SC - Medieval writing styles

[Philip & Susan Troy]

LrdRas at aol.com wrote:
> 
> A quick glance at a few of my books dating from the Victorian era back,
> clearly shows that verbose and pompous writing was , in fact, the sign of a
> good writer. IMO, Chiquart clearly shows hinself to be a man of learning in
> his writings as opposed to those who set down works like Ancient cookery and
> FoC on parchement. It is not until; we get into this century that simplistic
> writing styles break any ground and in recent yeras writers have become so
> simplistic and inane that there are few, if any, works worth reading at all.

Another consideration, if I may be frank without seeming to criticize
anyone (for the simple reason I'm not), is the translator's slant on
things. Sometimes something that sounds perfectly sensible in its
original language comes out in a completely different tone when
translated. If anyone doubts this I have three simple words for you:
"The"..."Gallic"..."Wars". Here are three more: "The"..."Civil"..."War".

Read 'em in Latin...then read 'em in English and weep.

Caesar was many things, but pompous and boring he was not... .

Conversely, there are those books which are vastly improved by removal
from their original language, in cases where the original language
constitutes, in the case of the given book, a threat to public safety.
Proust, anyone?

Adamantius
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================