de Quevedo and de Leon

[frn]

Hi all.

I´m new to this forum and found it while I was looking for some information about where to find English translations of some Spanish works.

Maybe you can help me.

I´m looking for English translations of :

* Francisco de Quevedos "Satirical letter of Censure" (Sermon estoico de censura moral)

* The poems of Fray Luis de Leon.

Any help would be appreciated.

[stlukesguild]

For Spanish poetry of this period I have three anthologies. Most recently there is The Golden Age: Poems of the Spanish Renaissance tr. by Edith Grossman, who also made the wonderful recent translation of Don Qixote. This volume includes several poems by Fray Luis de Leon and Quevedo. The two other anthologies are older; one entitled Ten Centuries of Spanish Poetry is edited by Eleanor L. Turnbull and the other entitled An Anthology of Spanish Poetry from Garcilaso to Garcia Lorca in edited by Angel Flores. Both are of mixed quality in terms of the merits of the translations... but they do offer some decent work by Edwin Morgan, W.S. Merwin, Roy Campbell, H.W. Longfellow, Lord Byron, etc... The Angel Flores anthology contains the Quevedo poem you seek translated by Denise Levertov... while both volumes contain a reasonable selection of both poets's works.

[quasimodo1]

to frn: You might find some of your poems posted in bilingual form here... http://books.google.com/books?id=T3j3ygr3Qm8C&pg=PA29&lpg=PA29&dq=Fray+Luis+de+Leon&source=web&ots=LvMST2D8y3&sig=JYvhTrmZZPuaugYvBUIvsrL50XE&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=7&ct=result#PPA10,M1

[frn]

Thank you both for your help!

[Pecksie]

No idea about English translations, but congratulations on your choices! Quevedo is great at both satire, where he could be quite savage (see his poem 'To a Nose'), and 'serious' poetry (see for instance his poem in honor of the Duke of Osuna). There's a very interesting study somewhere in the cyberspace about his treatment of erotic dreams.

As for Fray Luis, who can fail to love this man! After I don't know how many years in an Inquisition dungeon, he was released and allowed to go back to teaching. On his first day of class in charge of his former chair at the University of Salamanca, after that long absence, he began his lesson with the words, 'As we were saying yesterday...' :)