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Margaret Carroux

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Margaret Carroux in 1977

Margaret Carroux (31 May 1912 – 22 July 1991) was a German translator who translated from English and French into German. Born in Berlin into an international family, she studied economy, English and French before working as a commercial clerk and as foreign language correspondent. After World War II, she worked for the American military government before moving to Frankfurt, where she did translations and news agency work. In the 1960s, she started translating books; the first of more than eighty was Moshe Pearlman's The capture of Adolf Eichmann. Under the pseudonyms Martin Boor and Emmi Heimann, she translated books by Guillaume Chpaltine [fr] and Leopold Trepper from French to German.

Carroux's most well-known work is the first German translation of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, which appeared in 1969 and 1970. Her translation was done in dialogue with Tolkien and used his Guide to the Names in the Lord of the Ring, and has been described as classy and respectful. In 1983, she also published a translation of the Tolkien parody Bored of the Rings.

Life and family[edit]

Margaret Bister was born on 31 May 1912 into a German-speaking international family in Berlin.[1][2][3][a] Her father, who was born in Berlin, was originally French and later went to the US where he married his deceased first wife's sister before returning to Germany.[3] Her mother was originally Jewish but had been baptised as a child.[3] Carroux studied economy, English and French in Berlin but dropped out after she suspected her advisor was a Nazi.[3] She then worked as a commercial clerk and as a foreign language correspondent.[3] After the end of World War II, she worked for the American military government, further improving her English.[3] Together with an American friend, she founded a subsidiary of Overseas Weekly and offered translations of American articles to German newspapers.[3] She moved to Frankfurt in 1949, where she co-founded an international news agency.[5] She married a civil engineer and had two children.[5]

Carroux died on 22 July 1991.[1] In his eulogy at her funeral on 1 August 1991, the translator Klaus Birkenhauer remembered Carroux's raspy voice, the "sparkling brevity" in her use of language and the hospitality she offered to other translators during the Frankfurt Book Fair. He also praised her "brilliant" contributions to a translator-built dictionary.[6]

Translation work[edit]

In the 1960s, after the end of her marriage, Carroux started to translate books from English and French.[5] Her first published translation was of Moshe Pearlman's The capture of Adolf Eichmann,[5] which appeared as Die Festnahme des Adolf Eichmann at S. Fischer Verlag in 1961.[7] From 1967, she was a member of the VdÜ [de], the German association of translators;[8] she contributed several articles to its members' journal, Der Übersetzer.[9] By 1977, she had translated 87 books[3] and was a sought after translator who earned up to DM 19.80 per page[10] (equivalent to €24.50 in 2021).[11] Her translation work included both fiction and non-fiction, especially from the humanities.[2] Besides her own name, she used the pseudonyms "Emmi Heimann" and "Martin Boor".[12] As Martin Boor, she translated La Renonce ou Le tracé des frontières relatives by Guillaume Chpaltine [fr] as Die nichtgespielte Karte; the book appeared in 1963.[13] As Emmi Heimann, she translated the autobiography of Leopold Trepper, Le grand jeu into German as Die Wahrheit, appearing in 1975.[14] Other authors translated by Carroux include Betty Friedan, Arthur Janov, Miles Tripp, Sébastien Japrisot, Edna O'Brien, Chaim Potok, Françoise Sagan[15] and Nadine Gordimer.[16][17]

Translating Tolkien[edit]

Further information: Translating The Lord of the Rings
Tolkien received Carroux in his unheated study, a converted garage (doorway at left) of his house at Sandfield Road, Oxford.[3]

