Recommend a Translation?

[jill_rg]

I need to hear what English translation of Gaston Leroux's original novel Phans recommend. I know that the only translation out prior to 1990 was horribly abridged and is now widespread due to being in the public domain. Among the more complete translations by Bair, Wolf, and the Lofficiers, which do most die-hard fans consider the best?

Please and

Comments

[silent_lorelei]

It really depends on your cup of tea. Wolf is probably the most scrupulously accurate, but he does a lot of tedious (and occasionally unnecessary) footnoting, and there are occasional mistakes in the text. Bair's translation reads better, but is occasionally slipshod about the translation, and in a few places leaves things out entirely (it's not nearly as abridged as the old translation, but it has its moments). The Lofficier version is up front about the fact that it is not a direct translation: instead, the translators try to get as close as possible to the spirit of the original work as they can, in some places inserting more modern vernacular, English colloquialisms and so on.

If you're going for getting the entire text in one place, I'd go for Wolf; if you're just looking for a good story, I'd pick up Lofficier, and if you want to get a good mix of the two, I'd try the Bair. :) I have all three.

[jill_rg]

Thank you very much! I want something that will show me as close as possible the intact story of the original novel but will still be enjoyable to read. As a text on its owm, I like Bair's so far; I was hoping it's also an accurate translation and that I'm not missing any crucial details in the plot or the personalities of the characters. Some review of the 4 translations I found online said only one passage was missing from Bair.

[jill_rg]

Thanks a lot for the link. I've also since learned that there are 2 different Bantam translations by Bair -- one is labeled "abridged" and the other "unabridged." Thanks to my library, I was able to compare them, but all that shows is that Bair's "unabridged" version is indeed more complete than his "abridged" version.

[cdaae]

The Lofficiers seriously annoy me because they inserted things into the text that simply are not there - for instance, their translation says that Christine is 17 years old, which is absolutely not in Leroux (where her age isn't directly mentioned, but we can work out that she was at least 19, probably 20).

I tend to go with Wolf, simply for accuracy.

[jill_rg]

Thanks.