Broadway Translations

Routledge & Sons (Routledge, Kegan & Paul) (London, UK)
Series dates: 1923-1930
Size: 5.25″ x 7.5

E.P. Dutton (New York, US)
Series dates: 1923-1930
Size: 5.25″ x 7.5

Update 7/31/2024

“This new series offers to English-speaking lovers of good books translations of great authors of the past. The texts are taken from existing translations where such are available and are of a high degree of excellence. If no translation has before been made, or, where made, is of inferior quality, a new version has been undertaken. It is intended that every volume shall be a contribution to the Literature of Translation.” (Times Literary Supplement, April 5, 1923).

Fifty-one titles were issued in the Broadway Translations series between 1923 and 1930. Reprints are frequent and appear as late as 2005, attesting to the quality of some of the translations in this series.

Several Routledge series share the Broadway moniker, named after Broadway House (the long-time headquarters of Routledge in London):

Advertisements in the Times Literary Supplement for the Broadway Translations series appear frequently between 1923 and 1926, many noting new additions to the series. Advertisements and dates of publication are shown below. I’ve used details from these advertisements in the list of titles compiled further below.

Times Literary Supplement, April 5, 1923

Times Literary Supplement, May 17, 1923

Times Literary Supplement, July 12, 1923

Times Literary Supplement, November 22, 1923

Times Literary Supplement, December 13, 1923

Times Literary Supplement, February 14, 1924

Times Literary Supplement, October 9, 1924

Times Literary Supplement, December 4, 1924

Times Literary Supplement, February 12, 1925

Times Literary Supplement, September 24, 1925

Times Literary Supplement, April 8, 1926

Times Literary Supplement, April 22, 1926

Times Literary Supplement, September 30, 1926

Times Literary Supplement, October 14, 1926

Times Literary Supplement, November 25, 1926

Fifty-one titles in the Broadway Translations series are documented below, issued between 1923 and 1930. Reprints appear as late as 2005. Many titles in the series don’t include the year of publication, but this information can be found on WorldCat.

1923 (18 titles documented)

Available April 5, 1923 (the first four titles in the series)

The Girdle of Aphrodite: The Complete Love-Poems of the Palatine Anthology, translated by F.A. Wright

Zadig and Other Romances, by Voltaire; translated by H.I. Woolf

The Satyricon, by Petronius Arbiter; translated by J.M. Mitchell

Master Tyll Owlglass, His Marvellous Adventures, and Rare Conceits,
translated by Kenneth R.H. Mackenzie; illustrated by Alfred Crowquill

Available May 17, 1923:

Persian Letters, by Charles de Secondat Montesquieu; translated by John Davidson

Available July 12, 1923:

Letters from the Country and the Town: of Fishermen, Farmers, Parasites, and Courtesans, by Alciphron; translated by F.A. Wright

Available November 22, 1923:

The Travels of Baron Münchausen. Gulliver Revived, or The Vice of Lying Properly Exposed, translated by William Rose

Poems of Heinrich Heine, by Heinrich Heine; translated by Louis Untermeyer

Three Plays of A.V. Lunacharski: Faust and the City, Vasilisa the Wise, The Magi, by Anatoly Vasilievich Lunacharsky; translated by Leonard A. Magnus & K. Walter

Available December 13, 1923

An Æthiopian Romance, by Heliodorus of Emesa; translated by Thomas Underdowne; edited by F.A. Wright

French Comedies of the XVIIIth Century, by Jean-François Regnard; Alain René Le Sage; Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux; Néricault Destouches; translated by Richard Aldington

The Buccaneers of America: A True Account of the Most Remarkable Assaults Committed of Late Years upon the Coast of the West Indies by the Buccaneers of Jamaica and Tortuga, both English and French, wherein are Contained More Especially the Unparalleled Exploits of Sir Henry Morgan, our English Jamaican Hero, who Sacked Porto Bello, Burnt Panama, etc., by A.O. Exquemelin & Basil Ringrose; translated by William Swan Sonnenschein; introduction by Andrew Lang

Celestina, or, The Tragi-Comedy of Calisto and Melibea, by Fernando de Rojas; translated by James Mabbe; introduction by H. Warner Allen

Also available 1923:

Chronicles of a Russian Family, by S.T. Aksakov; translated by M.C. Beverley; introduction by Prince D.S. Mirsky

History of Twelve Caesars, by Suetonius; translated by Philemon Holland

The Lover’s Handbook: A Complete Translation of the Ars Amatoria,
by Ovid; translated by Frederick Adam Wright

