The Heptameron (Classic Reprint) - Tapa blanda

Excerpt from The Heptameron

A Duke of Florence would have his friend prostitute his sister to him; but in place of love meets with death.

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Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Heptameron

In attempting a new version of the "Heptameron" the translator has endeavoured - 1, to preserve as closely as possible the sense of the original; 2, to give the work a thoroughly English dress, and not merely to transfer the idioms of one language into those of another. The Queen of Navarre made use of a style marked by a quaint redundancy, and every page teems with repetitions which would not be tolerated in a modern book. Indeed, the reader is now and again reminded of the Law Reports, so determined was the writer to be understood by posterity, a peculiarity which the translator has, to the best of his ability, reproduced. But though the work is calculated to remind readers rather of Walton than Macaulay, it by no means lays claim to an antiquarian accuracy; "thou," "thee," "hath," &c., would, if pertinaciously adhered to throughout, become tedious, and be resented as a needless and irritating piece of affectation.

The present translator was, indeed, all the more impelled to choose an older form of English, after examining the version of Mr. W. K. Kelly (now out of print), originally published by the late Mr. H. G. Bohn in 1855, and afterwards by Messrs. George Bell and Sons, in which, from one end of the book to the other, not the slightest attempt is made to reproduce the quaint diction of the original. Slipshod in style, erroneous and unscholarlike in rendering, this translation, besides its grievous sins of commission, to which we shall I presently return, is guilty also of sins of omission, excusable only on the ground of parsimony on the part of the original publisher.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.