Special Copies of Villette, Part 1 – Lewis Carroll’s

In libraries in the United States a few copies of Charlotte Brontë’s Villette can be found that once belonged to equally renowned authors. The Rosenbach Library in Philadelphia for instance has one that was part of the collection of books of Charles Dodgson (1832-1898), better known as Lewis Carroll, author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass. He must have loved Villette. He had two copies of the novel!

When Charles was eleven years old his family moved from Cheshire to Yorkshire, where his father, a vicar too, got a new and better position. They lived in Croft-on-Tees, near Darlington, but it also brought them sometimes to the Cathedral of Ripon, not that far from Haworth. At home he, like the Brontës, wrote domestic magazines. In 1846 he went to Rugby School, where he spent three unhappy years, and then he went to Oxford. For the rest of his life Dodgson would live there at Christ Church College.

One of Dodgson's rooms at Christ Church, Oxford

The Translations of Villette and The Professor – New Acquisitions Part 2 – 400 Comes Up

While doing more research for the China article, the last of the translations series published recently, I found several more previously unknown editions. China brought the total score to 396 editions that have been reported here.

Earlier, recently, a new 2016 Italian edition was found with both novels, and indeed the other Brontë novels too, Tutti I Romanzi. It was published by Newton & Compton (1920 pp.). It has the translation of Marcella Hanau of Villette, and a new translation of The Professor by Angela Ricci. It’s only the second book which has both novels in translation (counting as two translated editions).

Cover of the 2016 Italian Villette,
The Professor and the other
Brontë novels

And an Italian The Professor was discovered that was published on 1 February of this year, also by Newton & Compton (192 pp.). It is a second edition for the Angela Ricci translation. From a chronological point of view this is the 399th translated edition. (It appears that nr. 398 is the Swedish The Professor of October 2016.)

Villette and The Professor in China

The first Chinese Villette was published in 1932, in Shanghai, in a translation by Wu Guangjian (1867-1943). In 1930 his Wuthering Heights translation had been published. He also did Jane Eyre, it was published in 1935. Before that, in 1933, this Villette (or:  洛雪小姐遊學記; Luoxue xiao jie you xue ji), got a second edition, of which we know a bit more. It was published by Shanghai Commercial Press, in two volumes (290 and 306 pp.).

Cover of the first volume of the
1933 Chinese Villette

Worldcat has an edition of ‘192?’, but this is certainly a mistake. The 1933 work refers to the first edition of 1932 (or rather the 21st year of the new Chinese empire timetable).

The translation got a third edition in 1971, in Taiwan. It has already been described in an article of May 2016. Later I also explained that the title translates as ‘Miss Luo Snow’s study tour in the mind.’

The Translations of the Brontë Devoirs

When at the Pensionnat Heger in Brussels, Charlotte and Emily Brontë wrote quite a lot of essays, or devoirs, at the instruction of Monsieur Heger, in French. These compositions are not only an important part of the legacy of their time in Brussels, they are also “a crucial link between the juvenilia and the novels,” as Sue Lonoff put it in her The Belgian Essays, published in 1996 by Yale.

For the first time the texts of all the known manuscripts were published, also in English translations. Previously, some could be found in Elizabeth Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Brontë;  Enid Duthie's The Foreign Vision of Charlotte Brontë, and several articles in the Transactions of the Brontë Society.

Cover of Enid Duthie's
The Foreign Vision of Charlotte Brontë

The first separate publication of devoirs was Fannie Ratchford's and Loraine White Nagel's Emily Brontë. Five Essays Written in French, published in 1948 by the University of Texas Press (with a 1974 reprint by Folcroft from Pennsylvania; 19 pp.). Fannie Ratchford (1887-1974), an important Brontë historian of the mid-20th century, was the Librarian of the Rare Book Collections of the University of Texas in Austin, which has among its collection of Brontë manuscripts one of the devoirs. She was the author of The Brontës Web of Childhood, about the juvenilia, edited  Gondal's Queen: A Novel in Verse by Emily Jane Brontë (1955) and contributed to C.W. Hatfield’s edition of Emily’s poems (published in 1941) and the Oxford edition of the complete works of the Brontes. In 1960 she published an article in the Transactions with three more essays.