Tragical Tales: The Complete Novels, by Matteo Bandello; translated by Geoffrey Fenton; introduction by R. Langton Douglas; modernized with a glossary by Hugh Harris

Voyages to the Moon and the Sun, by Cyrano de Bergerac, translated by Richard Aldington

1924 (10 titles documented)

Available February 14, 1924:

Three Tibetan Mysteries: Tchrimekundan, Nasal, Djroazanmo, as Performed in the Tibetan Monasteries; translated by H.I. Woolf from the French of Jacques Bacot

The Idylls of Theocritus, with the Fragments Bion and Moschus, by Theocritus; translated by J.H. Hallard

Available October 9, 1924:

The Poets of the Greek Anthology: A Companion Volume to the Girdle of Aphrodite, translated by F.A. Wright

Count Lucanor, or, the Fifty Pleasant Tales of Patronio, by Juan Manuel, Infante of Castile; translated by James York, M.D.; introduction by J.B. Trend

Simplicissimus the Vagabond: That is – the Life of a Strange Adventurer named Melchior Sternfels von Fuchshaim: Namely Where and in what Manner he Came into this World, What he Saw, Learned, Experienced, and Endured Therein, also Why he Again Left it of his own Free Will;  Exceedingly Droll and Very Advantageous to Read, by Hans Jakob Christoph von Grimmelshausen; translated by Alfred Thomas Scrope Goodrick

Available December 4, 1924

Dangerous Acquaintances, by Choderlos de Laclos; translated by Richard Aldington

The Twelve Books of Epigrams, by Martial; translated by J.A. Pott & F.A. Wright

Also Available 1924:

A Book of ‘Characters’ from Theophrastus: Joseph Hall, Sir Thomas Overbury, Nicolas Breton, John Earle, Thomas Fuller, and other English Authors; Jean de La Bruyère, Vauvenargues, and other French Authors, translated by Richard Aldington

The Epic of the Beast, consisting of English Translations of the History of Reynard the Fox and Physiologus, edited by William Rose & W.T.S. Stallybrass; translated by James Carlill; illustrated by Wilhelm von Kaulbach

Gesta Romanorum: Entertaining Stories Invented by the Monks as a Fire-side Recreation and Commonly Applied in their Discourses from the Pulpit, Whence the Most Celebrated of our own Poets and others have Extracted their Plots, translated by Charles Swann, introduction by E.A. Baker

1925 (9 titles documented)

Available February 12, 1925

The History of Manon Lescaut and the Chevalier Des Grieux, by Prévost, translated by George Dunning Gribble

Buddhist Birth-Stories (Jataka Tales); the Commentarial Introduction entitled Nidana-Katha, the Story of the Lineage, translated by T.W. Rhys Davids & Robert Cæsar Childers, edited by Caroline A.F. Rhys Davids

The Utopia, by Thomas More; translated by Ralph Robinson & Francis Bacon; edited by H. Goitein.

Available September 24, 1925

The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus (1592), Together with the Second Report of Faustus, Containing his Appearances and the Deeds of Wagner (1594), translated by William Rose.

Also available 1925:

The Autobiography of Guibert, Abbot of Nogent-sous-Coucy, by Guibert, Abbot of Nogent-sous-Coucy, translated by C.C. Swinton Bland (uniquely listed as Broadway Translations – Medieval Section in WorldCat and other sources. The Broadway Medieval Library was first issued in 1927, and this title may have been a precursor to that series)

Il Novellino: the Hundred Old Tales, translated by Edward Storer

The Mirror of Venus: Love Poems and Stories from Ovid’s Amores, Medicamina Faciei Femineae, Ars Amatoria, Remedia Amoris, Heroidae, Fasti, and Metamorphoses, by Ovid, translated by F.A. Wright

The Princess of Cleves, by Madame de La Fayette, Madame as assisted by Jean Regnauld de Segrais & François La Rochefoucauld; translated by H. Ashton

Three Plays of Plautus: The Slip-knot (Rudens), the Crock of Gold (Aulularia), the Trickster (Pseudolus), by Titus Maccius Plautus; translated by F.A. Wright & H. Lionel Rogers

1926 (6 titles documented)

Available April 8, 1926

Tibetan Tales, Derived from Indian Sources, translated by Anton Schiefner and William Ralston Shedden Ralston; introduction by Caroline A.F. Rhys Davids

Available April 22, 1926

The Complete Poems, by Gaius Valerius Catullus; translated by F.A. Wright

Available September 22, 1926: “Nearly 50 volumes of this series have now been issued.” [43 titles are documented here through 1926; I’m unsure if that counts as “nearly 50.”]

