Madame De Stael

Corinne Madame De Stael

Whatever defects may exist in my attempt at rendering "Corinne" into English, be it remembered, that we have many words for one meaning-in French there are several significations for the same word. Repetition, an elegance in French, is a barbarism in English. Thus I had to contend with a tautology almost unmanageable, and even a reiteration of the same sentiments. Sentences, harmonious in French, lost all agreeable cadence, until entirely reconstructed. Madame de Staël's diffuse manner obliged me also to transpose pretty freely. I found, in so doing, many self-contradictions, some of which I could not efface. Her boldness of condensation, too, and love of vague, mysterious sublimity, often left me in doubt as to what might be hidden beneath the dazzling veil of her eloquence. It may appear profanation to have altered a syllable; but, having been accustomed to consult the taste of my own country, I could not outrage it by being more literal.