IV in Russian

[Mark Kohut]

I think I only know this re Peavaer & Volokhonsky. I read War & Peace in English a few summers ago. First time. I believed all 
the hype about them, I guess, and read their translation---with the maps and list of characters from an old Inner Sanctum
edition, the vaunted Maude, which I had gotten long ago hearing it was the best. 
 
I was OK with P--V's book, felt real, and right...until the first battle scenes........egregious (imho)......The Maudes' was readable and good.
I remembered and checked an interview with P--V in which I relearned that Ms. Volkhonsky (of the pair) did a literal rendering then he did the modern
translating (mostly)......
 
Well, as a high school buddy who impressed me greatly by telling me once he had read W & P said, 'well, most skip the battle scenes anyway"...I never
forgot that and it seems Mr. Peavear is another who who figured he did not have to work on the dated overliteralness of the battle scenes because most skipped those scenes.......he did.

From: "kelber at mindspring.com" <kelber at mindspring.com>
To: pynchon-l at waste.org 
Sent: Friday, July 12, 2013 1:01 PM
Subject: Re: IV in Russian


Thanks for the explanations, and for directing me to Language Hat. I've looked through some other translations (via the "look inside" application on Amazon). Some other choices are: torment, crisis, heartbreak and crack-up (particularly bad). I'm wondering why no one used the word "stress," which could have been rendered: "Dmitry is pure stress," or humorously-slangily (and overly modern): "Dmitry is stress on a cracker." Anyway, it does seem pointless to insist that any translation is the "best" or the "truest." Each translation is a series of judgment calls that can't possibly ring true to every ear.


-----Original Message-----
>From: Max Nemtsov <max.nemtsov at gmail.com>
>Sent: Jul 12, 2013 1:06 PM
>To: kelber at mindspring.com
>Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
>Subject: Re: IV in Russian
>
>right. this is a war, happens all the time. the war between the old and 
>the new Dostoyevsky's translators and their fans (Language Hat, i 
>believe, published dozens of essays and opinions on Karamazovs)
>
>the phrase occurs in the 3rd chapter: Дмитрий только надрыв. nadryv is 
>actually a tear (when something is torn) or anguish. bearing in mind the 
>naturalistic twist in Dostoyevsky, Garnett clearly preferred laceration 
>as something with more physiology to it (but no, there are still no open 
>wounds there), and the new couple preferred the more technical side of 
>it. both were slightly off the mark, in conveying the meaning is that 
>Dmitry is clearly a drama queen here. however, the problem with the new 
>version is different: what P&V missed is the shade of meaning of 
>"tol'ko". they translated it as "only" although the meaning here is 
>different. to my ear, the correct(-er) phrase would be "Dmitry is all 
>strain" (meaning all tragic exertion). a-and, this strain (nadryv) is 
>clearly one of the key words in the novel, where everything is strained, 
>D. uses it all the time to describe people, situations and scenes, and 
>to me, it's more natural to say that a scene in a sitting room is 
>strained than lacerated
>
>yet there's no clear line re what translation of the novel is better or 
>worse. i believe both have merits, and all translators had their reasons 
>to make their decisions. and both versions are imperfect as all 
>translations are
>Mx
>
>
>On 12.07.2013 20:25, kelber at mindspring.com wrote:
>> As long as I've got the ear of a Russian English translator, can I ask you one non-Pynchon question? I recently read the Pevear-Volokhonsky translation of The Brother Karamazov, and I was puzzled by their choice of the word "strain," instead of the word "laceration," used in the old Constance Garnett translation, which I'd read years ago in high school. Such as in the the phrase: "Dmitry is only a strain." The word isn't usually used this way, with an article, in English. It's an awkward formulation, and it has no easy connotation. If I called someone "a strain," they'd have no idea what I was talking about. "Laceration" actually seems much closer to the sense of "an open wound" that the context implies. Just curious, do you have any idea why they chose the word "strain"?
>>
>> Laura
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Max Nemtsov <max.nemtsov at gmail.com>
>>> Sent: Jul 12, 2013 11:57 AM
>>> To: kelber at mindspring.com
>>> Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
>>> Subject: Re: IV in Russian
>>>
>>> thanks, Laura -
>>> it was my luck, yes, that the insurance term in Russian gives plenty
>>> opportunity for wider interpretations. and, porok in Russian may also
>>> signify "sin," to boot )) the only minus is that vnutrenniy is not as
>>> rich in meaning as inherent, it doesn't have this connotation of being
>>> inbred, only more or less internal. well, it's always this give and take
>>> game going on, in translation. here you lose, there you win ))
>>> Mx
>>>
>>> On 12.07.2013 19:46, kelber at mindspring.com wrote:
>>>> Congratulations, Max. Great cover. I looked up the word "porok" (sorry, no access to a Cyrillic keyboard)in my Russian-English dictionary, and it gave three definitions: vice, defect, flaw. Whereas looking up the word "vice" in my handy online dictionary gives the first definition as: moral depravity or corruption; wickedness. And the dictionary only mentions the word defect as a minor, less-used definition. So on the face of it, it seems that the Russian word better captures the nuances of Pynchon's title than the English word (which gains meaning only within the whole phrase). Do you think this is so?
>>>>
>>>> Laura
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: Max Nemtsov <max.nemtsov at gmail.com>
>>>>> Sent: Jul 12, 2013 9:09 AM
>>>>> To: pynchon-l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>>>> Subject: IV in Russian
>>>>>
>>>>> Dear colleagues,
>>>>> this is just to inform everyone interested that IV will be published in
>>>>> Russian in late summer - early fall, in my humble translation.
>>>>> here's the link to the cover: http://spintongues.livejournal.com/385558.html
>>>>>
>>>>> a-and the next step will be V. - the Russian publisher hired me to do
>>>>> the new translation, it's going to be the third one into Russian
>>>>> no rest for the wicked
>>>>> Mx
>
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