Confusion in 14 verses. Bilingual collection of English sonnets composed and translated by Pierre Winclair

This collection presents fourteen sets of sonnets written by leading English-speaking poets from the 17th century to the present day: William Shakespeare, John Donne, Mary Wroth, John Milton, William Wordsworth, John Keats, Elizabeth Browning, Christina Rossetti, GM Hopkins, Edna St. Vincent Millay (from a verse from which the collection’s title is taken), Wilfred Owen, ee Cummings, Joshua Ib and Marilyn Hacker .

Selections, translations and introductions by Pierre Vinclair.

Four collections (by Marie Wroth, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Joshua Ipe, and Marilyn Hacker) have not been translated into French.

Each introductory note reports on accepted translation principles, which vary from one collection to another. For example, Shakespeare’s sonnets were rendered with rhymes because the epigrammatic dimension of the final couplet necessitated it; In contrast, translations of John Donne’s sonnets (where precision of view prevails) do not rhyme. The introductory notes (which also provide historical and biographical context) can thus be read both as reflections on the art of translation and as fragments of a dissertation on the various functions that rhymes can have in economics. .

“A Spanish proverb tells me this: He who does not know how to write a sonnet is a fool, but he who writes two is a madman. (John Donne)