Poetic Translation in 'The Word Exchange'

Of interest to all students of the history of the English language 'The Word Exchange' is a new Norton compendium of 123 Anglo-Saxon poems which sit alongside modern English translations rendered by a line-up of 70 contemporary greats including Seamus Heaney (who also provides the foreword) and Paul Muldoon.

Read more in this Washington Post review.

Neil L. Inglis
Editor, TSJ

Top billing at last - thanks to Beeb's Jim Naughtie

Thanks be to James Naughtie of BBC Radio 4 for his morning broadcast today on 'The Story of the King James Bible'.

The following passages were recorded in the Chapel at Hertford College Oxford - home to The Tyndale Society - in front of the famous Whitefriars window image of William Tyndale:

"Tyndale revolutionised English as a language. It is as big as that. He changed the way the English spoke and thought.

"It is extraordinary and one of the great mysteries of this story that a man in his late 20s, early 30s, in a garret on the continent, on the run, hunted by the establishment, eventually dying as a martyr for translation could do this.

"The whole story of The Bible in English is unthinkable without him."

To listen to the entire broadcast (available on BBC iPlayer for the next six days) click here.

(Note: Fast forward to 2.06 to skip the news broadcast at the beginning of the recording)

Thank you Radio 4!

Truth or Consequences...

Some years ago I went through a period of reading everything I could get my hands on in the field of contemporary Jesus scholarship. I learned a good deal but was left feeling vaguely unsatisfied...

Observe these interesting signs that contemporary Jesus Movement scholars are backing away from a strict emphasis on a truth/lies distinction in their analysis of the Gospels.

From The First Christmas by Borg and Crossan: "For a moment, we return to the truth of parable and the question of historical factuality. (...) In our judgment, there was no special star, no wise men, and no plot by Herod to kill Jesus. So is the story factually true? No. But as parable, is it true? For us as Christians, the answer is a robust affirmative. Is Jesus light shining in the darkness? Yes. Do the Herods of the world seek to extinguish the light? Yes. Does Jesus still shine in the darkness? Yes."

From The First Christmas, p. 184 (softcover): Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan (pubs. HarperCollins, 2009).

Neil L. Inglis, Editor, TSJ

Tyndale Rocks...

I'm heading off to Denver Colorado for the annual conference of the American Translators Association (October 27-30).

The world of translation is far removed from Tyndale's time of course, but Tyndale always has interesting things to teach modern translators.

Will keep you posted... Neil L. Inglis, Editor, TSJ