/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.13478241]

Post your Dostoevsky shelf

[Anonymous No.13478284]

[Anonymous No.13478311]

I’m rereading Brothers K so that’s why there’s a gap. Still waiting on a decent copy of Insulted and Humiliated to be released that doesn’t look hideous.
Got the two postcards from visiting Dostoevsky’s apartment in St. Petersburg. It’s been turned into a museum. Saw his death mask too.

[Anonymous No.13478335]

Dostoevsky or Dostoyevksy? What's the superior spelling?

[Anonymous No.13478340]

[Anonymous No.13478346]

>>13478311
>Still waiting on a decent copy of Insulted and Humiliated to be released that doesn’t look hideous.
The one above you is good

[Anonymous No.13478356]

>>13478311
>P&V

[Anonymous No.13478360]

>>13478311
>that drawing
cute!

[Anonymous No.13478372]

[Anonymous No.13478381]

>>13478241
>>13478284
>>13478311
>>13478340
>>13478372
lmao he didn't write in english lmaooooo you wasted so much time reading a mediocre translation that totally fucks up the original hahaha im laughing at you

[Anonymous No.13478395]

>>13478381
I read for status. I don't care about how it's "meant" to be read.

[Anonymous No.13478400]

>>13478381
The only way to truly test a work's strength is to translate it.

[Anonymous No.13478402]

>>13478395
status and plot apparently, must suck to be you

[Anonymous No.13478411]

>>13478395
redpilled

[Anonymous No.13478462]

>>13478381
Yeah, another of these anti-translation kids, eh? It's simple: our choices are to not read anything that wasn't written in a language we know, or to read translations. And since:
1. Only about half of North Americans speak even two languages, let alone the dozen required if you'd like to read much great world literature, and
2. Only 4chan /lit/ morons truly think you can readily teach yourself a new language to the level required to appreciate complex literary works at a better level than reading a professional translation,
I think I'll enjoy hundreds of translated works for what does shine through, be aware that I'm missing parts of the meaning, and not pretend I'm going to learn Attic and Early Modern Spanish and Baihua in my spare time for the sake of a few books.

[Anonymous No.13478665]

Everyone's missing "A Writer's Diary"
> “And now,” all the lovers of humanity would cry, “now that human needs are taken care of, now we will reveal our true potential!”… But such rapturous outpourings would scarcely be enough for even one generation! People would suddenly see that they had no more life left, that they had no freedom of spirit, no will, no personality, that someone had stolen all this from them; they would see that their human image had disappeared and that the brutish image of a slave had emerged, the image of an animal, with the single difference that a beast does not realize that it is a beast, but a human would realize that he had become a beast. And humanity would begin to decay… seeing that their lives had been taken away for the sake of bread, for “stones turned into bread.” People would realize that there is no happiness in inactivity, that the mind which does not labor will wither, that it is not possible to love one’s neighbor without sacrificing something to him of one’s own labor, that it is vile to live at the expense of another, and that happiness lies not in happiness but only in the attempt to achieve it.

[Anonymous No.13478681]

>>13478462
>too lazy to even learn spanish (or too dumb?)
shut up lmao

[Anonymous No.13478688]

>mom found the Dostoevsky shelf

[Anonymous No.13478692]

>>13478356
whats wrong with P&V i enjoyed their notes from underground translation

[Anonymous No.13478755]

Can someone help me?
What are the best translations for the following:
Brothers K
The Idiot
Crime and Punishment
Thank you in advance.

t. burger

[Anonymous No.13478780]

>>13478688
>sister found copy of lolita

[Anonymous No.13478782]

>>13478688
Then I raped her

[Anonymous No.13478817]

>>13478780
Did you rape her after?

[Anonymous No.13478930]

>>13478755
I feel like on this site that's a question that gets asked a lot but sees little reply's, would like to know as well].

[Anonymous No.13478961]

>>13478335
The correct one. Dostoyevsky

[Anonymous No.13478969]

>>13478755
David McDuff was the best for me. I read McDuff's Brothers K and Constance Garnett's C&P and let me tell you, he is far superior to her. She translated in the early 20th century so she sounds Victorian as fuck, and doesn't provide any endnotes the way McDuff, who translated in like the 1980s and 90s, does.

[Anonymous No.13479110]

>>13478755
I have a variety, some books in more than one. It doesn't really matter desu. All the ones that are being published and are easy to buy are good.

[Anonymous No.13479254]

[Anonymous No.13479305]

>>13478692
They’re fine. Lit just hates anything popular.

[Anonymous No.13479634]

>>13478755
David McDuff and Jessie Coulson, don't bother with anything else.

