Finding faith in translation

Classics major senior Lauren Milburn is traveling through time to the 1500s through her work translating ancient texts and studying the civilizations who created them. However, her capstone experience for her classics major is more than translating a textbook or famous novel.

For her classics capstone course, Milburn must read "The Book of Hours," an 85-page Christian text of prayers from the 1500s, and translate it from Latin to English. "The Book of Hours" resides in Pickler Memorial Library and Milburn's work will be the first translation available there.

Milburn's capstone course requirement originally involved translating the Greek work, "The Tragedy of Medea," but she had trouble with the translation early on. After talking with her capstone director, Milburn learned the library had an un-translated Christian work in its directory, "The Book of Hours." Milburn's Catholic background and interest in sacred Christian texts persuaded her to change her capstone requirement in academic collaboration with the library. Her capstone director agreed to the proposal.

"I was shown the text, ‘The Book of Hours' in the library," Milburn said. "I was told that the book was a text that many other classes have looked at, but they don't have a translation of it yet. I was also told that it would be helpful for the library to have a way to show the translated text for other classes."

Milburn was raised Catholic, so her early knowledge of Catholicism contributed to her studies in religious texts at Truman, she said.

"As a Catholic, I find it rewarding seeing how members of my church prayed so very long ago, and since my church still uses these prayers today, I have this connection with those people from the Middle Ages."

Milburn even uses the Bible as reference material in translating "The Book of Hours."

"I have lucked out because I'm Catholic and the prayers in the text I'm translating are prayers that I've said before," Milburn said. "Sometimes the text will cite a passage from a scripture that I have not yet come across before, so I have to find the passage in the Bible to find the psalm or the testament that it came from to help me translate the text more easily."

Like Milburn, classics professor Rebecca Harrison has performed translations for the classics department, including documents like the Magna Carta and the works of Isaac Newton. Harrison advises students interested in deciphering languages of older texts to gather knowledge about the subject area being translated.

Harrison encourages patience, because the actual translating task can take long periods of time and plenty of effort. The languages usually use different characters or abbreviations than modern English, and when translating meanings of words, they might not correspond in one language to another, she said. Different cultures might imply different meanings, she said.

Foreign language professor Thomas Capuano has worked with manuscripts in languages such as Swedish, transcribing intricate texts that originated as far back as the 14th or 15th centuries. Capuano emphasized the cultural changes that occur when transcribing documents, showing how far we've come since the Middle Ages.

"It makes students see that the way we communicate ideas over time has changed drastically," Capuano said. "I think that's important that when a student is able to understand how many different phases there are of language development, it's easier to see our modern age with more perspective."

Milburn continues to persevere through the assignment, preparing for her last big challenge in her Truman experience.

"It's very difficult to begin and you're always going to have these little challenges and pitfalls through the translation," Milburn said. "But if you stick with it and make good use of your resources via research mentors or textbooks, it's very rewarding."

Milburn also wants her time traveling to be her way of thanking the library, the University and her religious community.

"I view this project as a way that I can give back to Pickler," Milburn said. "The resources that we have within the library, we're all fortunate and blessed to have, so I feel that accomplishing this task says ‘thank you' to the library."