Is It Time to Translate Shakespeare?

Abstract

Well, we have been doing it, haven't we? The earliest collected edition of Shakespeare's plays, the 1623 First Folio, would simply stun most first-time readers who now depend upon numerous aids: scene divisions, stage directions, modernization of spelling and punctuation, emendations of corrupt passages, glossaries, and notes. Other simplifications have come forward: Tales from Shakespeare, Shakespeare Arranged for Modern Readers, acting editions, prose paraphrases. Why don't we take a full step forward? The trouble with many of these editorial aids is that they distance Shakespeare. They force readers to the footnotes, endnotes, and glossary at a high loss of continuous contact with Shakespeare's text. They send teachers on a hunt for all available elucidations of a rough passage, and they overawe younger students who see the author as impenetrably barricaded from their direct experience. I argue that a minimal translation of Shakespeare can restore him to millions of readers without serious loss of his powers and in a form which allows steady flow of readers' attention with least hindrance from the archaic vocabulary, supererogatory proper nouns, and syntactical inversions which strain the modern ear. Shakespeare can be rescued from the darkening linguistic and cultural obscurity which would have dimmed out Chaucer and the Pearl Poet except for splendid recent translations.