[Mary Meriam]

Thank you all for this fascinating and helpful discussion. It's encouraging to hear that "other formal versions" might actually exist of various poets, since I thought for the most part translators ignore form. This is the first Vivien translation I've read, out of many, that respects the form.

After reading the book with facing French, I had a feeling I might prefer English only. I do know some French and felt distracted from the English by the facing French. I also know some formalism, and was distracted by comparing the meter and rhyme in French-English. I think I'd rather not be distracted by technique while reading poems. So here's my plan. The first half of the book will be English, and the second half French. Not an appendix, but with matching format. Cool?

[Catherine Chandler]

Unless the reader is particularly interested in comparing the versions (e.g., a university course in literary translation) I don't see why anyone would want to put the publisher to the additional expense of the French pages.

My last book contained ten literary translations, and the concepts of copyright and public domain were of great importance to the publisher in the pre-production process. I would strongly urge due diligence in the matter.

I would also suggest a true bilingual (not only via the language but also the culture) proofread the English versions, in order to avoid embarrassing mistranslations.

[AZ Foreman]

Another low-cost option that Edwin Morgan, Richard Wilbur and some others have used is to include just the first line of the original after the title with every poem. That allows people to google the original quickly, and does not swell the book to unwieldy proportions. Morgan would sometimes format it like so:

The Title

Le premier vers....

The first line...
The second line....
And so forth

Alternatively, you could include the first line of the original at the end.

This also has the advantage of stimulating readerly curiosity for the more linguistically inclined

[Mary Meriam]

Thanks, Cathy. The production cost is the same up to a certain number of pages, and this is a small book, page-wise, so there's plenty of wiggle room.

That's brilliant, AZ. Thanks so much. The translator and I were just discussing right now whether to include more translations.

We're also thinking about blurbers, so step right up and PM me if you're interested.

Mary