To provide a new translation of Baltasar Gracián's Oráculo Manual y Arte de Prudencia.

I have loved Gracián since I was a little boy and have loved the Oráculo since I first read it (believe it or not, at the age of 10). I was at that time attending a Jesuit boarding school in Spain, and Gracián's texts were not on approved reading lists, or at least that is the sense I took of the matter when one of the priests slipped me a dogeared copy and swore me to the secrecy of its existence lest it were discovered in my possession and result in, he assured me conspiratorially, my certain excommunication and, if I broke under interrogation as he was sure I would, his as well. And so I read it in secret, sometimes camouflaging it between the pages of a schoolbook, other times under my bedsheet with a small flashlight, certain that it contained, as Padre Eusebio had assured me it would, a road map for my life. I devoured it. Often, when other kids were a safe distance away and I was certain we could not be overheard, I would ask Padre Eusebio to define words with which I was unfamiliar, explain sections I could not understand. He did so with head bowed, in sotto voce, furtively looking from side to side and over his shoulder. He seemed to know everything, explained everything with perfect clarity. Could Padre Eusebio, I wondered, have known Gracián?

I didn't read the Oráculo in English until I was in university in the United States. I forget the translation I picked up at the bookstore, but I recall feeling discomforted by it, knowing that this just was not the Gracián I recalled from my childhood. Since then, I have read various English translations of the Oráculo. They all represent well-meaning efforts to disseminate the work, and for the most part they get at its essence. But they don't satisfy me. And I'm sure they would not have satisfied Padre Eusebio.

I think so. We need a translation that reflects as faithfully as possible Gracián's own words and intended meanings, a translation that will, if necessary, sacrifice poetry for accuracy. Gracián is excrutiatingly difficult to translate. He is referred to as El Intraducible/The Untranslatable. The English translator Joseph Jacobs wrote that "I know no prose style that offers such difficulty to a translator as Gracian's laconic and artificial epigrams." There are several reasons for this. First, the Oráculo was written over three centuries ago, in 1647. Many Spanish words in use at that time have either changed meaning or suffered disuse. The phrasing itself is stylized, and sifting out Gracián's intentions for a phrase can be daunting. Think Shakespeare, then throw in a little Chaucer. Also, Gracián wrote aphoristically, which is to say that he created (or used) numerous proverbs and refrains that do not translate as lyrically as they sound in the original. In many cases, Gracián composed double entendres that are truly impossible to translate. I hope my notes below the translations explain most of these cases.

Previous translators have sometimes simply mistranslated certain words and passages. To maintain the lyrical sound of the proverbs and aphorisms, they have sometimes sacrificed original meanings in the service of a catchy phrase that, catchy though it may be, does not reflect with any sense of accuracy Gracián's intended meaning, or even his actual prose. In some cases they translate too literally. Of course, equivalence of words is not equivalence of meaning. A literal translation does not always service the meaning of a word or passage.

There are currently 11 English translations of the Oraculó (that I know about). The first was published as early as 1694, only 47 years after the original publication of the Oráculo in Spain. This translation by John Savage (available here thanks to Lachlan ) is an adaptation of an anonymous 1685 translation, and it has wonderful and insightful notes and some very nice touches. Among other good things, this is the only translation that is faithful to the title of the work. Whereas other translators have used The Art of Worldly Wisdom, Savage faithfully translated the work as The Art of Prudence (although his subtitle, A Companion for a Man of Sense, is pure invention). Although it often works hard to be literal, it was translated from a French translation of the Oráculo. Nonetheless, this is a scholarly work that merits perusal. Let me add that there is a 1730 book entitled The Compleat Gentleman: Or a Description Of several Qualifications, both Natural and Acquired, That are necessary to form a Great Man, translated by T. Saldkeld, and published in London that is often mistaken as a translation of the Oráculo when it is actually a translation of El Discreto.

Joseph Jacobs' translation, originally published in 1892 by Macmillan and reprinted several times, is possibly the best known translation (available here). In 1993 Shambhala Publications added the Oraculó to their little "pocket classics" series (available here), selecting the Jacobs translation but updating it because, as they explain in the introduction, the original was "at times unclear and somewhat dated in syntax and grammar." The original Jacobs translation was preserved in the recent Dover edition (2005). Neither effort does sufficient justice to Gracián.

