/lit/ - Literature

>he doesn't learn Russian to read Dostoyevsky
Cringe

>no P&V
Nice

Anyone know standard German translations for him? just wondering

>>16258294
Is this an ironic or unironic nice because I'm reading the P&V translation right now.

avsey's idiot & karamazov are definitely the best
slater and ready also have good c&p's

>>16258669
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/gary-morson/the-pevearsion-of-russian-literature/
https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the-pevearvolokhonsky-hype-machine-and-how-it-could-have-been-stopped-or-at-least-slowed-down

still, don't worry about it

>>16257583
Constance Garnett for everything

>>16258707
Fuck... I compared a couple paragraphs between the P&V and McDuff versions and P&V seemed more understandable to me.

why do you choose these ones?

>>16258786
Then just read it. Every anti-P&V article is countered by four or five pro-P&V articles.

>>16258786
p&v is fine, don’t sweat it. /lit/ is just acting out its usual ’fuck the system’ stance about them. make up your own mind. it barely matters when it comes to dosto anyway

Constance Garnett
1915

>I am a sick man... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well—let it get worse!

Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky
1993

>I am a sick man . . . I am a wicked man. An unattractive man. I think my liver hurts. However, I don't know a fig about my sickness, and am not sure what it is that hurts me. I am not being treated and never have been, though I respect medicine and doctors. What’s more, I am also superstitious in the extreme; well, at least enough to respect medicine. (I'm sufficiently educated not to be superstitious, but I am.) No, sir, I refuse to be treated out of wickedness. Now, you will certainly not be so good as to understand this. Well, sir, but I understand it. I will not, of course, be able to explain to you precisely who is going to suffer in this case from my wicked- ness; I know perfectly well that I will in no way “muck things up” for the doctors by not taking their treatment; I know better than anyone that by all this I am harming only myself and no one else. But still, if I don’t get treated, it is out of wickedness. My liver hurts; well, then let it hurt even worse!

Constance Garnett did great English translations of the Russians. They were readable, enjoyable, all the great English writers of the twentieth century read them, they established the reputation of the Russians in the English world. All the great Modernists read them.

But then the scholars came along, and they couldn't beat Garnett on readability and style, so they took the accuracy angle. They were accuracy pedants. They couldn't write a good English sentence, but they could say, "Well, that word Garnett used for this Russian word isn't exactly right" and so on. So we got "Dostoevsky—Now with 200% more accuracy!" Sounds good, right? But the scholars' translations suck. They may be more accurate, but they're less readable. And nobody needs them. The general reader just wants to enjoy a novel and therefore is served by the work being rendered in a way that reads well in English, and the scholars—are reading it in the original! The only people who might need these stilted translations are aspiring scholars who are learning the language and need a crib.

Nabokov hated Garnett's translations, but you have to keep in mind that he was an author himself, one whose big strength was his style, who labored over every word, and was therefore prone to be defensive about his choices carrying over accurately. But as I demonstrated above, translations that favor accuracy so much that the readability suffers serve nobody well. The general reader doesn't want them, and the scholar doesn't need them.

P&V lean on Garnett more than Matthew, Mark and Luke lean on Q.

For the most part, P&V take her sentence structures, and substitute a different word or phrase.

Once you see it >>16258912, you can't unsee it.

>>16258826
>why do you choose these ones?
They are just my personal preferences for nice paperback editions with readable translations, I don't personally own all of them but I've read them in stores or online enough to get a good feel for them.

>>Notes from Underground, also translated as Notes from the Underground or Letters from the Underworld by one translator who wanted to be different and so picked a shittier title
>Constance Garnett, revised by Ralph Matlaw (9780452285583)
Fixed

>>16258912
is the point that theyre exactly the sme

I was gonna make a thread asking for suggestions on where to start on Chekov but I think I'll just ask here.

I've recently read The Brothers Karamazov. My russian friend's family gave a copy to me for my birthday many years ago and I tried a couple times but it was pretty slogging. But recently I persevered and was well rewarded.