The German publishing house Ernst Klett Verlag [de] (later Klett-Cotta Verlag [de]) made an offer for the German translation rights for J. R. R. Tolkien's epic fantasy book The Lord of the Rings in October 1966.[18] After other translators had declined, Klett asked Carroux to translate it.[16] Carroux first translated Tolkien's story Leaf by Niggle; her translation (which appeared in 1975 in the collection Fabelhafte Geschichten)[19] was sent to Tolkien as a sample of her work via his publisher, Rayner Unwin, in September 1967.[20] A visit of Carroux in Oxford was arranged for December 1967, shortly after Tolkien had received the first 110 pages of her translation.[21] Carroux arrived on a cold day with a suitcase full of books and was received by Tolkien in his unheated study, a converted garage.[b] Both Tolkien and his wife were ill, so he was unable to offer any refreshments, and he was testy and tight-lipped, so Carroux left again after just one hour.[3] They continued to be in contact via mail. She found it difficult to translate especially the poetry, but Tolkien encouraged her after seeing further specimens, stated that he hoped to see poetry and prose translated by the same person, and offered further assistance.[24] According to Carroux, Tolkien discreetly voiced some disapproval of her poetry, and she herself doubted her ability.[3] The poetry was finally translated by Ebba-Margareta von Freymann [de].[16] The book appeared as Der Herr der Ringe in three volumes in 1969 and 1970.[19]

In response to his dissatisfaction with the Dutch and Swedish translations of the Lord of the Rings, Tolkien had created a Guide to the Names in the Lord of the Ring, a glossary with instructions for translators.[25][26] Carroux generally followed his guidelines, as in translating the innkeeper's name "Barliman Butterbur" as Gerstenmann Butterblume.[27] For "Shelob", a giant spider whose name is composed of the female-indicating "she" and "lob", a dialectal word for spider, Carroux changed Kanker, an old German term for spider, to a female form, resulting in "Kankra".[28] For "The Shire", Tolkien would have preferred Gau, but worried that its Nazi use might have made the word unacceptable to use. Carroux shared this concern (which she explained in her translation of the appendices), and chose Auenland ('meadow-land') instead.[29]

Carroux's translations were described by the contemporary reviewer Eugen Skasa-Weiß [de] as "resonant" and "blissfully clear".[16][3] However, there were various errors, some of them caused by Carroux's lack of knowledge of the background of Tolkien's writing that would later appear as the Silmarillion.[16] Other mistakes were introduced by her editor, who insisted on translating some English standing expressions literally.[16][10] The Tolkien scholar Susanne Stopfel gives as her overall verdict, "It is a very classy translation that treats its source with enormous respect."[16] Some of the mistranslations were corrected in a later edition by Roswitha Krege-Mayer in 1991.[30][31] Wolfgang Krege, the translator of the Silmarillion into German,[30][32] criticised that Carroux's translation had applied a "uniform fairy-tale tone" to the diverse styles of the original.[33] He created his own new translation of the Lord of the Rings that used a greater variety of German styles to correspond to different manners of speech in the original.[34]

In addition to Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, Carroux also translated the 1969 parody Bored of the Rings into German.[16] The book appeared in 1983 as Der Herr der Augenringe ('Lord of the eye-rings').[35] In an "apology" published in 1984, Carroux explained her motivation for translating this parody. While she was not as fascinated as by the original text, she welcomed the challenge posed by the combination of Tolkien-inspired antiquated language with recent dirty American slang. She also pointed out that the title had been translated by the publisher, not by her.[36]

Translations[edit]

From English[edit]

From French[edit]

Footnotes[edit]

  1. ^ Most of what is known about Carroux's life is from a 1977 article by Elsemarie Maletzke [de] that is based on an interview with Carroux.[4]
  2. ^ Tolkien had converted his garage to compensate for losing his room at Merton College when he retired.[22] He later wrote to Charlotte and Denis Plimmer, referencing the phrase the cramped garage that he uses as a study they used in a draft article for The Daily Telegraph Magazine, saying "May I say that it is not a 'study', except in domestic slang: in happier days I had one. It was a hastily contrived necessity, when I was obliged to relinquish my room in college and provide a store for what I could preserve of my library. ... I have never written any literary matter in it. ... [M]y house has no reception room but my wife's sitting-room, filled with her personal belongings. This was contemptuously described in the New Yorker ... Since then she has refused to admit anybody but personal friends to the room."[23]

Citations[edit]