In 1934 Martin Fischer, a professor at the University of Cincinnati, tried without success to better Jacobs' efforts, imposing at times a pompous style on Gracián's elegant and crafty wordplay. Of course, discerning readers should have known what was coming after reading the first two sentences of Fischer's introduction to the volume: "Gracian wings across some fifty odd years of history like the flight of a Mother Carey's chicken. Out of gray obscurity, he flashes into the visible sky—black, swift, unafraid, screaming his song." Nonetheless, in certain critical passages Professor Fischer does a better job than do other translators, and I have in places borrowed the fruits of his labors.

A few years later, in 1938, Charles Burlingame privately printed, "for the Entertainment of [his] Friends," Gracian: A Selection of Wise, Witty, Moral and Satyrical Maxims, Pluck'd from the writings of the Spanish Philosopher and Monk. There is no real effort at fidelity here, and Burlingame includes only a handful of maxims, all from the first 50. Lachlan has scanned the Burlingame maxims.

Otto Eisenschiml's effort, published in 1947 by Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, does not aim to be a faithful translation. Rather, his aim was to "modernize the original text." As he writes, "the rendition which I have attempted is not a literal translation. Instead, I have condensed Gracian's obsrvations and simplified his phraseology. I also have modernized his ideas, so as to give them more cogency and force for modern readers. Using Gracian as a basis, I have introduced material of my own and have illustrated it with incidents and events, many of which did not come to pass until after the Spanish monk's death." Eisenschiml contends that he maintains the "substance of the original," which he indeed does much of the time. Clearly, of course, this is not El Arte de Prudencia, but rather Eisenschiml's take on what it would look like if he himself had written it. Don't look for accuracy, but do look for clever stories appended to some of the aphorisms. In some cases, I include these stories in my notes.

In 1953, Professor L. B. Walton, at the time Head of the Department of Hispanic Studies in the University of Edinburgh, published a scholarly book in which the Spanish original and the English translation are presented on alternate pages. Very much an effort after my own heart. Three problems, however. First, Professor Walton did not have access to Morena-Navarro's and Blanco's excellent texts and notes. Second, he did not have access to the Oráculo that Blanco unearthed in Argentina, which contains a more faithful text than was previously used by scholars. And third, like other translators, he simply cannot resist the temptation to abandon Gracián's text when he believes his own prose is superior. On balance, a fine effort that also falls short.

A decade passed before Thomas Corvan's version appeared in 1964. This is a very slight book in which Corvan takes great liberties with Gracián's prose. His edition much resembles Eisenschiml's both in that he makes no effort to be faithful to Gracián and in that he often includes bits and pieces of his own. He offers the aphorisms out of their original order, separating them, unnumbered, into three sections: about fate, about ourselves, and about others. There is more Corvan here than there is Gracián.

Lawrence Lockley, professor at the University of Santa Clara, published his translation in 1967. He writes, "it is probable that anyone who has ever translated any of Gracián will not be entirely happy over anyone else's translations. The present translation is undiluted Gracián, written as simply as possible, and put into English to be as close to the Spanish original as could be." He nonetheless translates Oráculo Manual as "The Science of Success." He then begins with the first aphorism by translating Todo está ya en su punto, y el ser persona en el mayor into "Everything, now, is at its peak, and it is harder than ever to excel." In this same aphorism, Gracián's sabio becomes "a well-informed man"; siete becomes "the seven sages of old"; un pueblo becomes "a city of people"; un solo hombre en estos tiempos becomes "a modern man." Sigh.

Doubleday published a lovely little book in 1992 entitled The Art of Worldly Wisdom that went on to become a New York Times bestseller. This is a fine and highly readable effort from Professor Christopher Maurer of Vanderbilt University that quite reasonably reflects, in broad strokes, the Oraculó. In his introduction to the volume, Maurer writes with great affection about Gracián and explains, as I do, why a more faithful rendering of the Oraculó is needed. Nonetheless, he ultimately succumbs to the same temptation that got the better of previous translators: choosing lyrical over literal, sacrificing meaning for music, imposing himself on the text.

In 1993, Pocket Books published The Wisdom of Baltasar Gracian, which contains various passages from Gracián's works, including some from the Oraculó, translated by J. Leonard Kaye. It makes no claim at accuracy or effort to be faithful.

