Urquhart and Motteux
The work was first translated into English by Thomas Urquhart (the first three books) and Peter Anthony Motteux (the fourth and fifth) in the late seventeenth-century. Terence Cave, in an introduction to an Everyman's Library edition, notes that both adapted the anti-Catholic satire. Moreover,
The translation is also extremely free. Urquhart's rendering of the first three books is half as long again as the original. Many of the additions spring from a cheerful espousal of Rabelais's copious style. [...] Le Motteux is a little more restrained, but he too makes no bones about adding material of his own. [...] It is a literary work in its own right.[2]
J. M. Cohen, in the preface to his translation, says Urquhart's part is "more like a brilliant recasting and expansion than a translation"; but criticised Motteux's as "no better than competent hackwork... [W]here Urquhart often enriches, he invariably impoverishes". Likewise, M. A. Screech says that the "translation of Urquhart and Motteux [...] is at times a recasting [...] rather than a translation"; and says it "remains a joy to read for its own self".[29] Donald M. Frame, with his own translation, says he finds "Sir Thomas Urquhart [...] savory and picturesque but too much Urquhart and at times too little R".[b][30]
The translation has been used for many editions, including that of Britannica's Great Books of the Western World.
From The Third Book, Chapter Seven:
Copsbody, this is not the Carpet whereon my Treasurer shall be allowed to play false in his Accompts with me, by setting down an X for an V, or an L for an S; for in that case, should I make a hail of Fisti-cuffs to fly into his face.[31]
Smith
William Francis Smith (1842–1919) made a translation in 1893, trying to match Rabelais' sentence forms exactly, which renders the English obscure in places. For example, the convent prior exclaims against Friar John when the latter bursts into the chapel,
What will this drunken Fellow do here? Let one take me him to prison. Thus to disturb divine Service!
Smith's version includes copious notes.
Donald M. Frame, with his own translation, says that Smith "was an excellent scholar; but he shuns R's obscenities and lacks his raciness".[30]
Putnam
Also well annotated is an abridged but vivid translation of 1946 by Samuel Putnam, which appears in a Viking Portable edition that was still in print as late as 1968. Putnam omitted sections he believed of lesser interest to modern readers, including the entirety of the fifth book. The annotations occur every few pages, explain obscure references, and fill the reader in as to original content excised by him.
Donald M. Frame, with his own translation, calls Putnam's edition "arguably the best we have";[c] but notes that "English versions of Rabelais [...] all have serious weaknesses".[30]
Cohen
John Michael Cohen's modern translation, first published in 1955 by Penguin, "admirably preserves the frankness and vitality of the original", according to its back cover, although it provides limited explanation of Rabelais' word-plays and allusions.
Donald M. Frame, with his own translation, says that Cohen's, "although in the main sound, is marred by his ignorance of sixteenth-century French".[32]
Frame
An annotated translation of Rabelais' complete works by Donald M. Frame was published posthumously in 1991. In a translator's note, he says: "My aim in this version, as always, is fidelity (which is not always literalness): to put into standard American English what I think R would (or at least might) have written if he were using that English today."[32]
Frame's edition, according to Terence Cave, "is to be recommended not only because it contains the complete works but also because the translator was an internationally renowned specialist in French Renaissance studies".[2]
However, M. A. Screech, with his own translation, says: "I read Donald Frame's translation [...] but have not regularly done so since", noting that "[h]ad he lived he would have eliminated [...] the gaps, errors and misreadings of his manuscript".[29] Barbara C. Bowen has similar misgivings, saying that Frame's translation "gives us the content, probably better than most others, but cannot give us the flavor of Rabelais's text";[33] and, elsewhere, says it is "better than nothing".[34]
From The Third Book, Chapter Seven:
'Odsbody! On this bureau of mine my paymaster had better not play around with stretching the esses, or my fists would go trotting all over him![35]
Screech
Penguin published a translation by M. A. Screech in 2006 which incorporates textual variants; and brief notes on sources, puns, and allusions. In a translator's note, he says: "My aim here for Rabelais (as for my Penguin Montaigne) is to turn him loyally into readable and enjoyable English."[36]
From The Third Book, Chapter Seven:
Crikey. My accountant had better not play about on my bureau, stretching esses into efs - sous into francs! Otherwise blows from my fist would trot all over his dial![37]