The Fifteen Joys of Marriage, by Antoine de La Sale; translated by Richard Aldington

The Choice Humorous and Satirical Works, by Francisco de Quevedo; translated by Roger L’Estrange & John Stevens; edited by Charles Duff

The Poems and Fragments, by Sappho; translated by Charles Reginald Haines

Also available 1926:

A Huguenot Family in the XVI Century: The Memoirs of Philippe De Mornay, Sieur du Plessis Marly, by Charlotte Arbaleste de Mornay; translated by Madame de Witt, Madame & Lucy Hill Crump

1927 (2 titles documented)

Faust, Part One, by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe; translated by G.M. Cookson; introduction by John George Robertson

Memoirs of the Court of England in 1675, by Madame d’Aulnoy; translated by Lucretia Arthur; edited by George David Gilbert

1928 (2 titles documented)

Candide and Other Romances, by Voltaire; translated by Richard Aldington (This title is listed as published by Routledge and Dutton as well as John Lane / The Bodley Head and Dodd, Mead as part of the series. I can find no explanation as to why four publishers would simultaneously issue this one title)

The Facetiae of Poggio and Other Medieval Story-Tellers, by Poggio Bracciolini, Ludovico Carbone, Giovanni Gioviano Pontano, and Lodovico Domenichi; translated by Edward Storer

1929 (1 title documented)

Three Plays: The Girl from Samos, The Arbitration, The Shearing of Glycera, by Menander of Athens; translated by Levi Arnold Post

1930 (2 titles documented)

The Aeneid of Vergil, Literally Rendered into English Blank Verse with the Text Opposite, by Virgil; translated by Thomas May.

The Love Poems of Joannes Secundus, by Joannes Nicolaius Secundus, translated by F.A. Wright

Dust jackets for the Broadway Translations series are common to the series, with several different text-based designs appearing between 1923 and 1930. Dutton wrapped at least one title in a unique, illustrated jacket (see below).

Among the common jackets found on UK and US series titles is the one shown below, The History of Manon Lescaut and the Chevalier Des Grieux, by Prévost, translated by George Dunning Gribble. The series name is on the jacket spine, along with the tile, translator, price (7/6 net), and publisher. This is a UK book and jacket. The front of the jacket includes the title, translator, and note of an introduction to the book. The front jacket flap is blank.

This title is undated but was first published in 1925. WorldCat indicates printings in 1926 and 1933. I’ve seen this style jacket on dated series copies from 1925 and 1926.

The rear of the jacket and back jacket flap are blank:

A very basic red cloth binding with black typography and a box around the author, title, and translator:

Blank endpapers:

The half-title page:

The title page, cased by a red box.

“Printed in Great Britain” (and no date) on the copyright page.

“Printed in Guernsey by the Star and Gazette Co., Ltd.”

All dust jackets I’ve seen for this series are variations of text-based designs except the one shown below from Ovid’s The Lover’s Handbook. This design may have been used on later Dutton US series copies. This Ovid title was first included in the series in 1923. This copy lists The Complete Poems, by Gaius Valerius Catullus, as a series title on the back flap of the dust jacket, which was first published in 1926. The book’s title page indicates “Second Edition,” which was first issued in 1927. At least one more revised edition of this title was issued in the series.

The woodcut design on the jacket below is common to the series title upon which it is used, with space left to print the author and title. The illustration stretches across the front, (faded) spine, and back of the jacket. The series name is included in the illustration. The Dutton name (and not Routledge) is included in the woodcut on the spine of the jacket.

The front jacket flap includes information about the book and the series’ name. Dutton is listed as the publisher; thus, this is a US title.

The rear jacket flap lists seven titles in the series. Dutton seems to have issued all of Routledge’s titles in the UK.

The book is quarter-bound in red and tan cloth, with the title and author glued on paper on the spine and book front. This is a significantly more deluxe binding than the UK example shown previously.

Marbled endpapers suggest older, Victorian-era books:

The first half-title page includes the series name:

The second half-title page:

The title page is cased in a red frame, includes the series name, and indicates “Second Edition” – issued in 1927 (the first being issued in 1923). This dates this book (along with the additional series titles listed on the dust jacket).

The imprints are both Routledge and Dutton, suggesting the books were printed and possibly bound in the UK and sent to the US, where Dutton added dust jackets.

The back of the title page includes the statement “Printed in Great Britain by the Edinburgh Press, 9 and 11 Young Street, Edinburgh.”

The final printed page in the book repeats the same printer information:

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