Translations by Elizabeth I, 1592-98
by Janel Mueller and Joshua Scodel
Elizabeth’s translations demonstrate her fantastic intellect and seriousness. This is what she did for her leisure when she was taking a break from ruling the country! In her translation of Boethius there is a real sense of it being done in haste, the grammar is a bit wonky and it is a very knotty muscular translation which has a rugged engaging quality.
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“I wanted to give an example of some of her own writing because that is where we get closest to feeling that we know her and we get an insight into her own mind and attitude and ideas. I have been massively assisted in that because in the last ten years the University of Chicago has been publishing a series of volumes of Elizabeth’s collected works. From these you get a sense of her breadth and diversity as a writer: not just speeches and letters, but also prayers and poems, and all these translations.” Read more...
Helen Hackett, Historian
