Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2024 August 27

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

August 27

What the Maid Saw and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Years ago I read about the English translation of Yasutaka Tsutsui's novel What the Maid Saw. The translation was notorious because at one point, there is a quotation from T. S. Eliot's poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock", but the translator seemingly did not recognize the quotation and instead translated Tsutsui's Japanese translation back into English. Eliot's original text read as follows:

I grow old ... I grow old...

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

But the English translation of the novel rendered the text as:

The years are taking their toll.

It’s time to roll up the cuffs of my pants—

Time to part my hair from the back—

Time to eat peaches.

I put on my white flannel pants and walked on the beach.

I heard mermaids singing to each other—

Mermaids who would never sing out to me.

However, I seem to recall reading later that this (i.e. the English translator not recognizing the poem and translating it on his own) was an urban legend. And, indeed, I can hardly find any references to this online. One of the few I can find (https://aclanthology.org/1997.mtsummit-workshop.6.pdf) cites it to "a 'clipping' (undated) from the New Yorker", that is, one of the "snippets containing amusing errors, unintended meanings or badly mixed metaphors ... used as filler items, accompanied by a witty retort", which doesn't seem to be a particularly reliable source.

So my question is: Did the English translation of What the Maid Saw actually include the mistranslated quote from "Prufrock", and if so, was there any explanation other than the translator not recognizing the poem? -- Metropolitan90 (talk) 07:32, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Urban legend, I think. According to the New Yorker clipping quoted in the Helmreich article you link to, the translator, Adam Kabat, renders Tsutsui's Japanese as "Katsumi had come across the image of the peach in a poem by an American poet. The years are taking their toll [etc.]". But in this 2011 reprint of the original 1990 Kabat translation we have something very different:

Katsumi had come across the image of the peach in a bit of verse by an American poet.

The poem also used images of mermaids, the beach and a necktie, but it was the symbolic line about eating peaches that had left the most vivid impression on Katsumi...

There is no quotation from the poem there. I wondered whether the 2011 reprint might have corrected this passage from the 1990 original, but only a 1990 copyright date is given for it, so seemingly not.

Incidentally, we discussed double translations here 13 years ago. --Antiquary (talk) 09:12, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

The 1990 edition is available on Archive.org. It does have the "The years are taking their toll..." version on page 82. See here (registration required). DuncanHill (talk) 10:19, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

I rather suspect the hand of Valerie Eliot in the removal. DuncanHill (talk) 10:22, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

• Thanks to both of you for the information. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 15:33, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

"Whiter than white cocaine" (or similar) British soldiers song of WW1

In Graves book "Goodbye to all that" he mentions a song that soldiers sang, I translate it back to English, it's "Whiter than white cocaine", "Brighter than white cocaine" or something similar.

Song lyrics/info will; be appreciated. 2A0D:6FC0:8EF:6000:983C:9409:335E:6247 (talk) 17:55, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Presumably "Oh wash me in the water that you washed the Colonel's daughter, and I shall be whiter than the whitewash on the wall" Sung in "Oh! What a Lovely War" here. DuncanHill (talk) 19:49, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Graves remembered the words slightly differently: "Whiter than the milky cokernuts" etc. Lyrics here. --Antiquary (talk) 19:58, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

A contemporary (1917) record of the lyrics and music is here, p. 91. --Antiquary (talk) 20:08, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

And a few more historical details in Max Arthur's When This Bloody War Is Over, here, p. 69. --Antiquary (talk) 20:37, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

I didn't know that WW1 British pilots called their airplane "the bus" until I looked at that file. Many of the soldiers in Robert Graves' unit were from rural Wales, and he found that they would rather sing melancholy songs than aggressively anti-German songs... AnonMoos (talk) 15:53, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

It is based on the hymn "Blessed be the fountain of blood" which has the refrain "Whiter than the snow / Whiter than the snow / Wash me in the blood of the Lamb / And I shall be whiter than snow". DuncanHill (talk) 19:53, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

A YouTube clip of the original hymn is here. Alansplodge (talk) 14:38, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

Robert Graves says, in his native English, "to the tune of the Salvation Army tune of 'Whiter than the snow'" (I believe this is a variation of Blessed be the Fountain) and gives the key line as "whiter than the milky cokernuts". See page 92 of the Penguin edition at Archive.org (registration required). DuncanHill (talk) 20:01, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

I am curious to know, 2A0D, which language you've found Graves's book translated into. The translator seems to have misunderstood "cokernuts" rather badly. --Antiquary (talk) 20:50, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Hebrew 🤣2A0D:6FC0:8EF:6000:983C:9409:335E:6247 (talk) 21:36, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Coco/coca confusion? DuncanHill (talk) 20:54, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

