São Paulo – If the stories of the "The Arabian Nights" (aka "One Thousand and One Nights") have become famous in the West, it was thanks to the work of French orientalist Antonie Galland, who translated 50 of the tales to his language, between 1704 and 1717. But Portuguese was not left far behind and also got its first translation still in the 19th century, and by noble hands, those of Emperor Pedro II, who dedicated a large part of his language studies to the stories of Scheherazade.
The translation by Pedro II, worked on after the Proclamation of the Republic of Brazil, during his exile in France, was the theme of the master’s dissertation of researcher Rosane de Souza, of the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC). Her interest in history and reading the emperor’s biography called her attention to the matter and she decided to research the manuscripts, kept in Petrópolis Imperial Museum.
She explained that the emperor "loved Eastern culture". In fact, D. Pedro II was the first Brazilian head of state to travel to the Middle East, in 1876, when he visited Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Palestine. "He took the trip due to his interest in the culture of the East. He may have seen the book for the first time there," said Rosane.
According to the researcher, the emperor started his studies of Arabic during the Paraguayan War (1864-1870). He had two teachers, named Karl Henning and Seybold, but studies on the translation of the "Arabian Nights" show that Pedro II did them alone, without orientation.
"There were mistakes in the translation that show that there had been no revision by anyone with great knowledge of the language," said Rosane. In her work, the researcher, who does not speak Arabic, had the assistance of Mamede Mustafá Jarouche, a professor in the Oriental Letters Department at the University of São Paulo (USP) and author of the complete translation of the "Arabian Nights" into Portuguese, published in 2005.
Rosane had access to the emperor’s translation of 84 nights. The first booklet studied dates from January 21st 1890 and includes the 36th to 69th nights. The second, which began on July 10th, 1890, begins at the end of the 69th night and ends at the 120th night. The last page is dated November 9th, 1891, less than one month before Pedro’s death, on the 5th of the following month. According to the researcher, the manuscripts with the translations of the prologue to the 35th night have not yet been found.
Apart from the "Arabian Nights", the emperor also translated other works from Greek, Hebrew, French, English, Italian and German. It was in German, in fact, that Pedro II read the work for the first time. The original in Arabic, used for the translation, was by Breslau (there are five different editions in Arabic), published in Germany, in 1825.
The researcher explained that Pedro II had no intention of publishing his translation of the "Arabian Nights" into Portuguese. "He used the translation for learning and to exercise his knowledge of Arabic," she said. "He explained in his diaries that he did not want publication as he did not feel up to being considered a translator," he finished off.
However, the study by Rosane shows that the monarch’s translations were, in fact, good quality. According to her, there are stretches translated by him that are very similar to the later translation by Jarouche, who had not read the imperial manuscripts when he worked on his translation. The researcher said that even the verses were similar to those translated by the USP professor.
As another example of the emperor’s good work, the researcher recalls that Pedro’s manuscripts were initial translations, not having been reviewed, with smudges and other indications of a good initial work, whereas the most recent translation is finished and reviewed work.
Faithful to the Arabic original, the emperor also maintained the original style of the text, ignoring the structure of the Portuguese language, very different from that of Arabic. According to Rosane, this shows that Pedro II followed a German translation line, of the 19th Century. "They want the reader to learn how the text is in its original form," she explained.
*Translated by Mark Ament