[Anonymous No.13479686]

;-;

[Anonymous No.13479823]

>>13478692
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-pevearsion-of-russian-literature/

[Anonymous No.13479826]

>>13479305
4chan hates anything popular

[Anonymous No.13479998]

>>13479823
>The Pevearsion

[Anonymous No.13480072]

>>13479823
thanks im new to russian translations and heard good things about P&V from online and friends but reading that article has made me pause and give more though on the translations i read from now on.

[Anonymous No.13480088]

>>13479686
dust your shelves

[Anonymous No.13480366]

>>13478692
> wicked

[Anonymous No.13480375]

I only have an unread copy of C&P

[Anonymous No.13480551]

>>13478241
wow old dosty actually wrote a lot of shit

anyway I read NFtU and most of The Idiot on my kindle

[Anonymous No.13480669]

>>13478241
Is dostoievsky a /lit/ meme? It seems that acts more as a source of identity than as a source of ideas.
Look at this guy >>13478311
He's so into the persona of Dostoievsky that he has dedicated a shelf to his merchandising commodities.
I've actually read brothers kharamazov and the idiot and i don't think i'm ever going to read anything more by him. The novels read like theater plays and just tackle daily matters as fundamentally morally intrinsic where there's always something missing.

[Anonymous No.13481649]

>>13478755
>The Idiot
David McDuff or Alan Myers

>The Brothers Karamazov
David McDuff or Ignat Avsey

>Crime and Punishment
David McDuff or Jessie Coulson or Michael Katz

[Anonymous No.13482017]

>>13478755
P&V for accuracy, Garnett for prose style (Norton has revised editions of her work if you're an autist). Katz and Pasternak are also acceptable. Ignore any other suggestions (/lit/ will probably tell you to read David "Glasnost" McDuff).

[Anonymous No.13482026]

>>13478241

[Anonymous No.13482032]

>>13478692
P&V are literally cancer, LITERALLY.

[Anonymous No.13482037]

>>13482017
>P&V for accuracy
???

[Anonymous No.13482053]

>>13478340
Finnegan's Wake

[Anonymous No.13482109]

>>13482032
you people are so easily influenced. you read one article from some contrarian conservatard literary mag and you regurgitate this tradthot's opinion as if it were your own. the only people who hate p&v are non-russian speakers, boomers attached to garnett's translation, or brainlets who demand translators cater to their provincialism with american idiom. p&v are to dostoevsky and tolstoy what lattimore is to homer. fuck the haters.

[Anonymous No.13482120]

>>13482037
Literally no one disputes this, not even their detractors.

[Anonymous No.13482126]

>>13482109
>>13482120
McDuff is better.

[Anonymous No.13482143]

>>13482126
>glasnost

lol okay anon i'm sure you know what you're talking about

[Anonymous No.13482159]

>>13478241
>>13478284
>>13478311
>>13478340
>>13478372
>>13479254
>>13479686
>>13482026
all these books and literally 0 (zero) of them are actual works by Фёдop Mихáйлoвич Дocтoéвcкий. how sad.

[Anonymous No.13482160]

>>13482109
It's not the opinion that matters, it's the comparison of the texts. P&V is shit. Pure marketing.

[Anonymous No.13482168]

>>13482159
The original is not faithful to the translation. - Borges

[Anonymous No.13482250]

>>13482160
>comparison of the texts

they're the best at preserving dostoevsky's voice and humor, and they're the most accurate (you can literally look up the russian text and do word by word comparison yourself).

>Pure marketing.

yeah pure marketing, which is why their work had the endorsement of the country's best slavic scholars before it was even published.

this board is filled with kolya krasotkins mouthing off about stuff they don't understand.

[Anonymous No.13482390]

>>13482250
It's not gracefully and professionally rendered into English. It's Google Translate tier.

[Anonymous No.13482459]

I can speak three and read in two languages. I can understand why someone wont learn a new language. It is a great task for which you must have a passion and interest for. Simply learning a new language out of impulse wont get you the knowledge or will to be able to wield it. It takes years of studying and practice in order to have a basic understanding, to therefore even try to tackle more complex works. You'd be a fool not to read translations.

[Anonymous No.13482469]

>>13482459
>i'm a brainlet
>that means it's ok to be a brainlet
the coping

[Anonymous No.13482674]

>>13482459
Exactly. Notice how the anti-translation trolls are kids with nothing to say but a few childish insults, terrified that it will become obvious they're all monoglots?

[Anonymous No.13482742]

>>13482469
are you done speaking in memes and buzzwords? I think you're the "brainlet" here.

>>13482674
case in point:
>>13482469

[Anonymous No.13482765]

>>13482742
>anon who disagrees with my view: brainlet
>anon who agrees with my view: case in point

[Anonymous No.13482806]

I've read TBK in Garnett, P&V, and McDuff translation and the only difference I noticed was that Garnett was a bit too flowery at times.
Sperging over slightly different syntax a couple of instances per paragraph is beyond retarded, especially for an author whose prose no one really gives a shit about.

