Randall Buth at biblicalulpan.org (don't I wish) notes - as long as we're off
topic -
>>To what may this be compared?
English and German are sister languages like Arabic and Hebrew.
German Shakespeare is good,
English Shakespeare is Shakespeare.<<
German Shakespeare is "unser Shakespeare". The early 19th century
translations of Shakespeare made by August Wilhelm Schlegel and Ludwig (or
was it Ursula - sorry - I'm on the road today, and my major in German is
nearing a half century in the past) really make Shakespeare a living writer
for Germans, even more than he is for English speakers. Schlegel and Tieck do
a remarkable job of creating a Shakespearian verse style in German:
Mitbürger, Freunde, Römer, hört mich an!
Begraben will ich Cäsarn, nicht ihn preisen.
When I was in high school reading Shakespeare in the original, I used to use
Schlegel-Tieck for notes - they always come up with some kind of a meaning,
even for the most corrupt passages - though they aren't always right.
But this is what literary or scriptural translation has to be - the
re-creation of a voice in a new world. Biblical translators do have the
special advantage of being informed by the Spirit.