On Mon, 27 Mar 2000 21:08:11 -0600, Jake wrote:
 
>meaningless squabbles over the
>relative merits of completely unrelated books (i.e., the Seamus Heaney
>discussion) 
 
Dear Jake, you're right, of course, that Heaney is not Pound, so the
thread is a step away from the focus of this list. But the actual
discussion on Heaney's Beowulf (it hasn't actually become a
meaningless squabble yet, tho I'm sure we're all working on it) seems
to me fairly relevant to issues which Poundians must find central
(it's significant that one of the earlier Beowulf translators
mentioned is a respected Poundian): what do you try to make or save
when you translate? The answers so far on this list - tho in no way
"unified" - imply a, hmm, flavour such as I haven't found in other
discussions of H's B: it's distinctly hands-on, rather than, uh,
academic, and it's distinctly concerned with sound values. I think
that hands-on sound approach ties in nicely with Pound's concerns. I'm
not one to nurture the thread beyond its natural life, but it seems to
me that it might at any moment lead directly into consideration of P's
translations, and that even if it doesn't, it already carries
implications in that direction which shouldn't be ignored.
 
Richard