The most recent effort comes from Astrolog Publishers in a handsome 2004 paperback entitled The Manual of Prudence: 400 Years of Worldly Wisdom. This translation by Juan de Aragon "attempts to perserve the essence of the original," which as you should know is always code for "we made no effort to provide an accurate reflection of what Gracián wrote." Señor de Aragon takes massive liberties, the most onerous being the exclusion of difficult passages. In the first aphorism, for example, y más es menester para tratar con un solo hombre en estos tiempos que con todo un pueblo en los passados is simply omitted.

If you wish to give a friend the gift of Gracián's Arte de Prudencia in book form, best to do so with Maurer's lovely little book (and in hardcover). Then, once they're captured, as they surely will be, send them the URL to this web site.

First, I start with the original Oráculo, not an updated or doctored one. For example, I do not use the one popularized by Jose Ignacio Diez Fernandez in 1993 (Ediciones Temas de Hoy), which he based, interestingly enough, in part on Christopher Maurer's 1992 English translation. I understand why Fernandez chose to modernize the Oráculo, and he did a fine job of it. Most readers will, and should, turn to this version if they wish to enjoy Gracián in modern Spanish. Ultimately, however, the Fernandez Spanish version represents, in essence, a translation of a translation, and Maurer, who tells us that he was guided by Morena-Navarro's annoted version, often takes great liberties with the prose. In the process, much of Gracián's original intent is obscured.

The original wording of the Oráculo can be found in Professor Emilio Blanco's (Universidad da Coruña) authoritative edition (Ediciones Cátedra, S. A., 1995) (available here with concordance from the biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes). There are many editions of the Oráculo. Blanco uses the first edition of the work, by way of a facsimile published in Buenos Aires, which enabled Blanco to restore any altered passages in previous editions. He also includes more than a thousand notes to help explain the difficult manual. I also use Miguel Romera-Navarro's excellent edition (CSIC, Madrid, 1954) and notes. Profesora Raquel Asun (Universidad de Barcelona) also provides excellent notes in the Edición de Luys Santa Marina (Planeta, 1984).

I made two decisions early on. Most of Gracián's aphrisms begin with verbs in their infinitive form (e.g., llevar, escusar, desmentir). For example, aphorism #5 is entitled Hazer depender. The infinitive verb hazer translates as "to make," hence the correct translation of this aphorism is "to make depend" (or "to make to depend"). In many cases, translating the aphorism using the English infinitive form can result in inelegant phrasing. This is especially the case when Grácian mounts one infinitive atop another (e.g, #33, Saber abstraher/to know to put aside; #58 Saberse atemperar/to know to temper; #64, Saberse escusar/to know to avoid; #70, Saber negar/to know to negate). Only Savage maintains the infinitive form of the titles. All others transform the title into an injunction of sorts, such that it becomes an instruction or mandate to the reader. Jacobs, for example, does this by simply dropping the "to" of the infinitive and using second person. Thus, his titles enjoin readers to do this or that: "know your strongest point"; "think over things"; "know how to take a hint"; "be spotless." Since the Jacobs translation, all others have followed suit.

After much thinking, I decided to transform the infinitive into a gerund, which I believe keeps faith with the manner in which Grácian worded the aphorism titles but at the same time avoids the awkwardness that can be caused. So, for example, "to know to put aside" becomes "knowing to put aside." It bears noting that, if Gracián had intended for his aphorisms to be direct injunctions, he would have written them that way. As he did not, I think it important not to translate them as such.

The second decision deals with Gracián's use of the masculine as the "default." Many of the aphorisms refer to el hombre or el varon, which is to say, "man." When possible, and it is not always possible, I try to use "person" or "individual." I don't do this out of a misguided sense of political correctness. Rather, I believe that Gracián's words carry universal import and thus should be as "inclusive" as possible. In making this decision, I realize that the word "person" has special meaning for Gracián. For this reason I take great care that, when I use that word, it is consistent with his intended meaning. When that is not the case, I use "individual."

So how do I arrive at a translation? I read the passage carefully, translate what I think I know, ponder, carefully peruse the dictionary of the Academia Real trying to understand how a particular word may have been understood 300 years ago, consult Blanco's, Romera-Navarro's, and Asun's notes, ponder, change my mind about a particular word or passage, reflect on Padre Eusebio, consult with Spanish-speaking friends and colleagues, check other translations to see how previous translators handled a particular problem, steal what seems accurate, ponder some more, consult with higher authority, sleep on it, decide.

Not really.

Absolutely.

Oh, I'll never finish. The leaf must not fall.