Cover of the 1948 Emily Brontë,
Five EssaysWritten in French

Photograph of Fannie Ratchford

Villette and The Professor in Korean

The first Korean Villette was published in 1996, in a translation by Joel Lee. It was published by Ch'angjak kwa Pip'yŏngsa from Seoul. The title gives the sound of Villette, Pillett'ŭ in a transcription. The second translation’s title in transcription is Billette. This work was published in two volumes, of 270 and 218 pages. The covers were identical (apart from nrs. 1 and 2).

Cover of the 1996 Korean Villette
(Painting: Johannes Vermeer - Woman 
reading a letter  (ca 1663))

Villette and The Professor in Iran

Villette
The first Villette translated in Persian (or Farsi; as far as I could gather) was published in 1992 by Insight (474 pp.). The translation was done by Farida Timurid. She also translated Shirley. The second edition was published in 1993. The covers couldn’t be found unfortunately.
The third, fourth and fifth editions were published in 2011, 2012 (probably) and 2013 respectively, by Secretary Press (486 pp.). They have the same cover. Only the year of the fourth has been given, 1390, which corresponds with March 2011 to March 2012. The third edition is from January 2011, the fifth from March 2013, so it seems fair to assume the fourth will be from about halfway between.

Cover of the 2011, 2012 and 2013
Iranian Villette

Villette and The Professor in Turkish

Turkey is unique in having, albeit abridged, both Villette and The Professor in one book, published in 1958 (410 pp.).  There were actually two editions of this work, published by Türkiye Yayınevi from Istanbul. This translation was done by Sayhan Bilbasar (1915-1999).
It is interesting that the jacket covers only give the The Professor title, Sevdiğim Adam, which translates as Favorite man. The book covers also give the Villette title, Istirap Yillary, or A Year of Suffering. One edition has a green cover, the other a reddish one. It’s not known which was published first.

Cover of the book jacket of the first
Turkish 1958 The Professor/Villette

A Celebration of Anne Brontë

Anne Brontë was born on 17 January 1820. To commemorate her birthday Eric has collected a few covers of her books.



Czechia, 1975

Finland, 1971

The Villette and The Professor Translations – New Acquisitions

In the last few months more translated editions of Villette and The Professor have been published. And recently two more Villettes were announced to be published in a few months time. These new acquisitions will be presented here, as well as an update on the statistical figures, showing what a successful year 2016 has been. It is for instance the best ever year for The Professor, with 12 editions so far.

A few months ago, at about the time the Brazil article was published, a second Brazilian 2016 Villette was published by Marin Claret from São Paulo. It was translated by Solange Pinheiro (856 pp.). She has also translated Wuthering Heights.

Cover of the second 2016 Brazilian
Villette

Back cover of the second 2016
Brazilian Villette

The translations – Wuthering Heights on 61 languages, Jane Eyre on 59

The amount of languages in which Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre have been translated has continued to expand. In the last updated version of the second translations analysis article of 24 November the score was 51-49. Emily Jane is still in the lead, still two ahead. Wuthering Heights is now on 61 languages, Jane Eyre on 59. (It’s a combined total of 67 languages.) In the revised article the new lists of languages can be seen.

There may be more languages in Asia and Africa for both that have not yet been discovered. And there will be new languages in upcoming years.

Cover of Wuthering Heights
in Bengali

The Professor in French, part three

It took until 1971 before a new Le Professeur was published, a new translation by Janine Rebersat et Jacques Papy. It was described earlier in the Switzerland article.

The second edition of the Tissier de Mallerais translation was published in 1982, again by Nouvelles Ėditions Latines. The cover is almost the same as the original one from 1946, the amount of pages is the same.

