Hyperion, or the Hermit in Greece by Friedrich Hölderlin (review)

Howard Gaskill's translation of Hölderlin's epistolary novel Hyperion (1797/99) represents the culmination of years of extensive scholarship on the author, this work, and issues surrounding its translation. While there are other recent translations for the interested reader to choose from, this edition has the distinct advantage of being available online and free of charge through the publisher's website. Of further benefit for the student and scholar is the extensive apparatus accompanying the translation. A map of Greece visualizes the myriad place names in the text (though the protagonist's journey between these is not marked); a comprehensive index of proper names provides necessary background information on geographical, historical, and mythological references in the text; the select bibliography lists relevant scholarship for further study (though German-language scholarship is left out); and, most importantly, the substantial afterword is in itself a valuable contribution to the English-language scholarship on the novel. Here, Gaskill not only summarizes the genesis of the novel within its (literary-) historical, philosophical, theological, and political context, but also provides an in-depth analysis of Hölderlin's usage of the epistolary genre, as well as the previous scholarship on the novel and further interpretative possibilities.

Of primary interest, of course, is the new translation itself. Gaskill provides a detailed and helpful section in the afterword entitled "Englishing Hyperion," in which he explains his translation practice. Here, he acknowledges other translations of the work (which he is not trying to rectify with his translation), accounts for the text he takes as his basis (Beissner's Stuttgart Edition), and justifies when and where he has made editorial adjustments to the text. He preserves the original punctuation, even where this looks strange in English, and he adds single quotation marks to direct speech and direct thought, which does simplify comprehension, though one may object that the ambiguities in the original text do belong to the reading experience. Following Hölderlin, he uses contractions abundantly, whereas he avoids certain stylistic elements, such as the double negative. Gaskill concedes that it is impossible to recreate the metrical and rhythmic aspects of the original but explains how he has approached them (e.g., by avoiding stress clashes). The ultimate merits of the new translation though stem from Gaskill's previous scholarship. In particular, he renders numerous unconventional translations stemming from the intertextuality he has investigated. For example, he has directly taken sentences from the King James Bible and, drawing on the Luther Bible familiar to Hölderlin, departed from literal meaning to preserve biblical allusions, such as translating "Ewiger Klarheit" as "Tranquil glory." Gaskill exhibits a similar degree of scholarly sensitivity when approaching passages that evoke Ossian and Goethe. In so doing, he creates an English text that is as deliberately intertextual as the original. Beyond these instances, he frequently finds creative translations for German words for which there is no English equivalent; for example, translating "eine Geisteskraft" as "mind and spirit."

Nonetheless, as with any translation, there are numerous instances that one might gripe about. On occasion, Gaskill employs the curious practice of changing the original order in which adjectives are listed. For example, the first letter ends "never-changing, beautiful and tranquil," whereas, originally, the word "beautiful" comes last ("waldellosen, stillen und schönen"). There is no apparent literary purpose in the new order, and, given Hölderlin's poetic and rhetorical mastery, it is hard to imagine that such changes are justifiable. Additionally, Gaskill's "judicious use of northern or Scots words" may well be a barrier for American readers. Beyond these particulars, however, the question must be asked if Gaskill has in the end succeeded with his "strange mixture of the poetically highly charged with the colloquial and regional," which he suggests is rooted in the style of Hölderlin's original text.

All in all, this edition is an invaluable resource for students of Hölderlin, given its easy...