Aaron,

Coming into this discussion late, I see that you may already have a solution, but I also wonder whether you might just find a word for "place/transpose into the sky" (rather than focus on the star aspect).

Claudia

Aaron,

As mentioned before, "stellify" sounds better for all the above reasons. But I'd also use Alicia's suggestion mixed with it and do something like:

"and those who have been stellified, now set among the stars"

so that "stellify" is immediately followed by its definition. Shakespeare uses this same trick with "...incarnadine, making the green one red" in case there's anyone in the pit going "Incarnadine? WTF?"

Once you've defined the new verbiage in the text of the poem, you can use it as often as you want.

Oh, goodness, I missed a couple of people in my first response. What can I say?--I posted before my afternoon power-nap.

Yes, Ralph, I also may use "translate to heaven"--I just fear I would be calling attention to my own "translation" as a translation--hmn--meta-translation?

Alicia and Susan, thank you--yes, I will go with "place him in the stars" and "set in the sky". Dear ol' Aratus is, bless his heart, precious and highly artificial. It's the same problem I run up against again and again when translating--the ancients in general had a much higher tolerance for artificial language in poetry than we do here in the 21st century. To be true to the original in that sense would be to make a translation contemporary readers couldn't stomach. For me to take "stellify" from Chaucer as Aratus took diction from Homer is, in a sense, more accurate but readers of translations are happier with "place him the stars" or "set in the sky." Is readability, in the end, the objective that trumps all other concerns in translation?

Claudia, yes, I think I have been won over to the "clear and contemporary" school. "Transpose" is good, too--lots of rhymes.

Kevin--yes, I do "editorialize" in my translation a little here and there. I want the translation to need as few footnotes as possible and I want these footnotes to concern the original text and not my Chaucerian word choices. I may do just what you suggest.

Thanks, again, all--and my apologies to those whose posts I missed the first time around.

[This message has been edited by Poochigian Aaron (edited January 23, 2008).]