The Elizabethan Age
Jumping a few centuries, we come to the Elizabethan age that played a significant part in the development of English as a language and also became the nursery of a great literature. 16th century England and in fact all of Europe saw many sea voyages being undertaken to parts of the globe that were hitherto unknown. This curiosity in the geographical world had its cultural counterpart too. Translations from other languages into English became more popular and they spoke of strange shores and stranger customs. It should be noted that these translations were undertaken rather casually without much concern about fidelity to the original. They were done in a spirit of adventure that characterizes the voyages of the time. They opened up the Elizabethan mind to different literatures and languages. Most of these translators did not know the original language in which the text was written. The translations were mostly from another translation of the original, with the result that they were more of recreations of the original.
For example, there is Sir Thomas North’s translation of Plutarch’s Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans (1579). North did not know Latin and translated Plutarch from French.  Plutarch was a Roman historian who had written biographies of famous Greek and Roman men. This was also history, in a sense and became an important source book for Shakespeare when he wrote his history plays like Julius Caesar. Philemon Holland, a clergyman of the 16th century, also translated Plutarch, mainly his work called Moralia. It is said that his translation is better than most 20th century translations of the same work. His translation of Livy’s History of Rome is another major work of translation of the same age. It helped writers with no knowledge of Latin to get acquainted with the great figures in Roman history and also provided them with raw material for their work. What characterizes Holland’s translation is his own stamp that he gave to the texts that he translated, so much so that it became an altogether different text.
John Florio is another translator that we cannot ignore, for it is through him that we have got the greatest essayist of English language, Sir Francis Bacon. Florio, a contemporary and friend of  Shakespeare, translated the French essayist Montaigne into English. It is said that Bacon was influenced by this and was inspired to write his famous essays. Florio translated from French, Italian and Spanish and is considered to be one of the most gifted translators in English. He is believed to have contributed more than thousand words to the language. In fact, he was such a gifted writer that there are people who believe that he is actually Shakespeare and wrote all those wonderful plays.
George Chapman, an Elizabethan poet and writer, also translated Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad into English. This was the first complete English translation of Homer and ran into volumes. Chapman’s translation stood the test of time because centuries later the Romantic poet John Keats was to write a sonnet on the emotions he felt on first reading the Chapman’s translation of the Greek classic: On first looking into Chapman’s Homer. He is also said to have influenced T. S. Eliot.
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