  1. ^ a b "Familienanzeigen - Margaret Carroux". Frankfurter Rundschau (in German). 1 August 1991. p. 27.
  2. ^ a b Schögler 2023, p. 382.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Maletzke 1977, p. 65.
  4. ^ Maletzke 1977, pp. 65–67.
  5. ^ a b c d Maletzke 1977, p. 66.
  6. ^ Birkenhauer, Klaus (1992). "Grabrede vom 1.8.1991 zum Tode der Übersetzerin Margaret Carroux" [Eulogy from 1 August 1991 on the occasion of the death of translator Margaret Carroux] (PDF). Der Übersetzer (in German). 26 (3/4): 1.
  7. ^ Perlman, Mosheh (1961). "Die Festnahme des Adolf Eichmann". S. Fischer. Retrieved 8 June 2024.
  8. ^ VDÜ (14 April 1967). "Der VDÜ teilt mit" [The VDÜ notes] (PDF). Der Übersetzer (in German). 4 (4): 4.
  9. ^ Zsue. "Margaret Carroux". Übersetzen (in German). Retrieved 8 June 2024.
  10. ^ a b Maletzke 1977, p. 67.
  11. ^ 1500 to 1850: Ulrich Pfister, 2010. "Consumer prices and wages in Germany, 1500 - 1850," CQE Working Papers 1510, Center for Quantitative Economics (CQE), University of Münster. 1851-1882: Coos Santing, 2007, Inflation 1800-2000, data from OECD, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Economic Outlook. Historical Statistics and Mitchell, B. R. International Historical Statistics, Africa, Asia and Oceania 1750-1993 London : Macmillan ; New York : Stockton, 1998, International Historical Statistics, Europe 1750-1993 London : Macmillan ; New York : Stockton, 1998, and International Historical Statistics, The Americas 1750-1993 London : Macmillan ; New York : Stockton, 1998. After 1883, German inflation numbers based on data available from the Deutsches Statistisches Bundesamt archive and GENESIS database.
  12. ^ Kürschners Literaturkalender 1988, p. 1465.
  13. ^ Chpaltine 1963.
  14. ^ Trepper 1975.
  15. ^ Maletzke 1977, pp. 66–67.
  16. ^ a b c d e f g h Stopfel 2005, p. 11.
  17. ^ Gordimer 1982.
  18. ^ Scull & Hammond 2006, p. 677.
  19. ^ a b Hammond 1993, p. 395.
  20. ^ Scull & Hammond 2006, p. 708.
  21. ^ , Scull & Hammond 2006, pp. 712–713.
  22. ^ Scull & Hammond 2006, p. 544.
  23. ^ Carpenter, Humphrey, ed. (2023) [1981]. The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien Revised and Expanded Edition. New York: Harper Collins. ISBN 978-0-35-865298-4. Letter 294 to Charlotte and Denis Plimmer, 8 February 1967.
  24. ^ Scull & Hammond 2006, pp. 732–733.
  25. ^ Nagel 2004a, p. 24.
  26. ^ Nagel 2004b, pp. 98–99, 113.
  27. ^ Nagel 2004b, p. 100.
  28. ^ Nagel 2004b, pp. 101–102.
  29. ^ Nagel 2004b, pp. 106–107.
  30. ^ a b Stopfel 2005, p. 12.
  31. ^ Hammond 1993, p. 397.
  32. ^ Hammond 1993, pp. 395–396.
  33. ^ tkz (20 October 2003). "Wider den Märchenton. Der Tolkien-Übersetzer Wolfgang Krege in Bietigheim" [Against the fairy tale tone. The Tolkien translator Wolfgang Krege in Bietigheim]. Stuttgarter Zeitung (in German). p. 36. Retrieved 8 June 2024 – via LexisNexis.
  34. ^ Stopfel 2005, p. 13.
  35. ^ Beard & Kenney 1983.
  36. ^ Carroux, Margaret (1984). "Apologie. Warum ich die Verballhornung von Tolkiens Der Herr der Ringe übersetzt habe" [Apology. Why I translated the parody of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings]. Der Übersetzer (in German). 21 (1/2): 6–7.

References[edit]

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