My Life (Oxford World's Classics)

Rating:
Summary: Ian Myles Slater on: A Benvenuto (Welcome) New Version
Review: This much-translated book is the story, in his own words, of a real person whose life seems more like fiction. For clarity, I am going to offer readers unfamiliar with the work some facts, before briefly describing the excellent Oxford World's Classics version (the sixth in English), translated and annotated by the team of Julia Conaway Bondanella and Peter Bondanella. I hope that this will help others find their way through a confusing bibliography. (Those familiar with Cellini should skip to the end.)

Benvenuto Cellini, Florentine goldsmith, sculptor, and enthusiastic self-promoter, can safely be described as a man of the sixteenth century, since he was, conveniently, born, in November 1500, and died in February 1571. Other statements about him, however truthful, often sound like fiction. The autobiography he wrote and (he says mainly) dictated between 1558 and 1566 breaks off in November 1562. It covers several tumultuous decades in later Renaissance and early Counter-Reformation Italy, with excursions into the Swiss Alps and France. Alongside Cellini's frequent descriptions of his own prowess as an artist, a duelist and brawler, and a lover, it is notable for Cellini's almost equally frequent confrontations with celebrated figures; it sometimes seems the most appropriate title would be "And Then I *Told-Off * the Pope, the Emperor, the King and Queen, the Duke and Duchess, and the Judge." Amazingly, a lot of it can be confirmed from contemporary documents; Cellini's penchant for getting into trouble, and the fact that he worked in precious metals, both helped leave paper trails.

Cellini's treatises on goldsmithing and sculpture were published in his lifetime and include autobiographical passages; his account of his life had a limited circulation in manuscript, including one corrected by his own hand, until it was published, from an inferior copy, in 1728. A series of Italian critical and popular editions have followed, up to the present. He has yet to achieve the status of Michelangelo and Raphael, which he coveted, but he is being read. His great bronze statue of Perseus, the casting of which he told and retold, was recently restored. Unfortunately, this was soon overshadowed by the theft of his last surviving goldwork, the "salt-cellar" he created for Francis I of France (not the original patron for which it was designed, as usual).

The first English translation, by Thomas Nugent, appeared in 1771. A German rendering (serialized beginning in 1796, according to the Bondanellas), published in book form in 1798, ensured the work immediate European attention; the translator was Goethe, THE international best-selling celebrity author of the age. A second English version, by Thomas Rosco, appeared in 1822 ("Memoirs"). By this time a specifically Romantic vision of Cellini was developing, immortalized in Hector Berlioz's splendid opera of 1838, "Benvenuto Cellini." (Was Berlioz's own highly entertaining autobiography influenced by Cellini's example? Or Goethe's?)

The classic rendering in English, by John Addington Symonds, "The Life of Benvenuto Cellini, Written by Himself," was published in 1888. The Bondanellas attribute Cellini's present fame in the English-speaking world to this translation. It has certainly appeared in a variety of forms, including abridgments, and under various titles, and is sometimes listed by editor. It is still in print; there is a Gutenberg e-text available on-line, which is easily searchable, but you need to know Symonds' renderings of Cellini's sixteenth-century spellings of names. (There was even an edition of the Symonds translation illustrated by -- Salvador Dali!)

Unfortunately, the popularity of Symonds' translation overshadowed a richly documented fourth translation, with extensive commentary, by Robert H. Hobart Cust, published in 1910 (as "The Life of ... "); I remember consulting its notes in a library reserve copy, but have no impression of its quality as a translation. (I also have no idea why Dover never picked it up for reprinting, when they offered a translation of the Treatises.) According to the Bondanellas, Cust's version is still, for most purposes, *the* scholarly edition, in any language (Italian included), although more often used than cited.

Since 1956, editions of Symonds have had to compete with George Bull's translation, for the Penguin Classics, as "The Autobiography," which also was the basis of a Folio Society illustrated edition of 1970. Bull's version seems to be regarded as more accurate than Symonds'. Some (myself included) prefer Symonds' prose style; I have adapted much of this review from my notes comparing these two versions. (In revising, I have drawn heavily on the Bondanella's documentation, using their spellings and dates for other translators and editions.) Unhappily, like most Penguin editions of its vintage, it lacked notes or an index; a limited bibliography was supplied in some later printings. It was not until 1999 that the Penguin Classics edition was reissued in a revised version, with extensive notes and a detailed index. There are slight changes in pagination between the two editions of the Penguin translation, but it is my impression that Bull's translation was supplemented, rather than extensively revised. The Penguin edition may or may not be in print as you read this; anyone ordering a used copy should be aware of the difference. (The last page of the original version is 397, of the revised is 496.) For the notes and index, I prefer the 1999 edition to any form of the Symonds translation currently available. And now there is a third choice.

The Bondanella translation is based on the latest critical editions of the Italian text, and, quite explicitly, on Cust's documentation and explication. I am delighted with the result. The translation is more to my taste than that of Bull, or even Symonds. The Introduction and Chronology are clear, and the Select Bibliography is an invitation to further reading. The index is extremely useful. The annotations are tightly integrated with the text, and concisely explain allusions, identify people, supply facts, and answer many questions. (There are, inevitably, a very few points I would question: shouldn't the note on "unicorn's horn" on page 408 have mentioned that it may have been a narwhal tusk?) They even briefly discuss some problems with Cellini's breezy Italian (composed at the same time other Florentines were writing the first "official" grammars of the language), pointing out alternative understandings. A first-rate addition to the World's Classics list.