Cover of the 1982 French
The Professor

The Translations, a Statistical Analysis - Part Two, the Lists

All the Brontë novels
It’s an exciting race for the top scorer competition of the amount of languages. Wuthering Heights has taken the lead, with 51 languages. Jane Eyre has 49. But there must be more. As a comparison Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland can be given. It has 174 languages. Jane Eyre especially, who is almost as iconic as Alice, should be able to come considerably closer. It is interesting to note that Jane Eyre took a 11-1 lead in the 19th century, against Wuthering Heights.

Villette is a very good third, with 31 languages.  On fourth place come The Professor  and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, with 28. Shirley has 27. Agnes Grey is last, with 25. There will be more for them too.
One would think that the amount of translated editions of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Shirley and Agnes Grey come close to the amount of The Professor (150). I would guess that there are at least about 2500 translated editions of Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, each. Of both braille versions have also been found, but, especially because they are in English braille, these cannot be regarded as translations.

Update 29 December 2016. The latest scores are: Wuthering Heights 61, Jane Eyre 59, Villette 31, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall 30, Shirley 29, The Professor 28 and Agnes Grey 26.

In tables 8a-e you can see all the languages that have been found. The first two tables have the year in which the first translations of Villette and The Professor in a certain language was published.

Villette in French – Part Three

The first translation of Villette in French after (the abridged) La Maitresse d'Anglais was published in 1932 by Gallimard from Paris. It got to a remarkable seven editions that year, and a very good total of 23 editions altogether in 47 years. The 1932 and later editions, up to the fifteenth in 1949, probably all had (almost) the same cover.

Cover of the first 1949 French
Gallimard Villette

The translation was done by Albine Loisy and Brian Telford. Loisy-Léger (1909-?) also translated George Eliot's Middlemarch, Adam Bede and Silas Marner, and wrote two novels herself. Very little could be found about Telford.

The next editions that can be traced are the fifteenth and sixteenth from 1949. We don't know when exactly the eight to fourteenth editions were published. Gallimard introduced a new cover for the sixteenth edition.

Cover of the second 1949 French
Gallimard Villette

Nor can the 17th to 21st editions be found. The 22nd and 23rd were published in 1979. These covers couldn't be found too. The last one is said to be a facsimile reprint of the first 1932 edition. All these Gallimard editions seem to have had 630 pages. It may well be of course that there were only two different Gallimard covers, although there will have been more small variations. It is very remarkable and disappointing that so many editions are missing. In no other country has a Villette gone missing, let alone a dozen.

The Translations, a Statistical Analysis - Part one

Having found nearly all translations we can get a good picture of how Villette and The Professor in time spread around the world. About half of the translated Villette and The Professor editions were published in the last 30 years. Some of these years have been very productive, although there have been remarkably good years earlier too. These best years, and decades, will be revealed below. Among other aspects there is also a review of the total amount of languages for all of the Brontë novels.

Winning years
We’ll begin with giving the winning years. For both Villette and The Professor it was 2013, with 9 and 11 translated editions respectively. For Villette the years 1932 (thanks to one French translation) and 2011 come second with 7, while 1975 and 2008 come next with 6. In the The Professor competition 2016 is on second place with 10 translated editions, while 2005, 2009, 2014, and 2015 come joint third with 8. When the figures for both books are combined 2013 comes out as the clear winner, with 20. The years 2014, 2015 and 2016 are on third place with 13, followed by 2005 with 12. In tables 1, 2 and 3 more good years are shown for the novels in these competitions.

Update, 6 January 2017: The year 2016 has taken the lead in the The Professor competition, it is now on 12 editions. The year has also moved to sole second place for the two novels combined, with 16 editions. 


Click to enlarge

Decades
The years show a clear trend. It started quite slowly, but the amount of translated editions first really started to grow in the 1940s. It has been a quite regular growth since then, as this graph shows, as well as the accumulated total of translations of both novels. At present it is 218 for Villette and 170 for The Professor.

