Analogous Proverbs in Ten Languages [English, Romanian, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Danish, Portuguese, Latin]. By E.B. Mawr. London: Elliot Stock, 1885. Pp. 113. Rpt. ed. by C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu. Bucureşti: Contemporary Literature Press, 2011. Pp. 152

Pegulescu, Anca-Mariana

English

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                                                                                                                                                                                             ANCA-MARIANA PEGULESCUAnalogous Proverbs in Ten Languages [English, Romanian,French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Danish, Portuguese,Latin]. By E.B. Mawr. London: Elliot Stock, 1885. Pp. 113. Rpt.ed. by C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu. Bucureşti: Contempo-rary Literature Press, 2011. Pp. 152.Analogous Proverbs in Ten Languages, a book published in 1885 by E.B Mawr, has been brought back to the readers’ atten-tion in 2011 by C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu. The two Roma-nian editors, C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu, are not only dis-tinguished academics and book writers themselves, but they also play the guides’ role for younger readers, fond of literature, in general, and of more detailed knowledge in linguistics, semiotics,paremiology, orthography and axiology. The 2011 edition is an electronic product, issued at Contemporary Literature Press, an electronic publishing house of the University of Bucharest, Roma-nia.The reader is warned of the fact that Mrs. E.B. Mawr had an extraordinary language prevision, announcing ever since 1885 thestatus of English as a global, international language. The book reveals itself as a multilingual paremic collection where Romanian proverbs are inserted among proverbs in 9 other European lan-guages, and, in a certain way, compared to these European prov-erbs.The contents of the book opens with Professor Săndulescu’sprofessional opinions about paremiology, orthography, axiology and spirituality. This introductory message underlines Mrs.Mawr’s particular gift in searching “interlanguage propositionalequivalence of stable cliché–types with high moral incidence.”This Foreword written by Professor Săndulescu is rather an invita-tion to read the collection and “taste” it as a proverbs’ “gourmet”does. In fact, here, Professor Săndulescu intermingles personalmemories with a general technical evaluation on paremiology and axiology (the latter being considered to be the “values” science).PROVERBIUM 29 (2012)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         420 ANCA-MARIANA PEGULESCUAfter this opening, there is the European languages’ list in which the proverbs are displayed and the 1885 index of the prov-erb collection.Mrs. Mawr’s Preface is not only the very best image of whatwe can call editor/author –book relationship, but it also gives usinformation about her previous collection, issued in 1882 and theauthoress’ personal opinions about Romanian folklore and prov-erbs. More than that, it is for the first time (and this syntagm isused long before the structuralists’ dichotomy between expressionand content within the linguistic sign) when an author/editor of aproverb collection (at least within Romanian paremiology) affirmsthe undeniable relationship among different languages. She madesuch a statement bringing “under one heading the same expression of thought in different countries” (meaning European countries).Proverbs are considered to be by E. B. Mawr “the veritable Folk-Lore of the Peoples”. English is for E.B. Mawr, the starting pointfor all the other languages the collection displays. E.B. Mawr ad-mits that she did not try to translate the proverbs and she realized that in certain cases “a proverb will be met with bearing a directly contrary sense to that expressed in English”.E. B. Mawr acknowledges that Romania is “particularly rich in folk-lore” and at the same time she states that representatives ofthe Romanian Academy of that time helped her in her task (theeditors of the 2011 edition include a list of the members of theRomanian Academy, as an appendix, taken from the EncyclopedicIllustrated Dictionary “Cartea Românească”, issued at CarteaRomânească Publishing House, in 1933 and having I. Aurel Can-drea as its author.The volume issued in 2011 at Contemporary Literature Press,that is an electronic publishing house, includes the original index of the 1885 edition, the content of the 1885 volume, to which theeditors added the new index of the 2011 edition, modernized and completed. The 2011 edition also contains the original cover of1885 edition.The 1885 edition, published at London Elliot Stock is the se-cond analogous edition published by E.B. Mawr. The authoressmentions in the Preface to the 1885 edition the fact that she had been encouraged by the success the 1882 edition had. In the 1882                                                                                                                                                                                                                              421ANALOGOUS PROVERBS IN TEN LANGUAGESedition there were only four analogous languages to English,among them being Romanian.There are examples of English proverbs for which E. B. Mawrdid not discover a Romanian equivalent:Useless to spur the willing horse.What helps the Romanian reader, in such a situation, is definitely the French version:A bon cheval, point d’éperon.(“a willing horse” can be or not a “bon cheval”; for theFrench/Romanian/Italian/ or German reader “a willing horse” is ahorse that does what the master imposes, while “un bon cheval”can be “a willing horse” but even more than that.)In E.B. Mawr’s 1885 edition, there are proverbs that are not so much used nowdays. They are still the expression of the folk’swisdom:When the blind leads the blind both fall into the ditch.Orb pe orb povăţuind, cad amândoi în mormânt.And also:Crows will not pick out crows eyes.Corb la corb nu-şi scoate ochii.All these examples send a message , be it a positive or a nega-tive one. It is the idea of belonging to a certain category or classwhich leads to common decisions and results ( the blind making the other blind fall in the grave or the people of the same kind,doing the same things).For today’s reader, E.B. Mawr’s 1885 edition brings a stand-ard Romanian that is no more used, being retained only in theRomanian literature of that particular period of time.This collection is not the only multilingual proverb collection where Romanian (which is still a language not widely used, spread or even known) is launched together with languages international-ly spoken and used. Gabriel Gheorghe’ book ProverbeleRomânilor şi proverbele lumii romanice. Studiu comparativ, pub-lished in 1986, at Albatros publishing house, is a successful exam-ple of multilingual proverb collections There are more than onehundred years between the publication of the two multilingual                                                                                                                               422 ANCA-MARIANA PEGULESCUproverb collections and each of them is the image of the particularperiod of time the editors/authors lived and carried out their activi-ty, or their hobby targetting proverbs.All the proverbs collections (be they monolingual or multilin-gual) prove the richness and the complexity of the Romanian proverbs (counted as more than 4000 paremic units in theRomanin country of that time).Even if the proverbs were not selected according to theethofields criterion (a concept discussed and analyzed by ProfessorC. Negreanu in his book Structura proverbelor româneşti ), they display common themes and similar structures.That is why E.B. Mawr’s collection, as a leading example,should be valued and treasured as the sparkle of a permanentflame which continues burning in various contributions like arti-cles, studies, dictionaries of proverbs, sayings, idioms.We have to be thankful to the editors C.G.Sandulescu and Lidia Vianu for their dedicated work and contribution to the pare-mic international world.Anca-Mariana Pegulescu229, T. Vladimirescu Bd.B.5, Entrance 1, Ap.1220219 Drobeta Tr. SeverinRomaniaE-mail: a_pegulescu@yahoo.com

E.B. Mawr. Analogous Proverbs in Ten Languages [English, Romanian, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Danish, Portuguese, Latin]. (London 1885). Rpt. ed. by C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu. (Bucureşti 2011) – (Anca-Mariana Pegulescu)

E.B. Mawr. Analogous Proverbs in Ten Languages [English, Romanian, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Danish, Portuguese, Latin]. (London 1885). Rpt. ed. by C.G. Săndulescu and Lidia Vianu. (Bucureşti 2011) – (Anca-Mariana Pegulescu)

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