Plato’s Republic is the foundation text of political theory in general and utopian theory and practice in particular. It has had many Englsih translations. The first in Scotland in 1760’s. What is that translation like and why has it disappeared? Is hegemony the answer? I went to the Rare Book Room to find out.
I spent three weeks traveling in June. In the British Library I read 17th and 18th stories of fantastic voyages to Australia and other texts. It is a hegemonic institution that proclaims to have the world’s knowledge, and with very little trouble I can hold in my hand first editions of rare books, cutting over two hundred years of editors and translators, getting back closer to the author’s mind. One little mystery I explored this time is the fate of the first English translation of Plato’s Republic. (Note this book is called the Republic because that is the name it had in the Latin translation at the time of Cicero, which were in turn based on Greek translation from Arabic translation which had survived the destruction of Greece, i.e., there is no original text.) The book was read by the educated in England in Latin and Greek. A man named Harry Spens translated it into English and published it in 1761 in Glasgow. It seems to be a very literal translation from my reading. (I can explain why I think that in the absence of an original text, if you wish.) In the early 20th Century Everyman publishing was set up by the House of Dent to porduce classic work in cheap editions for a wider readership. (Paperback before paperback technology was available.) In 1901 Dent published Plato’s Republic in an Everyman edition using the Harry Spens’s translation and his forward, which was originally published in 1768 or so. In the 1913 reprint Spens’s forward was omitted, and the last printing was in 1926. A couple of mysteries there. (1) Why drop the forward in the second edition? (2) Why did Dent Everyman stop publishing this translation after 1926? (Dent is still publishing, so there is no obvious commercial explanation.) There were rival translation from dons at Oxford (Benjamin Jowett) and Cambridge (Alan Lindsay) in the late Victoria period, which altered the text to conform to the norms of the time, so de-emphasizing the homosexuality, wives in common, and the like. Maybe these hegemonies drove the Spens translation off the market.
Well done, welcome to serious blogdom.
All very well, and an excellent side track from thesis but have you seen the Iranian president’s blog yet? My god. As a genre it lies on the spectrum between tragedy and comedy with a sprinkle of thriller and mystery for garnish. Kepp the posts coming MJ.
I am interested to know why you consider the translation to be particularly literal in the absence of an original text! Almost (but not quite) makes one long for the days when it was considered important to have read the ancient Greek and Latin classics in the original language, a feat which John Stuart Mill allegedly achieved by the tender age of 8… one wonders whether it was worth the nervous breakdown twelve years later??