[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]
2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/lit/ - Literature

View post   
File: 303 KB, 1400x2092, 8117HB7WbvL.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7174094 No.7174094 [Reply] [Original]

I'm going to read The Brothers Karamazov. Which translation is best for a first read through? Some say Peaver is closest to the original, some say McDuff has a smoother flow. Any opinions? Thanks

>> No.7174105
File: 50 KB, 202x235, Capt. Kierk.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7174105

>>7174094
Either/Or

>> No.7174111

>>7174094
P&V is your best choice.

Have you read any other Dostoevsky?

>> No.7174114

Read excerpts and decide for yourself. Personally I think p/v read horribly.

>> No.7174119

>>7174111
No, I haven't.
>>7174114
Thanks for your input. I'll check on amazon.

>> No.7174120

Dostoevsky is always a great read, I would recommend the peaver

>> No.7174121

>>7174094
Get the revised Garnett.

>> No.7174134
File: 29 KB, 298x499, avsey-karamazov-brothers.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7174134

>>7174094

Pevear and Volokhonsky are all about marketing. Their method is faulty, even though on the surface it seems good. She produces a very rough pony in English, and he (who proudly knows no Russian) makes it grammatical. They miss tons of idioms this way, for example. Add to that the fact that Karamazov was the very first translation they did. </obligatory>

The best of the newer translations are McDuff and Avsey (note the title).

>> No.7174140

>>7174114
Their prose can be clunky occasionally, they I think they come closest to Dostoevsky's language and intent.

>>7174119
If I were to do it again, I wouldn't read BK first. I'd proably start with The Idiot.

>> No.7174161

I didn't even think about this when I bought The Idiot
And I just checked amazon reviews for it and apparnetly I bought a very over simplified translation.
What version of it should I get? What's the best translation I mean

>> No.7174164

>>7174140

>I think they come closest to Dostoevsky's language and intent
Pevear and Volokhonsky work too broadly to develop a connection to any particular author to capture his individual language/voice. This is also a major shortcoming of Garnett's work--the reader very much gets her voice gauzed over whatever author she translated.

>> No.7174177

>Not reading it in original Russian

Nice pleb

>> No.7174179

>>7174134
Avsey looks interesting. Thanks.

>> No.7174279

Basically P&V's big thing is they foreignize the prose so it feels like you're "reading Russian". they handle idiom literally so it reads quirky and eccentric and lots of readers now associate that with Russian. Is that closer to how Dostoevsky should actually read? who knows. They do capture humor in spots where McDuff totally whiffs, i would compare out of curiosity. Or maybe they created it who knows

Garnett introduced all the Russians and was read by an entire era. You want to read the Dostoevsky yo favorite authors read? Or the Dostoevsky that chick in your class read?

>> No.7174329

Avsey or Magarshack

>> No.7174348
File: 118 KB, 1265x576, should i.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7174348

on a related note should i buy these ? see them on /lit/ lists a lot, as a sci-fi plebian wondering if i should branch out

>> No.7174391

>>7174329
OP here, I think I'm going with the Avsey translation. It seems to be a good middle of the road translation from what people have to say about it.

>> No.7174410

>>7174348
I don't think it's necessary to buy IJ and BK considering they are so damn long.

>> No.7174457

>>7174348

Those are all worthwhile reading. I encourage you not to start with Karamazov if you haven't read Dostoyevsky, nor with Infinite Jest if you haven't read Wallace.

Good starting places for Dostoyevsky include his shorter works The Double, The Gambler, Notes from Underground, and Notes from the House of the Dead; or his other major novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and Demons (aka Devils or The Possessed). Thelatter in particular requires some attention to the politics of Dosto's spacetime and his personal political development. Also look into the translations that are available for each, and heed the cautions in this thread about P&V.

For Wallace, I recommend something shorter to get acclimated to his writing style, which can be an acquired taste. He wrote excellent nonfiction and short fiction both. My favorite essay collection is A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again; Consider the Lobster is also very good. (Both Flesh and Not was cobbled together posthumously, is generally not his best work, and can mostly be found online anyway. The title essay on Feder is outstanding though.) For short stories, I think his best (and the closest to IJ) is Oblivion, although Brief Interviews with Hideous Men is well recommended too. (Girl with Curious Hair is better for the DFW completist.) As for his other novels, I think Broom of the System might not be very reader-friendly. The Pale King is, but I'd say read it after IJ.

Also, I'll just say (since you have them together) that Karamazov and Infinite Jest go very well together since the former was a major influence on the latter. Do work yourself up to both of them. IJ has SF overtones too, so that part should be of interest to you as well.

>> No.7174486

>>7174457

Saved. Thanks will do.
Was asking if I should buy IJ because of the footnotes and the difficulty of reading them as an ebook. But will read his other shorter works as you suggested.

>> No.7174521

>>7174486
I would definitely recommend reading a physical copy of IJ as opposed to an ebook. The endnotes can be cumbersome, but they're intended to break up the reading, and it gets to be fun flipping between bookmarks. (There's also apprently an audiobook available, in which the endnotes are inserted into the narrative with a reverb effect. I can't even imagine.)

>> No.7174668

Wait on IJ, the 20th anniversary contest winner is going to be announced soon and if the cover is great you might regret it.

>> No.7176428

>>7174119
You should read his other stuff first in all honesty.

>Notes from Underground
>Crime and Punishment
>The Idiot

These obviously aren't all of his works, but they're usually considered the "best" or "most important". I would definitely recommend reading at least one of these before BK because it can be a little difficult going from BK to these considering that a lot of the same ideas are present. As far as trnaslations go I read P&V for all of them and had no complaints. I understand why some people say it's "clunky" at times, but all in all I thought they did a terrific job.

>> No.7176952

>>7176428
Is it really that important to read other works of his first? I'm interested in BK because I heard it has some religious / philosophical themes.

>> No.7178307

>>7176952
That's the thing. Basically all of Dosto's work is really heavy in the religious/philosophical/psychological aspect and BK is widely considered his magnum opus, because it's the novel that touches on all of those things in such interesting ways. His other books are basically focusing on different aspects of those three things, but ultimately the ideas he represented in his previous work all comes to full fruition in BK. If you read his other stuff first then when you read BK you will say "hey so and so is like so and so from his earlier work! But here he's doing this and this instead..." whereas if you go the opposite route it will be "hey this is just a prototype for such and such character in BK..." I mean maybe that won't happen and it won't bother you, but just read his other stuff first. If you're interested in it for the religious/philosophical aspects then any of his work should suffice honestly. If you're REALLY interested in the religious aspect I'd recommend The Idiot I suppose, but really anything will work.

Not trying to sound like an ass, but if you didn't already know that the majority of Dosto's work is religious/philosophical then maybe you should do a little more research of him on your own. Don't shy away from this for fear of spoilers, because there is no way to spoil the book. You might read "...culminating in the climax where this happens" but that doesn't mean the book has been ruined, because that isn't the plot isn't really the main idea in his work.

C&P and BK were spoiled for me before I read them and it had no detriment on my enjoyment of either.

>> No.7178520

>>7178307
Ok, thanks a lot. Maybe after all I will try The Idiot, or at least I'll look into it.