Michael Gilleland puts up a long quote about "conjectural emendation and proofreading" that ends hilariously this way:
In Malherbe's famous 'Rose, elle a vécu ce que vivent les roses.' 'Rose, elle' was originally a printer's error for the author's 'Rosette,' and to my mind one of the best things in all Herbert Spencer is the story that in the sentimental outgiving 'Pour connaître l'amour, il faut sortir de soi' the idealistic 'de soi' became in type the realistic 'le soir.'
I love it.
To translate that last part:
Pour connaître l'amour, il faut sortir de soi. = To know love, one must go outside of oneself.
Pour connaître l'amour, il faut sortir le soir. = To know love, one must go out every evening.
So we go from an idealistic understanding of love to a more John McCrarey-ish understanding of "love" as a salacious pursuit practiced every evening.
American rock songs famously confuse or conflate love and sex, so why not?
I love it! My life is either a literary masterpiece or a typographical error. Sometimes it feels like both!
ReplyDeleteI obviously don't know French (I'm still trying to master English), but it is funny how misplaced words or spelling errors can significantly change the intended meaning. Alas, when I think I've written words of wit and wisdom, my poor grammar (and punctuation) comes across as ignorance. But I keep trying!