Valentijn ende Oursson: Auteur, vertaler, censor en doelgroep

In the 2010 issue of this yearbook Voortgang I have explained why and how I got involved in the late medieval French Histoire de Valentin et Orson and its early sixteenth century translation into Dutch: Die historie van Valentijn ende Oursson. Since then a lot of ‘progress’ had been made. Editions of both the French source and the Dutch translation have been published in print and on the Internet, so now it is possible to compare them and to analyse the policy of the Dutch translator and the early seventeenth century censor Maximiliaen van Eynatten. Considering the changes he made, the translator was not writing for an audience that was married (for reasons other than love) but for young people for whom marriage was something special, that ought not be downplayed. In the eyes of the censor, sorcery, love and intimacy were not good for his intended public, schoolboys, and he removed as much of that as possible. Yet his ‘remaniement’ is not to be neglected.