Árbók Landsbókasafns Íslands - Nýr flokkur - 01.01.1983, Qupperneq 47

TIL ÍSLENDINGA
47
Til Ólafs Davíðssonar
Florence, June 26 [1889]
Dear Ólafur
It was a very good sight to see your handwriting once more.
Many thanks for the proof-reading. The sheets are of great use as
showing me that I liave made no gigantic blunder. You ask, in one
place, „því sic? Because H. Pétursson was written H. Peturson (with only
one j.)
The division of words has bothered me a good deal. The rules in
Italian (the only ones the printers know) are very different from those
in English. These last again diífer from those in Icelandic, and those
even, in some respects, from those in Danish. I finally decided to pay
little attention to any — as a subsidiary matter (before 1801 at any
rate) to the division of lines. It is very dilTicult in a printing-ofTice,
where neither English nor Icelandic is known, to get division of lines,
division ofwords, punctuation etc. all correct. I have mainly followed
the English rules for division of words.
So again the governing of Icelandic words in oblique cases by
English prepositions. I soon decided to pay no heed to that. In
speaking of this or that book, or of this or that man, I have used
always the nominative case, as, „from Ólafur Davíðsíon came a
package containing the „Passíusálmor“ of Hallgrínw Pétursíow“. In
the last century we writers of English used to say: „He advised me to
read Ciceronis philosophical treatises“ but we don’t do it any more.
In giving the headings, or other extracts, from books - when
stating their contents - I have generally considered it a rule, if quoting
in Icelandic, to give them exactly as they are, without any regard to
the English prepositions, or other words, which may precede them.
Thus, in the case you markedly refer to, 25. Exercitium Precum Olearii, I
wrote: Contents: — Titlefolio, on reverse dedication to Gofugre
Dygdaryk/re og....Everybody ought at least to see that the important
thing to do is to give the first lines of the dedication as they are, and
that this is what has been attempted (for purposes of identification or
other object). In bibliography, if you want to get anything like
accuracy you mus[t]n’t always be too gramatical. In old Icelandic
publications especially, there are many added difficulties owing to
the often injured conditions of the title and other pages, broken type
etc. Nor do you get much help from your predecessors. Nyerup &