Moonlight Addendum

Andrew Clarke from proust@yahoogroups has graciously allowed me to use some recently posted comments on the moonlight passage, in which he takes a crack at his own translation.

After I mentioned that I was using the1934 Scott-Moncrieff edition published by Modern Library, Andrew gave me a word of advice:

Put that ol' translation in the Nostalgia section of your library and get
the Kilmartin/Enright instead!

Noted -- in fact, I think I'll try to pick up one soon.

For those of you who can follow it, I've taken the risk of reprinting what I believe is the original passage in French -- begging your forgiveness for any mangled accent marks -- then Scott-Moncrieff's version, and then Andrew's comments, all of which were quite helpful in continuing to untangle this passage:

J'ouvris la fenetre sans bruit et m'assis au pied de mon lit; je ne faisais presque aucun mouvement afin qu'on ne m'entendit pas d'en bas. Dehors, les choses semblaient, elles aussi, figees en une muette attention a ne pas troubler le clair de lune, qui doublant et reculant chaque chose par l'extension devant elle de son reflet, plus dense et concret qu'elle-meme, avait a la fois aminci et agrandi le paysage comme un plan replie jusque-la, qu'on developpe. Ce qui avait besoin de bouger, quelque feuillage de marronnier, bougeait. Mais son frissonnement minutieux, total, execute jusque dans ses moindres nuances et ses dernieres delicatesses, ne bavait pas sur le reste, ne se fondait pas avec lui, restait circonscrit. Exposes sur ce silence qui n'en absorbait rien, les bruits les plus eloignes, ceux qui devaient venir de jardins situes a l'autre bout de la ville, se percevaient detailles avec un tel "fini" qu'ils semblaient ne devoir cet effet de lointain qu'a leur pianissimo, comme ces motifs en sourdine si bien executes par l'orchestre du Conservatoire que quoiqu'on n'en perde pas une note on croit les entendre cependant loin de la salle du concert et que tous les vieux abonnes,--les soeurs de ma grand'mere aussi quand Swann leur avait donne ses places,--tendaient l'oreille comme s'ils avaient ecoute les progres lointains d'une armee en marche qui n'aurait pas encore tourne la rue de Trevise.

Scott-Moncrieff:

"Noiselessly I opened the window and sat down on the foot of my bed; hardly daring to move in case they should hear me from below. Things outside seemed also fixed in mute expectation, so as not to disturb the moonlight which, duplicating each of them and throwing it back by the extension, forwards, of a shadow denser and more concrete than its substance, had made the whole landscape seem at once thinner and longer, like a map which, after being folded up, is spread out upon the ground. What had to move—a leaf of the chestnut-tree, for instance—moved. But its minute shuddering, complete, finished to the least detail and with utmost delicacy of gesture, made no discord with the rest of the scene, and yet was not merged in it, remaining clearly outlined. Exposed upon this surface of silence, which absorbed nothing from them, the most distant sounds, those which must have come from gardens at the far end of the town, could be distinguished with such exact `finish' that the impression they gave of coming from a distance seemed due only to their 'pianissimo' execution, like those movements on muted strings so well performed by the orchestra of the Conservatoire that, although one does not lose a single note, one thinks all the same that they are being played somewhere outside, a long way from the concert hall, so that all the old subscribers, and my grandmother's sisters too, when Swann had given them his seats, used to strain their ears as if they had caught the distant approach of an army on the march, which had not yet rounded the corner of the Rue de Trevise."

In the following, Andrew puts asterisks to "words that are dubious translations or just not there in the original..."

"Noiselessly I opened the window and sat down on the foot of my bed; hardly *daring* to move in case they should hear me from below. Things outside seemed also fixed in mute *expectation*, so as not to disturb the moonlight which, duplicating each of them and *throwing* it back by the extension, *forwards*, of a *shadow* denser and more concrete than *its substance*, had made the whole landscape seem at once thinner and *longer*, like a map which, after being folded up, is spread out *upon the ground*. What had to move—a leaf of the chestnut-tree, for instance—moved. But its minute *shuddering*, complete, finished to the least detail and with utmost delicacy *of gesture*, made *no discord* with the rest of the scene, and yet was not merged in it, remaining clearly outlined. Exposed upon this surface of silence, which absorbed nothing from them, the most distant sounds, those which must have come from gardens at the far end of the town, could be distinguished with such exact `finish' that the impression they gave of coming from a distance seemed due only to their 'pianissimo' execution, like those *movements* on muted *strings* so well performed by the orchestra of the Conservatoire that, although one does not lose a single note, one thinks all the same that they are being played somewhere outside ..."

Here's a fairly literal translation, with my interpolations in brackets:

I opened the window without a sound and sat at the foot of my bed. I made hardly any movement, in order not to be heard down below. Things seemed (they too) frozen in mute attentiveness so as not to trouble the moonlight which -- by doubling and moving back each thing, by placing that thing's own reflection (1) in front of it and then elongating the reflection, more dense and more more concrete than the thing itself -- rendered the landscape more thin (2) and more extended, like a map which up to now had been folded up, but which was now unfolded and spread out. What needed to move -- some leaves on a chestnut tree -- moved. But this trembling (3), [an action] minutely detailed and complete [in itself], and carried out to every nuance and every last delicacy, made no smudge on the rest [of the scene], did not merge into it, remained [distinctly] outlined. Exposed upon this silence, which absorbed nothing of them, the most distant noises (which must have come from gardens at the far end of town) were perceptible in such detail -- with such 'finish' -- that they seemed to owe the effect of distance only to their 'pianissimo' like those passages for muted instruments (4), played so well by the orchestra at the Conservatoire that although one does not lose a single note, one thinks all the same that they are being played a long way off  ...

Notes:

1. 'Reflet', not 'ombre', 'reflection', not, as one would anticipate, 'shadow'. This passage -- like much of Proust -- is easier to work out in the French, because the grammatical gender sorts out what refers to the moonlight (masculine) and what refers to the things (feminine).

2. 'amaigri' 'made thin' or 'made to look thin'. The simile between the thinner landscape and the thinner map doesn't really work. I wonder if by
'amaigri' Proust meant 'made flatter' or or even 'made less palpable'?

3. The French word can mean either "shudder" or "tremble" . Maybe Scott Moncrieff has seen a leaf shuddering, but I haven't ...

4. The French is simply 'en sourdine', 'con sordini'. SM adds 'strings' but it could be the brass section instead or as well.

And of course I acknowledge a little help from V. Nabokov et al.

Andrew Clarke