Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-10-23
THIS AND THAT
NY CHARLES r. TRACgWELL.

United ststea to-day have taken" from
4 ~ n years In school IN learn eTantly
nothing about The French N German
language During tho time they we're
making n prrtense IN theas languages
they no doubt read several books. such
rs COLOMBIA" and La TuIlpe Noire,"
and Mt the time fondly deiuded them
selves into the belief that they knew
French -
What they really did, Of course. was
to shoulder their way through several
delightful narratives with pick and
shovel. They managed 10 get the
meaning. but they lost the spirit. and
the meaning OF words is nothing with
out the spirit. The spirit of words E
their life. Without that spirit, that
tang of life in them, words are more
inert than stones for rocks mty have
atoms at eternal play within them, but
words have nothing at all, but only
mean what the reader puts in them,
after the writer has marshaled them
in a certain order.
Meaning is not all there is TO words,
however. Above the meaning, oven.
lies the spirit. With certain MASTER
pieces of fiction, such as the book mem
toned, and Cervantes' Don Ouixote, :"
for instance, there is the outlook OF an
entire race.
Somehow one knows the French
people better. by delving into their
literature than he would from any
number Of journeys. One may say this
without fear Of contradiction, because
1t Is personal matter, after all; II
another disputes it, it makes no differ
ence in the least; the book is to the
reader, and comes back most to him;
what he makes of it is all there is to It,
This may not explain the thing salts
factorily, because there is no explain
ing, in the last analysis, the intangible
quality in translation. 1t is there. but
the hand cannot touch 1t, and even the
mind cannot point 1t out to the mind
especially TO another mind. 1t is be-
cause of this Intangible in translatine
that many critics have been induced
to say that no translation, no matter
how good, can equal the original No
doubt that Is true in this peculiar
sense. 1t in a sense is the same as
saying that copy is not as good as
the original, not because 1t may not
bulk as large or have colors any
different but because the man who
made it in the first place put something
into it which the copyiSt with the best
will IN the world failed to put into It.
Consider again the "ASSommoir," a
monument, seen by too few moderns
alas. Considered with Mana" it Ia A
cole ssal perturbation of the life of
family OF. the very poor Out OF that
family came the beautiful but perverted
creature whose name became the talk
of all Paris" The latter half of
"L'Assommoir" Is used by the author 10
picture the degraded childhood Of Mana
as result of which she could not have
been anything other than what she
turned out to be.
Zola had in mind what he wanted to
do. That sense Is over the entire book
A translatcr, with the best will in the
world Is not so interested in the COM
plnte picture. He fails to enter into
the spirit of the two books, as one, but
confines himself 10 the one book. as
one. Hence the translation may land
in one instance does lose that fine
sense Of balance which a literary
creator puts into his best work.
This balance is the sanity of fiction.
Withcu ut It, novelists would be wasting
their time and that Of their readers
NovelistS who lack this ESSENTIAL sanity
do indeed. waste the time of their
readers. But those men land a few
women who are artists, who somehow
understand, as 1t is not given to the
majority to understand, keep a balance
Of mind, heart and hand, which forever
puts the novel among the real artistic
creations OF the spirit Of man.