Resources from Chris Warren, Teachit (UK) Ltd
TRANSFORMATION 3: CHANGE HISTORICAL STYLE
Examples:
• Past styles brought up to date: for example Shakespeare modernised
• Present writing transformed into a past style: for example contemporary prose rewritten in
Dickensian style (see Leon Garfield's Smith, and William Golding's Rites of Passage trilogy for
examples of modern writers emulating past styles)
• Imagined future styles: for example contemporary prose rewritten in the style of 2220AD (cf.
1984 (Newspeak), Ridley Walker, Clockwork Orange?)
This process can be practised by 'translating' suitable examples into the target style.
However, some students may prefer the freedom to compose freshly generated material, without
reference to existing text – especially if the task is to write in a future style. I would recommend
both, since the structure of a piece of text-for-translation provides everyone with a good starting
point! When translating into past or future styles, the rule is to choose translation pieces that are
short, clearly and progressively structured, and where the features of language that the translators
will need to emulate are very clearly on view.
Past styles brought up to date: for example Shakespeare modernised
Modernising Shakespeare can be a way into understanding both the shifts in culture that make
Shakespeare seem sometimes alien to the modern sensibility and the issues that, remarkably,
unite us across the centuries making him feel like a contemporary.
If the Shakespeare passage you've chosen is highly structured and with a strong progressive line,
the process can be delightful and arouse strong feelings of achievement. Although it may be a little
clichéd to us, students encountering the Seven Ages of Man for the first time find an instantly
accessible progression. It makes it almost the perfect passage to start with.
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
© Teachit (UK) Ltd
Page 1
Resources from Chris Warren, Teachit (UK) Ltd
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
Jaques – As You like It
You may prefer to pick up on a trick of language. Here Romeo gives us a quick display of wit by
reeling off a string of Petrarch-influenced oxymorons. He follows it with a definition of love. Both
can be 'translated'.
ROMEO
Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still,
Should, without eyes, see pathways to his will!
Where shall we dine? O me! What fray was here?
Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all.
Here's much to do with hate, but more with love.
Why, then, O brawling love! O loving hate!
O any thing, of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness! serious vanity!
Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms!
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health!
Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!
This love feel I, that feel no love in this.
Dost thou not laugh?
BENVOLIO
No, coz, I rather weep.
ROMEO
Good heart, at what?
BENVOLIO
At thy good heart's oppression.
ROMEO
Why, such is love's transgression.
Griefs of mine own lie heavy in my breast,
Which thou wilt propagate, to have it prest
With more of thine: this love that thou hast shown
Doth add more grief to too much of mine own.
Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs;
Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;
Being vex'd a sea nourish'd with lovers' tears:
What is it else? a madness most discreet,
A choking gall and a preserving sweet.
Farewell, my coz.
© Teachit (UK) Ltd
Page 2
Resources from Chris Warren, Teachit (UK) Ltd
Present writing transformed into a past style
This process is really very difficult. It requires, intense close analysis and research. Do not expect
fully authentic results! The attempt itself is enough, because there's a whole world of subtle
discoveries to make, whether the outcome succeeds or fails. Nothing will expose the little tricks of
word-order and vocabulary of a past style more clearly than an attempt to reproduce it! It beats
arm's-distance analysis every time.
To reduce the stress, and make the task more palatable, you may consider introducing humour – a
parody or crude pastiche based on a specific style.
Chaucer writes:
A knyght ther was, and that a worthy man,
That fro the tyme that he first bigan
To riden out, he loved chivalrie,
Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie.
Ful worthy was he in his lordes werre,
And therto hadde he riden, no man ferre,
As wel in cristendom as in hethenesse,
And evere honoured for his worthynesse.
At Alisaundre he was, whan it was wonne.
Ful ofte tyme he hadde the bord bigonne
Aboven alle nacions in Pruce;
In Lettow hadde he reysed, and in Ruce,
No Cristen man so ofte of his degree.
In Gernade at the seege eek hadde he be
Of Algezir, and riden in Belmarye.
At Lyeys was he and at Satalye,
Whan they were wonne; and in the Grete See
At many a noble armee hadde he be.
At mortal batailles hadde he been fiftene,
And foughten for oure feith at Tramyssene
In lystes thries, and ay slayn his foo.
This ilke worthy knyght hadde been also
Somtyme with the lord of Palatye
Agayn another hethen in Turkye.
And everemoore he hadde a sovereyn prys;
And though that he were worthy, he was wys,
And of his port as meeke as is a mayde.
He nevere yet no vileynye ne sayde
In al his lyf unto no maner wight.
He was a verray, parfit gentil knyght.
But, for to tellen yow of his array,
His hors were goode, but he was nat gay.
\Of fustian he wered a gypon
Al bismotered with his habergeoun,
For he was late ycome from his viage,
And wente for to doon his pilgrymage.
Now how about a version as a parody, written in mock Chaucerian (to make it sound as authentic
as possible). What about:
A chav ther was …
© Teachit (UK) Ltd
Page 3
Resources from Chris Warren, Teachit (UK) Ltd
DICKENS
Dickens affords plenty of superbly 'copiable' passages, ripe for transformation.
Here's the first description of Scrooge from The Christmas Carol
Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind- stone, Scrooge! a squeezing,
wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as
flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and selfcontained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features,
nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red,
his thin lips blue and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on
his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low
temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dogdays; and didn't
thaw it one degree at Christmas.
External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no
wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was
more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather
didn't know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet,
could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often "came down"
handsomely, and Scrooge never did.
Students can borrow the structure of this passage to describe someone contemporary in
Dickensian terms. Weaker students will simply change words, leaving the sentences largely intact.
More able students may be brave enough to generate fresh sentences in the same style –
exclamation marks, stacked adjectives and all and all.
© Teachit (UK) Ltd
Page 4
Resources from Chris Warren, Teachit (UK) Ltd
Imagined future styles
What will happen to language in 200 years? What events in human history may intervene to
influence the process? This is a fascinating speculation.
• Will texting become the norm?
• Will it gradually infiltrate our written forms?
• Will there be some variation on Orwell's Newspeak?
Perhaps one way to start might be to offer students a range of genuine writing types to translate –
a newspaper article; an informal letter, an advert, a set of instructions – then ask them to imagine
what the same piece would look like in a thousand years.
Some students might then want to write more at length.
If a large amount of novel vocabulary has been invented, students should supply a glossary (as
Orwell does in 1984, for example).
Here's a couple of examples, imagining that texting has become the norm, but that there are still
some basic rules. Other changes have taken place too.
I z haP 2 C U n soz θt I dOn 0 U NE mor. itz jus 1 O θOz θins! kn U 4gv mE?
I is happy to see you and sorry that I don’t love you any more. It’s just one of those things. Can you
forgive me?
It wz 0ly 2 C U θ uθr D. Y dOn wE mEt?
It was lovely to see you the other day. Why don’t we meet?
Glossary
z
n
θt
θ
θs
U
R
B4
2
2D
h
sh
is
and
that
the
this
you
are
before
to
today
he
she
0 [zero]
:)
NE
θOz
-in
t4gv
love
happy
any
those
-ing
thforgive
All capital letters sound as their name – even in the middle of words.
© Teachit (UK) Ltd
Page 5