The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English. In two parts.

CAROLINO, Pedro.

Verlag: Peking (Paris): and to the house of all the booksellers of Paris. 1869, 1869

Series title; leaves a little crimped. 19thC half brown calf; sl. rubbed, boards a little dulled & marked. Armorial bookplate of Charles Lancelot Shadwell. An earlier edition entitled O novo guia da conversação em Portuguez e Inglez, ou escolha de dialogos familiares was published in 1855; this is the first edition with the English title. Copac records the BL, NLS & Cambridge only; OCLC records the later 1883 edition only. One of the greatest tragicomedies in the history of translation. Commonly known as 'English As She is Spoke', Carolino used a French-English dictionary to translate from a Portuguese-French phrase book. The comic results were aptly summed up by Mark Twain: 'Nobody can add to the absurdity of this book, nobody can imitate it successfully, nobody can hope to produce its fellow; it is perfect'. The inserted auction catalogue entry describes this work as 'a most ludicrous attempt to teach English by two foreigners. Hardly a line of English can be read without laughing at the ridiculous attempt to translate the Portuguese into English'. In the section of dialogues on books and reading are the following indispensable phrases: 'what read you there?'; 'Now one is overflowed of these sort of stitchings'; 'you have there a library too many considerable, it is a proof your love for the learnings'. A typical translation of an anecdote reads: 'A tavern-keeper not had fail to tell their boys, spoken of these which drank at home since you will understand: Those gentlemen to sing in chorus, give them the less quality's wine'. And so on and so on. A classic bizarre book. Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers 97304

Bibliografische Details

Titel: The New Guide of the Conversation in ...
Verlag: Peking (Paris): and to the house of all the booksellers of Paris. 1869
Erscheinungsdatum: 1869
Einband: Softcover
Auflage: 1. Auflage