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譯人的故事（二十五）：從黃杲炘譯《殷紅的花朵》說起

[英國]高爾斯華綏John Galsworthy 著《殷紅的花朵》（The Dark Flower），上海譯文出版社，2001

《殷紅的花朵》封面就是類似紅康乃馨，翻譯者對於石竹可能的象徵有注，很不錯（雖然不完備，但總不致於像2003年台灣的某報將名畫＜聖母與石竹＞翻譯成「＜聖母與粉紅＞」…..）

我不認識翻譯者，所以特地查一下他名字的意義：（明亮的樣子。說文解字：杲，明也。詩經˙衛風˙伯兮：其雨其雨，杲杲出日。唐˙韓愈˙謁衡嶽廟遂宿嶽寺題門樓詩：猿鳴鐘動不知曙，杲杲寒日生於東。）；（光亮顯著而盛大的樣子。文選˙揚雄˙甘泉賦：揚光曜之燎燭兮，垂景炎之炘炘。）

其實黃杲炘先生的譯著，台灣也出版一些，所以我們應不太陌生（他還有些關於詩歌翻譯的論述）：
◎滋華茨(William Wordsworth)原著; 《華滋華茨抒情詩選》
◎喬叟(Geoffrey Chaucer) 著《坎特伯雷故事》 黃杲炘 譯. 貓頭鷹出版社：
◎[英國]丹尼爾•笛福Daniel Defoe著 黃杲炘譯
◎《英語愛情詩一百首》(100 English Love Poems) 作者：黃杲炘選譯 台北：台灣商務出版，1999
◎《柔巴依一百首》. 黃杲炘譯

基本上，黃杲炘譯注很不錯。不過有些地方如果能補充說明最好。譬如說，本書開頭提到：
“It was mighty hard in the back! No wonder poor old Aeschylus felt a bit
sick when it fell on his head!”這是關於古希臘名戲劇家死亡之傳說、故事，所以對於一般人，只指出其人是不夠的。

(原文參考He was on his way to his tutor's to read an essay on Oliver
Cromwell; and under the old wall, which had once hedged in the
town, he took out of his pocket a beast. It was a small tortoise,
and, with an extreme absorption, he watched it move its little
inquiring head, feeling it all the time with his short, broad
fingers, as though to discover exactly how it was made. It was
mighty hard in the back! No wonder poor old Aeschylus felt a bit
sick when it fell on his head! The ancients used it to stand the
world on--a pagoda world, perhaps, of men and beasts and trees,
like that carving on his guardian's Chinese cabinet.)

故事參考：Aeschylus was born in 525 B.C. Eleusis, his birthplace, was known for its mystical rituals of worship to the Earth goddess Demeter. Biographers enjoy attributing the mysticism of the author's plays to this early influence. According to legend, Dionysus, the god of wine and drama, appeared to Aeschylus in a dream and told him to write tragedies, which the seventeen-year-old easily proceeded to do. He spent much of his life in Athens, where he witnessed political and social changes that almost certainly influenced his plays: Prometheus's rebellion against tyranny could only have been invented by an author who had seen firsthand the collapse of tyranny, the introduction of a constitution, and the slow maturation of the world's first democracy. Aeschylus fought against the Persians who invaded Athens and lost his brother in the final battle. A play, The Persians, draws on his experience. His tragedies also reflect the cultural shift in Athens, as new scientific and philosophical ideas threatened to supplant traditional faith in the gods. Aeschylus died honored and revered as a poet, though apparently under unusual circumstances. An eagle, trying to crack open a turtle by dropping it on something hard, had difficulty distinguishing bald heads from rocks. We are not told whether the turtle shell cracked, but Aeschylus's head certainly did.