[gruseom]

Isn't that a Steve Jobs quote or something?

I believe it's Emerson. But Steve Jobs might well have adopted it, like the fake Leonardo quote ("simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" - actually William Gaddis) and the fake Picasso one ("great artists steal" - actually T.S. Eliot).

[FreakLegion]

> actually T.S. Eliot

Almost! With context: "One of the surest of tests is the way in which a poet borrows. Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different."

I'm also a fan of the way Gilles Deleuze framed it: "Proust says: 'Great literature is written in a sort of foreign language. To each sentence we attach a meaning, or at any rate a mental image, which is often a mistranslation. But in great literature all our mistranslations result in beauty.' This is the good way to read: all mistranslations are good -- always provided that they do not consist in interpretations, but relate to the use of the book, that they multiply its use, that they create yet another language inside its language. 'Great literature is written in a sort of foreign language...' That is the definition of style."

[gruseom]

Not almost; unequivocally. That the wording got polished over time is just what happens in popular discourse.

I don't see the connection to Deleuze. Eliot isn't talking about mistranslation or about how audiences receive art. He's talking about Dylan lifting the melody to "Don't think twice" from some other song.

[FreakLegion]

Yes, almost. Eliot almost said that -- said something superficially similar to that -- but didn't say that. People use "great artists steal" as incorrectly as they use "information wants to be free." The line hasn't been polished; it's been co-opted and transformed. Which is exactly what he and Deleuze were interested in, and why they so often circle the same drain.

Of course how audiences receive art and how artists create it aren't disjoint processes, but I understand you getting hung up on Deleuze's use of the word "mistranslation" there. It helps to know that he's working out of a tradition that treats the idea of translating as a figure for "owning" (in the Heideggerian sense, also translated "enowning").

[gruseom]

What I meant is that there is no other plausible lineage for that quote - and I've looked. If you claim otherwise, I'd love to see the citation.

It doesn't help to replace one obscure jargon with another, even more obscure jargon.

[FreakLegion]

Absolutely that's the provenance of the saying. Eliot just wasn't saying what the saying says =).