Monday, June 28, 2010

Second-Rate

I'd been looking forward to reading the new translation of The Second Sex for some time, as the original translation sounded like a waste of time. Alas, the recent translation is apparently just as bad, but in new and exciting ways.

What confounds me, though, is how this is even an issue. The new translation cost $50,000. That's less than the price of a new Cadillac Escalade. And yet decades went by without investment in a new English translation. Surely there's some poor, unemployed philosophy PhD who's fluent in French and would be thrilled to translate de Beauvoir. How long would it take for a Paypal passing of the hat? Is there no rich feminist out there who'd be willing to subsidize this endeavor?
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