English writer
Joseph Addison died this day, June 17th, in 1719. Addison is known for “The Spectator”, which
he founded. Another of Addison’s accomplishments
was a translation of Virgil’s Georgics, which John Dryden, among others,
admired. The text following, with Dryden
alluding to Addison’s translation, is found in “The Miscellaneous Works of
Joseph Addison”:
‘A TRANSLATION
OF ALL
VIRGIL'S FOURTH GEORGIC,
EXCEPT THE STORY OF ARISTiEUS.
This translation of Virgil is said by sir Walter Scott to have appeared in the third volume of
Dryden's Miscellany, published in 1693. Addison was
then in his twenty-second year. Dryden, in the postscript to his translation of
Virgil, says: "Whoever has given the world the translation of part of the
third Georgic, which he calls the Power of Love, has put me to sufficient pains
to make my own not inferior to his; as my lord Roscommon's Silenus had formerly
given me the same trouble. The most ingenious Mr. Addison of
Oxford has also been as troublesome to me as the other two, and on the same
account. After his Bees, my latter swarm is scarcely worth the hiving."
Scott's Dryden, vol. i. 378. xv. 193. Bishop Hurd says of it, that " the
version, though it be exact enough, for the most part, and not inelegant, gives
us but a faint idea of the original. It has the grace but not the energy of
Virgil's manner. The versification, except only the bad rhymes, may be excused;
for the frequent triplets and alexandrines, which Dryden's laziness, by the
favour of his exuberant genius, had introduced, were esteemed, when this
translation was made, not blemishes, but beauties."…’
