Editing François Villon (section)

== English translation ==

=== Complete works ===

George Heyer (1869–1925; father of novelist [[Georgette Heyer]]) published a translation in 1924. [[Oxford University Press]] brought out ''The Retrospect of Francois Villon: being a Rendering into English Verse of huitains I TO XLI. Of Le Testament and of the three Ballades to which they lead'', transl. George Heyer (London, 1924). On 25 December 1924 it was reviewed in ''[[The Times Literary Supplement]]'', p.&nbsp;886 and the review began "It is a little unfortunate that this translation of Villon should appear only a few months after the excellent rendering made by Mr. J. Heron Lepper. Mr. Heyer's work is very nearly as good, however: he makes happy use of quaint words and archaic idioms, and preserves with admirable skill the lyrical vigour of Villon's huitains. It is interesting to compare his version with Mr. Lepper's: both maintain a scholarly fidelity to the original, but one notes with a certain degree of surprise the extraordinary difference which they yet show." George Heyer was a fluent and idiomatic French speaker and the French and English are printed on opposite pages. The book also contains a number of historical and literary notes.

{{interlanguage link|John Heron Lepper|qid=Q59626737}} published a translation in 1924.<ref>{{cite book | first = François | last = Villon | translator-first = John Heron | translator-last = Lepper | title = The Testaments of François Villon | year = 1926 | location = New York | publisher = Boni and Liveright}}</ref> Another translation is one by Anthony Bonner, published in 1960.<ref name=Bonner /> One drawback common to these English older translations is that they are all based on old editions of Villon's texts: that is, the French text that they translate (the Longnon-Foulet edition of 1932) is a text established by scholars some 80 years ago.{{citation needed|date=January 2021}}

A translation by the American poet [[Galway Kinnell]] (1965) contains most of Villon's works but lacks six shorter poems of disputed provenance.<ref>{{cite book | first = François | last = Villon | translator-first = Galway | translator-last = Kinnell | title = The Poems of François Villon | year = 1982 | location = Hanover | publisher = University Press of New England}}</ref> Peter Dale's verse translation (1974) follows the poet's rhyme scheme.{{citation needed|date=January 2021}}

Barbara Sargent-Baur's complete works translation (1994) includes 11 poems long attributed to Villon but possibly the work of a medieval imitator.{{citation needed|date=January 2021}}

A new English translation by David Georgi came out in 2013.<ref>{{cite book | last = Georgi | first = David | title = Poems of François Villon | location = Evanston, Illinois, USA | publisher = Northwestern University Press | year = 2013}}</ref> The book also includes Villon's French, printed across from the English. Notes in the back provide a wealth of information about the poems and about medieval Paris. "More than any translation, Georgi's emphasizes Villon's famous gallows humor...his word play, jokes, and puns".<ref name=TruthDig />

=== Selections ===

Translations of three Villon poems were made in 1867 by [[Dante Gabriel Rossetti]].<ref name="Rossetti-1870">{{cite book | first = Dante Gabriel | last = Rossetti | author-link=Dante Gabriel Rossetti |chapter=Three Translations From François Villon, 1450 |chapter-url=http://www.rossettiarchive.org/docs/1-1870.1stedn.rad.html#A.R.VILLON | title=Poems (1870) |date=1872 | edition = Sixth | publisher=F. S. Ellis | location=London | url = http://www.rossettiarchive.org/docs/1-1870.6thedn.radheader.html | pages = 177–181 | access-date=23 July 2013}}</ref> These three poems were "central texts" to Rossetti's 1870 book of ''Poems'', which explored themes from the far past, mid-past, and modern time.<ref name=Rossetti-ScholarlyCommentary>{{cite web | url = http://www.rossettiarchive.org/docs/49-1869.raw.html | title = Scholarly Commentary | work = 1870 Poems First Edition text | publisher = Rossetti Archive | date = n.d. | access-date = 31 March 2020}}</ref> Rossetti used "The Ballad of Dead Ladies"; "To Death, of his Lady"; and "His Mother's Service to Our Lady".<ref name=Rossetti-ScholarlyCommentary />

[[William Ernest Henley|W.E. Henley]], while editing ''[[iarchive:slangitsanalogue01farmuoft/page/n8|Slang and its analogues]]'' translated two ballades into English criminal slang as "Villon's Straight Tip to All Cross Coves" and "Villon’s Good-Night".

American poet [[Richard Wilbur]], whose translations from French poetry and plays were widely acclaimed, also translated many of Villon's most famous ballades in ''Collected Poems: 1943–2004''.<ref name=Wilbur-Ladies />

=== Where are the snows of yesteryear? ===
The phrase "Where are the snows of [[wikt:yesteryear|yester-year]]?" is one of the most famous lines of translated poetry in the English-speaking world.<ref>{{cite book | contributor-first = William Carlos | contributor-last = Williams | contribution = Introduction | first = François | last= Villon | translator-first = Anthony | translator-last = Bonner | title = The Complete Works of François Villon | location = New York | publisher = Bantam | year = 1960 | quote = By a single line of verse in an almost forgotten language, Medieval French, the name of Villon goes on living defiantly; our efforts, as we seem to try to efface it, polish and make it shine the more. What is that secret that has escaped with a mere question, deftly phrased, the profundity of the ages: ''Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan?'' All that has been forgotten (or better said, all that would gladly have been forgotten) by the poet Villon in his fifteenth-century France has remained so vividly alive, present in everything we are, that it lives on in answer to that eternal question.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2013/04/great-lines-ldquowhere-are-the-snows-of-yesteryearrdquo | title = Great Lines: "Where are the snows of yesteryear?" | first = Micah | last = Mattix | date = 12 April 2013 | work = First Things | access-date = 31 March 2020}}</ref><ref name=TruthDig>{{cite web | url = https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-poems-of-francois-villon/ | title = The Poems of François Villon | first = Allen | last = Barra | date = 18 January 2014 | work = TruthDig | access-date = 31 March 2020}}</ref> It is the refrain in "The Ballad of Dead Ladies", [[Dante Gabriel Rossetti]]'s translation<ref name="Rossetti-1870" /> of Villon's 1461 "[[Ballade des dames du temps jadis]]". In the original the line is: "Mais où sont les neiges d'antan?" ["But where are the snows of yesteryear?"].

Richard Wilbur published his translation of the same poem, which he titled "Ballade of the Ladies of Time Past",<ref name=Wilbur-Ladies /> in his ''Collected Poems: 1943–2004''. In his translation, the refrain is rendered as: "But where shall last year's snow be found?"<ref name=Wilbur-Ladies>{{cite book | first = Richard | last = Wilbur | title = Collected Poems: 1943–2004 | year = 2004 | publisher = Harcourt Inc. | location = Orland etc. | isbn = 0-15-101105-2 | page = [https://archive.org/details/collectedpoems1900wilb/page/251 251] | url = https://archive.org/details/collectedpoems1900wilb| url-access = registration }}</ref>