[Anonymous No.13482816]

>>13482806
McDuff is better, just say it.

[Anonymous No.13482955]

>>13482765
Oh no, it's retarded.

[Anonymous No.13484165]

>>13481649
More like McBuff, amirite?

[Anonymous No.13484177]

>>13482955
>Oh no, it's retarded.

[Anonymous No.13484702]

So what are the best translations?

[Anonymous No.13484709]

>>13484702
McDuff and anything that isn't P&V.

[Anonymous No.13485783]

>>13484702
McDuff and Coulson

[Anonymous No.13485846]

>>13478755
Chadarshack

[Anonymous No.13485849]

>>13485783
Is Coulson acually good? I picked up a Franklin Library edition of C&P at the bookstore, and had no idea.

[Anonymous No.13485880]

>>13478241
>Post your Dostoevsky shelf

[Anonymous No.13486320]

>>13485849
Yes, he hasn't translated every single book Dostoevsky (as far I know) but his translations for Memoirs from the House of The Dead and Crime and Punishment are excellent.

[Anonymous No.13486405]

people only like macduff because he's not p&v and he's not garnett, so he's the safe bet if you don't want to be criticized. not that he's bad necessarily, but nothing is particularly noteworthy about his translation method or his prose style, and he uses jarring anachronisms like the soviet era word "glasnost".

/lit/ seems to be under the mistaken impression that there's a such thing as a perfect translation, so when they notice a flaw with one translation, they decide that it's trash and that's that. it doesn't occur to them that translations are inherently flawed, and every approach is inevitably going to suffer from some defect (a more literal translation will sometimes sound a little weird, a less literal translation will lose some of the author's voice and obscure certain national/regional characteristics). as a result of this thinking, people here often end up favoring mediocre translations purely because they fail to tick off any of the wrong boxes and aren't sufficiently high profile enough to have bitter articles written pointing out their flaws.

p&v's approach can sometimes result in odd, exotic sounding sentences, but this is generally kept to a minimum, and when it occurs, there's usually a reason. /lit/ likes to mock their opening of notes ("i am a sick man. i am a wicked man. [...] i think my liver hurts"), even though this is an accurate rendering. their defense is that they "prefer non-literal translations that remain to true to the spirit", but this defense is inadequate because it's not simply a matter of changing a word that would better capture the meaning for an english speaking audience. it's a matter of choosing a word with a completely different meaning. "wicked" is different from "spiteful". saying "my liver hurts" is different from saying that it's "diseased". feeling a pain in your stomach that you think is originating from your liver but aren't sure isn't the same as suspecting you have a liver disease. if you bother to do your research, you'll see p&v have a good reason for these seemingly odd translation choices. dostoevsky is notorious for his rough prose which some considered the result of poor style but later critics saw as unique to his polyphonic approach to literature. cleaning this up might make for a better style, but it distorts this aspect of his work, which is why p&v's translations are so important.

garnett also gets a bad wrap around here, which is weird because people here will shit on p&v for literalism and then dump on her for the inevitable mistakes that result from a less literal approach. in any case, she's by far the best prose stylist of his translators. her only real defect is that some of her victorianisms can be offputting, though on the whole her prose flows smoothly and shouldn't be any more offensive to modern ears than dickens.

anyway, they both have their flaws, but they're miles ahead of any of the others. ideally, you should read multiple translations and make up your own mind.

[Anonymous No.13486416]

>>13485880
How did you sneak into my home

[Anonymous No.13486437]

>>13482390
Dostoevsky isn't a graceful writer. Take it up with him.

[Anonymous No.13486611]

>>13484702
ignat avesy (rip)

[Anonymous No.13487226]

>>13478755
>>13482017
>be Polish
>read Russian lit in phenomenal Polish translations
>go check the original sometimes out of curiosity
>confirm time after time that translations are very accurate
>go check P&V once
>smile inside that you don't have to be reading that
Stilted, unnatural, sometimes hysterically bad. Of course you may very well end up enjoying P&V — I categorically do not. I think they're laughable with their goals. It doesn't matter that they keep the exact sentence structure or some other autismo if the mood is lost or changed in the process. It is like that in general with P&V though; I revised a translation to Polish of one of Gogol's short stories and was using German and English editions to see how some of the humour was tackled, and the P&V version was depressing because of how important the mood and language flow are with Gogol. Not saying other translations aren't bad, but it's hard to imagine they can be worse than P&V.
This list seems okay >>13481649

[Anonymous No.13487954]

>>13486405
>/lit/ seems to be under the mistaken impression that there's a such thing as a perfect translation
I've never seen anyone here make anything resembling that claim. There are better and worse/subpar ones, we generally think P&V is of the latter.

[Anonymous No.13488280]

>>13486437
He isn't yet P&V manage to make him even more awkward.