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Page: Profile: Wren's Nest News Local
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Article: 17401
[Art/Music/lit]
Date Posted:
3/4/2007
9:44:48 am EST
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Views: 6,513
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Comments: 1
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The Mabinogion (Book Review)
Author: Murrough O'Brien (reviewer) Source: The Independent (UK)
Title: THE MABINOGION
How many great works of Celtic literature can most of us call to mind? I canvassed some learned friends on their knowledge of Celtic literature (literature, mind, written in a Celtic language). There was humming and hawing. The Fenian Cycle? Vaguely. Cuchullain, the boy hero who defended Ulster single-handed against an entire army? Very vaguely. Still, one name did emerge from the mists: The Mabinogion.
I spoke to Professor Sioned Davies, chair of Welsh at Cardiff University, whose translation of The Mabinogion has just been published, asking her about the The Mabinogion's enduring appeal. "It's accessible," she says, "and, in the Four Branches, we see a real psychology. What do you make of Efnisien, for example, who kills his own nephew but then breaks the cauldron of re-birth and saves his people? He acts against his own nature."
Her own translation emphasises the vocal urgency of the original. In several passages she follows the original by shifting to the present tense. In others she lifts out a plainly poetic passage and gives it poetic form. Professor Davies also avoids archaism. The "thees" and "thous" of most translations, while lending an antic charm to the experience of reading, can distract and even befuddle.
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| Good Question! | Mar 5th. at 7:58:28 pm EST
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Lady GoldenRaven (New Castle, Pennsylvania) - Email Me
The only two which come to mind in a split moment is The Book of Kells and The Book of Deer. But, again, with Christian translations, who really knows the exact meanings of these books? Even if one knows Gaelic, who is to say that it was not the Christians who translated it into Gaelic from it's earliest forms? Most of the stories of our ancestors were not written down since they were illiterate. They drew many pictures and had their own way of communicating. One will only find out once we get to the Other Side. I have read all the above. The Book of Deer being Scottish. This is the only one which is still being translated. Most of it is predominately Christian.There is still very little known about it--at least up til the time of my reading the info I had on it.
Had our ancestors only known how much their future generations are desparatelt seeking answers which lie hidden.
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