By 1920 The Professor had taken a 18-9 lead, but from then on till the end of the century Villette won every decade: 1920s, 4-0; 1930s, 13-2; 1940s, 16-12; 1950s, 15-7; 1960s, 15-3; 1970s, 29-10; 1980s, 16-5 and 1990s, 26-17 (Note: the year of publishing of 12 French Villettes is not known, 7 are from between 1933 and 1948, 5 between 1950 and 1978, these have been divided here over these 5 decades in this count. Three unknown editions of The Professor have been given to the 1940s, the 2000s and 2010s). In this century The Professor won the first decade, 43-35, and is in the lead in this present decade, 53-37. It is remarkable that this present decade is already the best scoring one, with more than 4 years to go.

In table 4 the full figures for the decades are given, and they're also shown in the second graph.

The 1970s
In the 1970s the score of translated editions more than doubled in comparison to the previous decade. It was the great leap forward for Villette. It is an interesting phenomenon that the novel owes much here to Eastern European, then communist countries. Out of 27 editions, 19 were published there, divided over 7 countries. Serbia was a clear winner with 7 Villettes. Croatia came second with 4. Germany is third with 3, with two from East Germany.

The following decades
The communists continued to show more interest in the 1980s. They had a majority in languages and editions. But Germany was the winning country, West-Germany, with 4. Remarkably, two years had no translation of Villette or The Professor at all, 1981 and 1988. The only other year to do that since 1943 was 1954.

Although communism fell in eastern Europe in 1989 the countries continued to dominate the statistics, with Villette majorities in the amount of languages (9 out of 15) and editions (16 out of 26) in the 1990s. It was helped by a Chinese edition, still a communist country. Russian was the individual winner, with 5 editions. German is second with 4. Russia scores a resounding victory in the 2000s, with 15 Villettes! The Netherlands come second with 3. The decade has 11 languages, and 34 editions. The 2010s have already got 17 languages for Villette, and 37 editions as well. Russian has taken a lead. It’s on 6 (editions). Italian is on 5 and Brazilian-Portuguese have 4.

Table 5 gives the winning decades for both novels together, tables 6 and 7 give the Villette and The Professor results.

Villette: Countries and translators
The Dutch language scores a resounding victory in the competition of the most different translations of Villette. It includes one translation that is probably Flemish. It has 7. Germany and France have 5, Italy has 4.

French is the winner in the race of languages with most editions, with 39, followed by Russian with 30. Germany has 20, Dutch has 12 and Hungarian is fifth with 11. Russia appears to have the best running single translation. It got to 27 editions!

Henriette Loreau is easily the winner in the longest running category. Her French translation of The Professor was first published in 1858, and last in 2016. That's a near-perfect score of 158 years! Tyyni Haapanen-Tallgren is on second place with a splendid 96 years with her Finnish Villette (1921-2017). Róża Centnerszwerowa comes third with 74 years, with her Polish Villette  (1939-2013). The first man is on fourth place. Gaston Baccara is on 68 years with his French Villette  (1945-2013). It will be very interesting of course to see what the score will look like in 40 years time.

Women easily win the translator competitions, as could be expected. They have most translations and editions. One translation was done by two men, the Arab Villette. Its cover drawing, joint nr. 1 in the cover top 6, was made by a woman, Safwa Farid, I recently learnt.

Eric Ruijssenaars
(with thanks to René van Oers for the tables and graphs, and for earlier efforts to make documents publishable on the blog.)

The Professor in Germany

The first German translation of The Professor was published in 1858 in Stuttgart, translated "Aus dem Englischen von Dr. Büchele", as it says on the title page.

Title page of the 1858 German The Professor

This edition was republished in facsimile form in 2015 by Reink Books, as a print on demand book. A 2016 copy has also been spotted (but we have not included it in the statistical analysis article for that year).

The second and only other translation was published for the first time in 1990, by Ars Vivendi from Cadolzburg (302 pp.). It was done by Gottfried Röckelein, who also translated Jane Eyre.

Cover of the 1990 German The Professor

Villette in Germany – Part two

After the two translations of Villette published in Berlin and Stuttgart in 1853, described earlier, it took until 1971 before a new translation, by Christiane Agricola, was published in Germany. So far it has reached 14 editions, the last one having been published in 2015. The two other translations in German were Swiss. Agricola (1927-2009), was from Leipzig, in (the former state of) East Germany. She also translated Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey, and Welsh and Scottish folk tales (even from Welsh apparently!).  

