[Ads-l] Adage: Traduttori traditori (Translators, traitors)

[Dan Goncharoff]

I have read that the phrase was first said about French translations of
Dante, but I don't speak Italian, so I won't try to prove it.

On Apr 2, 2017 4:35 PM, "Laurence Horn" <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:

Thanks Garson.  I figured it might be of obscure (Italian) origin.  The
Montaigne/Coste connection is nice, but very sad (in a real, not Trumpian
sense), if he was right about those unscrupulous art forgers…

LH

> On Apr 2, 2017, at 4:14 PM, ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
wrote:
>
> Laurence Horn wrote:
>> OK, QI and other sleuths—isn’t this, as I assumed, originally from the
>> Italian:  traduttore, traditore?  Or is the Spanish version (which I had
>> never previously encountered) earlier?  At least we know it didn’t start
>> out in English (or French).  But, given the plural forms this isn’t
actually
>> mainstream Spanish anyway, right?
>
> "The Concise Columbia Dictionary of Quotations" presents an Italian
> version of the saying without an attribution or date.
>
> [ref] 1989, The Concise Columbia Dictionary of Quotations by Robert
> Andrews, Topic: Translation, Quote Page 267, Columbia University
> Press, New York. (Verified with scans)[/ref]
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> Translation
>
> Traduttori, traditori.
> Translators, traitors.
> Italian proverb
> [End excerpt]
>
> I only searched in Google Books, and I do not know how many Italian
> books are indexed.
>
> The adage appears in the 1754 commentary written by "M. Coste" about
> one of Montaigne's essays. The commentary is in French, but the adage
> "Traduttori traditori" is given in Italian.
>
> Year: 1754 (M.DCC.LIV)
> Title: Essais de Montaigne: Avec les Notes de M. Coste
> Volume: 4
> Quote Page 113
> Publisher: Chez Jean Nourse & Vaillant, a Londres
>
> https://books.google.com/books?id=JaYDAAAAQAAJ&q=traduttori#v=snippet&
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> C'est à quoi n'ont jamais pensé certains beaux-esprits, qui croient
> faire merveille d'anéantir nos vieux Auteurs en les traduisant en beau
> François moderne, (le plus moderne est toûjours le plus beau)
> Traduttori traditori, qu'on pourroit comparer à des Peintres
> médiocres, qui après avoir copié les tableaux de Raphaël, de Paul
> Veronese, du Titien, &c. jetteroient au feu ces divins originaux.
> [End excerpt]
>
> Garson
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 2, 2017 at 2:34 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:
>> OK, QI and other sleuths—isn’t this, as I assumed, originally from the
Italian:  traduttore, traditore?  Or is the Spanish version (which I had
never previously encountered) earlier?  At least we know it didn’t start
out in English (or French).  But, given the plural forms this isn’t
actually mainstream Spanish anyway, right?
>>
>> LH
>>
>>> On Apr 2, 2017, at 1:23 PM, Dave Hause <dwhause at CABLEMO.NET> wrote:
>>>
>>> Of course, labels aren't the only place.  Many years ago, my
dual-citizenship Venezuelan-Expat-American roommate taught me "Tradutore
son traidore." Translators are traitors.
>>> Dave Hause
>>> -----Original Message----- From: Mark Mandel
>>> Sent: Saturday, April 1, 2017 11:28 PM
>>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>> Subject: mistranslation?
>>>
>>> I sometimes see jaw-dropping mistranslations on labels, where the
original
>>> English says one thing and another language says something ridiculously
>>> different, apparently translated either by machine or by careless
lookup in
>>> a dictionary or by "Sure, I took ___ in high school, I can do that for
>>> you." But before sending them in to *Consumer Reports'* "Selling It"
page,
>>> I want to confirm that they really are as bad as I think. Here's a
French
>>> example. (I have a Spanish one too, but I can't find it at the moment.)
>>>
>>> Eng-Fr, on a card of bag clips intended to keep your (e.g.) potato chips
>>> enclosed and dry till you finish them:
>>> *Hand wash recommended.*
>>> Le lavage des mains est recommandé.
>>> Does that mean, as I think it does, that you should wash your hands,
rather
>>> than that you should wash (the product) by hand? Should the translation
be
>>> "... aux mains ..."?
>>>
>>> Mark
>>>
>>>
>>> . <http://X-Clacks-Overhead.dw/GNU-Terry_Pratchett>  .
>>> <http://www.gnuterrypratchett.com/>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org