This is a quite bad translation accidant. 2A0D:6FC0:8EF:6000:983C:9409:335E:6247 (talk) 21:51, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Admittedly, "cokernuts" is a non-standard phonetic representation of the way Graves's men pronounced the word "coconuts", so the translator couldn't have got much help from any dictionary. And few translators get paid enough to be able to spend much time solving such problems. --Antiquary (talk) 23:02, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Antiquarytalk, I just noticed I didn't even say thank you! My bad. Thank you for uncovering this. [OP] 2A0D:6FC0:8EF:6000:508C:B430:C9DB:D9FF (talk) 17:28, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure that ordinary WW1 trench soldiers without a medical background would have been familiar with cocaine in a white powder form anyway. Burroughs, Wellcome & Co. did manufacture and market (legal) "Forced March" tablets to soldiers, which apparently contained significant cocaine. A song which actually does mention cocaine is I Get a Kick Out of You (original lyrics)... AnonMoos (talk) 21:42, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

See "cokernut" on Wiktionary, dating from at least 1913, a year before WWI started. Coincidentally, I have been devouring "Goodbye to All That" (yep, that physical Penguin edition), and it's one of the best reads I have ever come across, where poetry and prose intermingle endlessly. The sudden and wholly unexpected (and very British) humour in the midst of unbelievable suffering is astounding. I found his relationship with other well-known anti-war figures (eg Siegfried Sassoon) to be especially revealing. I wonder if the OP was aware of any jokes at all in the book, if "cocaine" is par for the course. MinorProphet (talk) 00:47, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

Oh, do tell! I suspect the translation missed quite a bit. [OP] 2A0D:6FC0:8EF:6000:A10B:F23F:CAE9:DCF4 (talk) 09:43, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

I will hunt down a few choice moments, although I'm quite occupied with non-WP things right now. MinorProphet (talk) 20:26, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Prince Radziwill, a Polish officer with the Heavy Brigade

According to our article The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968 film), Laurence Harvey "was given the role of Prince Radziwill, a Polish officer with the Heavy Brigade, but his part was edited out of the completed film". Now, Princes Radziwill were ten-a-penny at the time, but was there actually one in the Heavy Brigade at the time of the Crimean War? Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 21:34, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Prince Radziwill is mentioned here as serving with the Russians: "There is no doubt that Cardigan overran the Russian battery as he was recognized there by Prince Radziwill whom he had know before the war." There is also an unreliable forum post which claims that Radziwill ordered that Cardigan be taken alive. Clarityfiend (talk) 12:06, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

In our article, James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan#Crimean War, he is identified as Leon Hieronim Radziwiłł (Polish article), with several references. The Polish article says that he was in a Russian Guard Hussar regiment, maybe His Majesty's Hussar Life Guards Regiment, so not even in the Russian Heavy Brigade (hussars are light cavalry). Alansplodge (talk) 14:29, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

More details at Talk:James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan#Prince Radziwill. According to that, he was the major-general commanding the Russian Uhlan division (also light cavalry). Alansplodge (talk) 14:57, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

I am reminded that I watched this film around three or four years ago, and my personal comment in the talk page was deservedly reverted. Nevertheless,

Sadly...

...this article fails to demonstrate what a load of self-indulgent twaddle this film really is. A deserved box-office bomb. If you think you might enjoy Trevor Howard grumpily yelling his tits off for an hour or so, and Harry Andrews growling his tits off back at Howard for a further hour and a half, coupled with David Hemmings slowly—very slowly indeed—seducing his best friend's wife, and John Gielgud's disappearing act, please watch this film. The genuinely exciting action sequences pre-date Waterloo by a couple of years, in which Rod Steiger's scenery-chewing knocks everyone's performances here into one of those proverbial cocked hats. On the other hand, Hemmings gives some stylish lessons in how to sit a horse.

Conversely, I found Letters from Head-Quarters (vol. 1 • vol. 2) remarkably refreshing, and makes it plain how much more the French suffered; despite the military 'victories', it demonstrates exactly how war should not be carried on with a so-called ally. MinorProphet (talk) 10:28, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

I thought Richard Williams' animations were rather stylish. Alansplodge (talk) 10:57, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

Going back to the original question, I have deleted mention of the Heavy Brigade, since we won't be misleading anybody by stating that he was a Polish officer. I have also added a link to the Polish WP article. Alansplodge (talk) 11:12, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

It's still somewhat misleading, though. While he was a member of Polish artistocracy, he served as an officer in the Russian army and even fought on the Russian side in the Polish–Russian War of 1830, so from the point of view of Polish national historiography, he was a traitor and a tsartist loyalist. — Kpalion^(talk) 08:14, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

He was still Polish though, whatever his affiliation. Feel free to edit, but I was conscious that the quoted reference doesn't go into details. Alansplodge (talk) 18:12, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Still, "a Polish officer" is a bit ambiguous, as it could be read as both "an ethnic Polish officer" or "an officer in the Polish army". — Kpalion^(talk) 20:19, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Not at the time of Crimea. Anyway, thank you all. DuncanHill (talk) 21:45, 4 September 2024 (UTC)