Last December, while searching for some volunteer translation work, I found this description from the Morgan Library and Museum, in New York, on idealist.org:
This is a wonderful opportunity for an individual with a serious
interest in 19th-century art and literature and a high proficiency
in French translation to assist the Cataloguer of the Morgan’s
Gordon Ray Collection. Duties include deciphering and translating
handwritten letters of luminaries from the worlds of art and
literature, conducting research where necessary or appropriate,
and preparing concise summaries of the letters for inclusion in
CORSAIR, the Morgan’s online collections catalog.
I thought, “This is for me,” applied, underwent a six-part background check, and was accepted.
Since January, I have been translating and summarizing mostly nineteenth-century French letters by noted authors, artists, scientists, politicians, and other public figures—Balzac, Baudelaire, Dumas (father and son), Condorcet (eighteenth century), George Sand, Renoir, counts, kings, and queens: the list goes on and on. Some of the letters are fairly mundane: “Thank you for your gracious dinner invitation. I will see you at 6:00 on Thursday.” Others involve intrigue about entry into the Académie Française, letters on various subjects from authors to their publishers, requests by generals for troops, lawsuits (many), and complex political, philosophical, or artistic discussions. I have learned a great deal about people I knew about and others I had never heard of.
It’s difficult to describe the constant thrill of reviewing documents in the handwriting of someone I’ve read or studied and realizing that I may be only the sixth person ever to have set eyes on them: the author, the recipient, the dealer, the collector, the cataloguer, and me.
Writing a summary is sometimes complicated, especially when the handwriting is difficult to read (either illegible or very small), when I’m dealing with a fragment or unsigned document, or there is little or no information about either the author or the recipient. I end up doing a lot of detective work. Is the person who wrote the letter really who the file label says it is? Sometimes it’s a relative, often with the same first and last name. Occasionally, the document turns out to be about the subject, not written by him or her. And at times the author is known by various names.
Often I need to research dates and addresses, check to see if the author’s correspondence has already been published (which makes it much easier to read), and look for postmarks. When I suspected that a letter was from Balzac, writing about the woman he would later marry, I went online to see if he had indeed been in Karlsrühe at the time the letter was written. (I was right.) Sometimes there is little or no punctuation, even when it’s a letter from a famous author, and often words are run together. There are people, like George Sand, whose handwriting changed dramatically during their lifetime. And once in a while, French is not the writer’s mother tongue, and there are many errors (for example, a letter from Caroline of Ansbach, the German wife of King George II of Great Britain).
If the letter is long or the handwriting is difficult to read, I transcribe it into readable French first. Then I do the translation in my head. I can summarize short, easy-to-read documents directly from the original. Often, the letters are witty or droll, and they’re always full of French charm, especially when written to someone of the opposite sex. Occasionally, what I’m working with isn’t a letter at all, but rather an excerpt from a play or novel.
In any case, I get to use my love for language and sharpen my skills, using materials from the period of French culture about which I’m most passionate. And my supervisor, whose intelligence and problem-solving skills are dazzling (and whose patience is remarkable) is always a great help.
I’m in France soaking up everything French I can right now, but I’m looking forward to seeing what Victor Hugo has to say when I get back to New York. And I can’t wait to start in on Flaubert.
Comments