Met subtitles in Macbeth: Verdi or Shakespeare?

[tomseeley]

As I watched the met telecast of Macbeth last weekend, I thought often about which might be a better English subtitle for Verdi's Italian: a literal translation of the italian or the original Shakespeare, at least in some obvious instances.

"Out, out, damned spot" seemed to make it through relative unscathed by the translators.  Near the end, the translators told us that life was "a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing". 

Certainly, in my opinion at least, that wonderful original Shakespearean writing is worth hearing again, whether or not it's just a subtitle in a Shakespeare-Verdi libretist-English subtitle writer cycle. 

But it made me yearn for more. 

How many of us, whoever studied Macbeth in high school or college (junior year English lit in high school for me) really want to hear "then screw your courage to the sticking place and we shall not fail" come out as "then be steadfast"!  I mean, come on!  Gimme a break! In a case like that, what would have been wrong (not different from how it's usuall done; I said WRONG) with just giving us the words the bard wrote in the first place?!

Thoughts, agreements, violent disagreements, what d'ya think?

[bhodges]

I saw Macbeth last fall at the Met, and while I haven't read the play in a very long time (something I hope to remedy before seeing the theatrical version with Patrick Stewart, now on Broadway), I would expect that Verdi's librettist, Francesco Maria Piave, had made substantial changes in the language.  So if that is the case, I'd prefer to read what Piave wrote, since presumably it corresponds with the singing.  But I can understand the desire for the original Shakespeare, especially if you know the play well--definitely could be disorienting.

--Bruce

[knight66]

I am with Bruce here....there are so many great lines in the play, but the Italian had to be sung. I hear this kind of transference in my head whenever certain bible passages from a modern translation at read out, I can only hear Handel's Messiah version of the words, based on the King James and how could the Brahms, 'How Lovely are thy dwelling places' be butchered into a translation of ' how amicable are your tabernacles' ?

Mike