Talk:Yvain, the Knight of the Lion

On the English translation of the title
Copied from my talk page:

I appreciate that you cannot accept original research, and I don't really care that my paragraph about the issue of the proper translation of the title of Chretien's Yvain and its implications for interpretation is not acceptable, but what I said about the translation itself is not original research, it is a fact. Every other translator I know, except for Burton Raffel, rightly translates "au" as "with" (check William Kibler, Ruth Harwood Cline, even the old W.W. Comfort). If Chretien had wanted it to be "of," he would have used "du." This is a distinction that was true in Old French and is still true today, as any Frenchman would affirm. Every medieval French scholar and Arthurian is aware of the proper translation of "au" in this context, so much so that nobody has needed to write about it. Nevertheless, every time Wikipedia translates the title as The Knight of the Lion, both in the article on the romance and in the article on Chretien de Troyes, it is perpetuating an error.

Thank you. Alanbaragona (talk) 17:35, 21 December 2010 (UTC) Professor of English and Fine Arts VMI


 * Have these other translators published translations of "Yvain", or works about it? Has any scholar published comments on Burton Raffel's choice of title? These would be the reliable sources you need to change the article title at Wikipedia. I don't know the subject at all; I only got as far as seeing Amazon.com's image of the front cover with his chosen title. -- John of Reading (talk) 18:18, 21 December 2010 (UTC)


 * The scholars seem to be about split between "Knight with the Lion" and "Knight of the Lion". I don't think it's a matter of error; it's a matter of which form gets the sense better in the opinion of the translator, the direct translations (with) or the less direct (of). And it's not only translators who are split, but also scholars discussing or referencing the work, etc., dealing with the later adaptations, etc. I don't know how we should determine which is to be preferred, but it seems to me that one is not obviously more preferable in the sources compared to others.--Cúchullain t/ c 19:09, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but this is not a matter of preference, it's a matter of grammar. While it's true that some scholars and a very few translators call the work "The Knight of the Lion," this is a matter of carelessness. I would also point out that no scholars make an argument FOR translating "au" as "of the" here, they just do it, whereas scholars will point out the significance of Chretien's choice of "au" to mean "with" in its special sense. The usage in Old French was the same as in Modern French, and no Frenchman would use "a" when he wants to say "of"; he would say "de." Moreover, the only time "a" is used like this, it is to mean "with" in the sense of an intimate connection, either an inherent trait (like eye or hair color) or close comradeship, which makes this a significant choice by Chretien. I do now have a published document on this matter, a note in Ruth Harwood Cline's translation of "Yvain," widely regarded by medievalists as among the best, but I don't yet know how to insert a footnote into an article or, indeed, how to reinsert my revision without retyping the whole thing. I'm very new at this.--Alan Baragona