Sunday, June 01, 2008

This is interesting. I have had cause to look at Marcus Aurelius' Meditations. It can be found on the internet, of course, and at Bartleby.com they have a translation by one George Long. In this translation there is this line...

And I observed that he had overcome all passion for joys; and he considered himself no more than any other citizen, and he released his friends from all obligation to sup with him or to attend him of a necessity when he went abroad, and those who failed to accompany him by reason of any urgent circumstances, always found him the same.


Rather mundane. However, this next is taken from a different source, supposedly the same book, by the same translator....

And I observed that he had overcome all passion for boys ; and he considered himself no more than any other citizen ; l and he released his friends from all obligation to sup with him or to attend him of necessity when he went abroad, and those who had failed to accompany him, by reason of any urgent circumstances, always found him the same.


In one instance we find 'joys', in another we find 'boys'. One has to wonder if this is an intentional substitution. There is no doubt one is much closer to a true translation than the other, and I would venture to guess that 'boys' is the more probable, because although boys could be misinterpreted as joys (Roman leaders always had boys in tow while out on military campaign, to pass on knowledge, and for relief of sexual tension), there is much less a chance that joys could be misinterpreted as boys.

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