The first edition (686 pp.) was published by List from Leipzig. It had an afterword by Helmut Findeisen (from Dresden probably). One suspects that was a marxist interpretation of the novel. No doubt it is a good translation. It is nr. 8 on the list of longest running translations, with a fine 44 years between the first and (so far) last edition, making her the top scorer for the German language.

Cover of the 1971 Leipzig Villette

It was republished the next year by the same publisher, List, but this time in Munich, in West Germany. As it had only 657 pages, with no mention of an afterword, it must be that it was dropped.

Cover of the 1972 Munich Villette

Villette and The Professor in German and French. Part two - Switzerland

Villette

The story of Villette in Switzerland begins in April 1856, with an ad for La Maitresse d'Anglais, the Belgian-French (abridged) translation published in 1855. It’s just an internet find but it helps to give an idea about how the novel spread around Europe. In this case to the French speaking part of Switzerland.

Head of the Feuille d’avis de Neuchatel
 of 19 April 1856

Part of page 2 of the Feuille d’avis
de Neuchatel of 19 April 1856

The German speaking part of the country will have learnt about the novel earlier, in view of the 1853 German translations. The first new German translation of Villette came in 1947. It was published in
Zürich, Switzerland, by Manesse (584 pp.). As far as is known this is the oldest illustrated Villette cover of a translation. It took until 1971 before Germany had its first new translation. Switzerland also has French translations, and it’s even got a Swiss-Italian Jane Eyre.

Villette in Russian – Part Two

There were three editions of the translation in 2007. Two of them were published by AST Chranitelj from Moscow. The first of these had 525 pages and was 17 cm high, the second was 18 cm. 

Covers of the two 2007 AST
Russian Villettes
(Painting: Karl Bryullov - Portrait
of Princess Elizabeta Saltykova (1841))

The third Villette of 2007 was published by Eksmo (605 pp.)

Cover of the 2007 Eksmo
Russian Villette
(Painting: Heinrich Maria Hess -
Portrait of Fanny Gail (1820-1))

Villette in Russian – Part One

The first translation of Villette was published in 1853. In 1856 and 1860 a translation of La Maitresse d’Anglais was published. These have been described earlier in Nastavnitsa ili pansion v brussele.
The first of 27 editions of a new Russian translation of Villette was published in 1983, as Городок (Gorodok, pronounced as Garadok), which means little city. The first half was translated by A. or L. Orel.  In most cases the name A. Orel is given, in the other cases L. Orel. It has not been possible to find out anything more about this person, but he or she also translated Shakespeare. The second half of the novel was translated by Elisabeta Jakovlena Surits.
The 1983 edition was published in Moscow, had 559 pages and an introduction by N. Michalskoy.

Cover of the 1983 Russian Villette

The second edition was published in 1990 by Pravda from Moscow, with the Michalskoy introduction. It had 477 pages.

Cover of the 1990 Russian Villette

Villette and The Professor on the Balkan – Part Two

In this article the translations of Villette and The Professor that were published in the countries of the former Yugoslavia will be described, except for those from Slovenia (and Macedonia), which were dealt with in the previous article. In these countries – Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia-Hercegovina and Montenegro – it is essentially Serbo-Croatian that is being spoken, which, incidentally, I forgot to mention in the  list of languages that have a Villette translation. Because Serbian and Croatian can now be regarded as two languages – both have their own translations - it means that the amount of languages for that novel is raised to 31.

Montenegro
The first Villette in (Cyrillic) Serbo-Croatian was published in 1956 in Montenegro, in the town of Cetinje. It was published in two volumes, of 303 and 291 pages, translated by Tadija Gavrilović, and published in three versions, with red, blue and violet covers.

Cover of the 1956 Montenegrin Villette

Cover of the 1956 Montenegrin Villette

Cover of the 1956 Montenegrin Villette