I love short stories, and apparently Chekhov is amazing so.... where do I start? Are there any good translated collections? I know he has an unbelievable volume so there won't be one only to check.

Anyway, help would be greatly appreciated.

>>16259396
>>16259009
>Constance Garnett revised
Is this better than her original translation?

Bump for interest

>>16257583
I enjoyed McDuff but I haven't compared.

>>16261311
daily reminder that mcduff was from his mother's womb untimely ripped

>>16257583
I read Arabic translations that rely on English translations, his works are still great, I will never get the translation autism, most do a fine job and if you're so anal about translations that those won't do then you will never really be satisfied until you learn the work's native language.

>>16261833
what

>>16261901
he wasn't born of woman

>>16258707
I enjoyed Ready’s C&P too.

>>16258786
McDuff's Brothers Karamazov is deliberately much more wordy than P&V (supposedly because the way the sentences are compressed in Russian doesn't quite work in English, there is a translator's note at the start that explains it) so I can see why you would think that. I found McDuff a better experience despite (and sometimes because of) this but either translation is perfectly fine and there will always be time to read the book again someday

>>16259548
If you want a specific volume then The Portable Chekhov is a pretty great place to start. If you just want a specific story than maybe try My Life. The format is pretty standard and the length is just enough to allow you to understand how Chekhov works.

>>16258707
Lmao there is always that one pseud who needs to post the same two irrelevant blog posts shitting on P&V.

For the Frenchfags here, Markowicz at Acte Sud did the best translations.

>>16259396
Underground is already a bad translation. Better would be cellar, or basement(maybe not). Something more...visceral?

>>16258921
There is one critical error in that pasta: P&V are the complete opposite of scholars caring about accuracy. They've always had their own unique ideas about translation, but their creations have still infested the whole African-American continent.

>>16259812
In principle, “revised” means it's still Garnett's translation, but someone very well studied has fixed some mistakes (like choosing a bit more proper name for a certain type of a horse carriage or piece of clothing), misprints, or accidental gaps, and probably rephrased some sentences that use dated language where there is no difference in original style. If you're fixing the style of the whole thing, you are making your own translation, as you'd have to revise basically everything. On the one hand, most of it can be done with footnotes. On the other hand, you can have copy rights for new work, and advertise it as revised on the cover. Whether you might want to choose it depends on how humble the editors are in their foreword, and what reviewers say about their work in professional journals.

>>16262385
There's more.

https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-pevearsion-of-russian-literature/
http://www.thinkaloud.ru/feature/berdy-lan-PandV-e.html
https://www.librarything.com/topic/260074
https://readingroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/the-art-of-translation/#comment-206
http://languagehat.com/the-translation-wars/
http://languagehat.com/more-translation-wars/
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/06/23/socks-translating-anna-karenina/
http://languagehat.com/janet-malcolm-vs-pv/
https://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/why-i-dont-read-pevear-and-volokhonsky-vtranslations/
https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the-pevearvolokhonsky-hype-machine-and-how-it-could-have-been-stopped-or-at-least-slowed-down/

>>/lit/?task=search&ghost=&search_text=pevearsion

>>16262560
Can you say “cellar movement” or “basement movement”?

>>16257649
That's my plan after Japanese. Right now I'm reading it in English though.

>>16261901
>hasn't read one of his most accessible plays

>>16262379

Thanks blud. I just wanted a place to start to read a bunch of his stuff. Like if there was a particular translator or volume of his work to start with. Portable it is. Thanks

Just bought The Brothers Karazamov by Wordsworth Classics how fucked am I?
It's actually titled The Karazamov Brothers

>>16257583
>Crime and Punishment
>Michael Katz (Norton Critical Edition)
Both Jessie Coulson and Katz have been published by Norton, but the newest edition is kino.

Maude for Tolstoy, McDuff for Dostoevsky seems like a good general rule of thumb.