The Astonishment of Words

<p>One two! one two! And through and through<br> The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!<br> He left it dead and with its head<br> He went galumphing back.</p> <p>Un deux un deux par le milieu<br> Le glaive vorpal fait pat-à-pan!<br> La bête défaite avec sa tête<br> Il rentre gallomphant.</p> <p>Eins Zwei! Eins Zwei! Und durch und durch<br> Seins vorpals Schwert zerschniferschnück.<br> Da blieb es todt! Er Kopf in Hand<br> Geläumfig zog zurück!</p> <p>The late Victor Proetz was by vocation a visual artist who created many distinguished architectural and decorative designs. His favorite avocation however was to explore the possibilities (and impossibilities) of words especially words in translation and to share his discoveries. As Alastair Reid says in his foreword He turned words over in his head he listened to them he unraveled them he looked them up he played with them he passed them on like presents all with an unjadeable astonishment.</p> <p>What Proetz wondered do some of the familiar and not-so-familiar works of English and American literature sound like in French? In German? How he asked do you say 'Yankee Doodle' in French-if you can? And How do they say 'Hounyhnhnm' and 'Cheshire Cat' and things like that in German? And in either language How in God's name can you possibly say 'There she blows!'?</p> <p>This book unfortunately left incomplete on his death in 1966 contains many of his answers. They are given not only in the assembled texts and translations but also in his wry curious sometimes hilarious commentaries. None of it is scholarly in any formal academic sense-and yet Reid reminds us his is precisely the kind of enthusiastic curiosity that gives scholarship its pointers.</p>