Not
only did Ducis introduce Shakespeare's masterpieces to thousands of
his countrymen who might otherwise never have heard of them, but his
renderings of Shakespeare were turned into Italian and many languages
of Eastern Europe. They spread the knowledge of Shakespeare's
achievement to the extreme boundaries of the European Continent.
Apparently Ducis did his work under favourable auspices. He
corresponded regularly with Garrick, and he was never happier than
when studying Shakespeare's text with a portrait of Shakespeare at his
side. Yet, in spite of Ducis's unquestioned reverence and his
honourable intentions, all his translations of Shakespeare are gross
perversions of their originals. It is not merely that he is verbally
unfaithful. He revises the development of the plots; he gives the
_dramatis personae_ new names.
Ducis's _Othello_ was accounted his greatest triumph. The play shows
Shakespeare's mastery of the art of tragedy at its highest stage of
development, and rewards the closest study. But the French translator
ignored the great tragic conception which gives the drama its pith and
moment. He converted the piece into a romance. Towards the end of his
rendering Iago's villanies are discovered by Othello; Othello and
Desdemona are reconciled; and the Moor, exulting in his newly
recovered happiness, pardons Iago.
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