese, and any other language into which the tale has been translated. (For help finding a translation, contact us or refer to our list of translations; if you know of others, please let us know.)

Depending on the total number of volunteers, participants will be asked to read around 50-60 lines apiece.

If you’d like to be part of the fun, please email us (GlobalChaucers at gmail dot com) with this info:

  1. which language(s) you’d like to read in;
  2. if you possess a copy of The Miller’s Tale in that language (if you don’t, we likely can send a copy to you); and
  3. if you consent to being recorded (both audio/video).

In mid-May, we will send your line assignments (and a copy of your lines, if requested).

We appreciate your patience as we pull together what promises to be a lively event.  

The Chaucer Studio and Global Chaucers will collaborate on new recordings of The Canterbury Tales in translation

by Shannon Prevost

https://www.wga.hu/html_m/zgothic/miniatur/1351-400/3other/10_1351.html

The Chaucer Studio and Global Chaucers will be working together in the near future to provide and create recordings of The Canterbury Tales in different translations. We learned from Michael Calabrese of California State University that “the idea of translating Chaucer in different languages for global access is an inherent part of what we would like to do.” The co-directors of the studio are pleased to collaborate with Global Chaucers to provide more readings of Chaucer’s works in translation.

The first planned recording will be in Spanish, read by Christina Gomez, executive director of the studio.

In the future we will work with interested parties to record either already existing translations or new translations. Global Chaucers and the Chaucer Studio will work together to provide global distribution and access. We are currently soliciting participants who’d like to translate and/or record with us.

The new set of co-directors at Chaucer Studio are:

  • Michael Calabrese (California State University, Los Angeles)
  • Tom Burton (University of Adelaide)
  • Regula Meyer Evitt (Colorado College)
  • Cathy Hume (University of Bristol)
  • Joseph Parry (Brigham Young University)
  • Christina Gomez (California State University, Los Angeles)

A new Japanese translation of The Canterbury Tales

by Candace Barrington

My copy of the beautifully executed translation of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales into Japanese arrived today thanks to Koichi Kano. In addition to new translations of all the tales, the volume includes Ellesmere images of the pilgrims, extensive notes, and an ample bibliography.

I look forward to learning more about the translations, their translators, and their translation strategies very soon.