[29.  Bjornson:  Vort Sprog.]

    [30.  Torp. Samtiden, Vol.  XIX (1908), p. 408.]

    [31. Vor Literatur.]

That Madhus does not measure up to his original will astonish no one who knows Shakespeare translations in other languages.  Even Tieck’s and Schlegel’s German, or Hagberg’s Swedish, or Foersom’s Danish is no substitute for Shakespeare.  Whether or not Madhus measures up to these is not for me to decide, but I feel very certain that he will not suffer by comparison with the Danish versions by Wolff, Meisling, Wosemose, or even Lembcke, or with the Norwegian versions of Hauge and Lassen.  The feeling that one gets in reading Madhus is not that he is uncouth, still less inaccurate, but that in the presence of great imaginative richness he becomes cold and barren.  We felt it less in the tragedy of Macbeth, where romantic color is absent; we feel it strongly in The Merchant of Venice, where the richness of romance is instinct in every line.  The opening of the play offers a perfect illustration.  In answer to Antonio’s complaint “In sooth I know not why I am so sad,” etc, Salarino replies in these stately and sounding lines: 

  Your mind is tossing on the ocean;
  There, where your argosies, with portly sail,—­
  Like signiors and rich burghers of the flood,
  Or, as it were, the pageants of the sea,—­
  Do overpeer the petty traffickers
  That curt’sy to them, do them reverence,
  As they fly by them with their woven wings.

The picture becomes very much less stately in Norwegian folk-speech: 

Paa storehave huskar hugen din, der dine langferd-skip med staute segl som hovdingar og herremenn paa sjo i drusteferd, aa kalle, gagar seg paa baara millom kraemarskutur smaa’, som nigjer aat deim og som helsar audmjukt naar dei med vovne vengir framum stryk.

The last two lines are adequate, but the rest has too much the flavor of Ole and Peer discussing the fate of their fishing-smacks.  Somewhat more successful is the translation of the opening of Act V, doubtless because it is simpler, less full of remote and sophisticated imagery.  By way of comparison with Lassen and Collin, it may be interesting to have it at hand.

Lor:  Ovfagert lyser maanen.  Slik ei natt, daa milde vindar kysste ljuve tre so lindt at knapt dei susa, slik ei natt steig Troilus upp paa Troja-murane og sukka saali si til Greklands telt, der Kressida laag den natti.

  Jes: 
          Slik ei natt
  gjekk Thisbe hugraedd yvi doggvaat voll
  og loveskuggen saag fyrr lova kom;
  og raedd ho der-fraa romde.

  Lor: 
          Slik ei natt
  stod Dido med ein siljutein i hand
  paa villan strand og vinka venen sin
  tilbake til Kartago.

  Jes: 
          Slik ei natt
  Medea trolldoms-urtir fann, til upp
  aa yngje gamle AEson.