A translator’s appraisal of classical and Hellenistic influences in Flaubert’s Salammbo

Abstract

In the present autobiographical appraisal my aims are: to mention briefly the reasons why I translated Salammbô; to give the reader of this paper, by means of parallel extracts from the Maltese and English translated texts, a glimpse of the dazzling beauty of Flaubert’s epic prose descriptions; to make the student aware of what I, as a translator became aware of while translating Flaubert, showing how the latter succeeds in creating such an excellent masterpiece by means of intertextual classical references and other non-written materials (in particular the coins that were minted with the name of Gozo on them); and to demonstrate why the reader is set on a course to discover both the Classical and Hellenistic worlds together with antiquity’s command over Flaubert’s imagination. Biblical sources, which this paper will be slightly referring to, are another source abundantly used by Flaubert.