An Essay Toward a History of Shakespeare in Norway | Page 7

Fru, d'er dan eg held i Hugen; aa, giv ho
hadde vist dat, at ho er dat! Ho talar, utan Ord. Kvat skal ho med dei?
Ho tala kann med Augom;--eg vil svara. Eg er for djerv; d'er inkje meg
ho ser paa, d'er tvo av fegste Stjernom dar paa Himlen, som gekk ei
Ærend, og fekk hennar Augo te blinka i sin Stad, til dei kem atter. Enn
um dei var dar sjølve Augo hennar. Kinn-Ljosken hennar hadde skemt
dei Stjernor, som Dagsljos skemmer Lampen; hennar Augo hadd'
straatt so bjart eit Ljos i Himmels Høgdi, at Fuglar song og Trudde, dat
var Dag. Sjaa, kor ho hallar Kinni lint paa Handi, Aa, giv eg var ein
Vott paa denne Handi at eg fekk strjuka Kinni den.--Ho talar.-- Aa tala

meir, Ljos-Engel, med du lyser so klaart i denne Natti kring mitt Hovud,
som naar dat kem ein utfløygd Himmels Sending mot Folk, som keika
seg og stira beint upp med undrarsame kvit-snudd' Augo mot han, naar
han skrid um dan seinleg-sigand' Skyi og sigler yver høge Himmels
Barmen.
It was no peasant jargon that Aasen had invented; it was a literary
language of great power and beauty with the dignity and fulness of any
other literary medium. But it was new and untried. It had no literature.
Aasen, accordingly, set about creating one. Indeed, much of what he
wrote had no other purpose. What, then, shall we say of the first
appearance of Shakespeare in "Ny Norsk"?
First, that it was remarkably felicitous.
Kinn-Ljosken hadde skemt dei Stjernor som Dagsljos skemmer
Lampen, hennar Augo, etc.
That is no inadequate rendering of:
Two of the fairest stars in all the Heaven, etc.
And equally good are the closing lines beginning:
Aa tala meir, Ljos-Engel med du lyser, etc.
Foersom is deservedly praised for his translation of the same lines, but
a comparison of the two is not altogether disastrous to Aasen, though,
to be sure, his lines lack some of Foersom's insinuating softness:
Tal atter, Lysets Engel! thi du straaler i Natten saa høiherlig over mig
som en af Nattens vingede Cheruber for dødeliges himmelvendte Øine,
etc.
But lines like these have an admirable and perfect loveliness:
naar han skrid um dan seinleg-sigand' Skyi og sigler yver høge
Himmels Barmen.

Aasen busied himself for some years with this effort to naturalize his
Landsmaal in all the forms of literature. Apparently this was always
uppermost in his thoughts. We find him trying himself in this sort of
work in the years before and after the publication of _Prøver af
Landsmaalet_. In Skrifter i Samling is printed another little fragment of
Romeo and Juliet, which the editor, without giving his reasons, assigns
to a date earlier than that of the balcony scene. It is Mercutio's
description of Queen Mab (Act I, Sc. 4). This is decidedly more
successful than the other. The vocabulary of the Norwegian dialects is
rich in words of fairy-lore, and one who knew this word treasure as
Aasen did could render the fancies of Mercutio with something very
near the exuberance of Shakespeare himself:
No ser eg vel, at ho hev' vore hjaa deg ho gamle Mabba, Nærkona aat
Vettom. So lita som ein Adelstein i Ringen paa fremste Fingren paa ein
verdug Raadsmann, ho kjøyrer kring med smaa Soldumbe-Flokar paa
Nasanna aat Folk, dan Tid dei søv. Hjulspikann' henna er av
Kongleføter, Vognfelden er av Engjesprette-Vengjer, og Taumann' av
den minste Kongleveven. Av Maanestraalanne paa Vatn er Selen, og av
Sirissebein er Svipeskafted og Svipesnerten er av Agner smaa.
Skjotskaren er eit nett graakjola My so stort som Holva av ein liten Mòl,
som minste Vækja krasa kann med Fingren. Til Vogn ho fekk ei holut
Haslenot av Snikkar Ikorn elder Natemakk, som altid var
Vognmakarann' aat Vettom.[15]
[15. Ivar Aasen: Skrifter i Samling. Christiania. 1911, Vol. I, p. 166.]
The translation ends with Mercutio's words:
And being thus frightened, swears a prayer or two, And sleeps again.
In my opinion this is consummately well done--at once accurate and
redolent of poesy; and certainly Aasen would have been justified in
feeling that Landsmaal is equal to Shakespeare's most airy passages.
The slight inaccuracy of one of the lines:
Av Maanestraalanne paa Vatn er Selen,

for Shakespeare's:
The colors of the moonshine's watery beams,
is of no consequence. The discrepancy was doubtless as obvious to the
translator as it is to us.
From about the same time we have another Shakespeare fragment from
Aasen's hand. Like the Queen Mab passage, it was not published till
1911.[16] It is scarcely surprising that it is a rendering of Hamlet's
soliloquy: "To be or not to be." This is, of course, a more difficult
undertaking. For the interests that make up the life of the people--their
family and community affairs, their arts and