Now reading...

[Joe]

Just finished Mark Nowak's REVENANTS (Coffee House). If only all so-called "documentary poetics projects" were this humble, careful, luminous.

Now reading Mario De Andrade's MACUNAIMA, a foundational text in Brazilian literary Modernism... "Rabelais in the rain forest"

[jlhoots]

Sigrid Undset: Gunnar's Daughter

Edited February 1, 2016 by jlhoots

[Brad]

I've been watching War and Peace and lately I've had an interest in the Napoleonic Wars (even before the program aired in teh US) and, well, I've decided to take the plunge.  Yes, you got it: War and Peace.

Reading War and Peace may have been discussed before but obviosly a major undertaking.

In thinking about whether to do it, I came across a couple of articles that may be of interest for those thinking about it:

Seven Reasons You Should Give War and Peace a Chance

Why Read War and Peace

In doing a little research there is apparently some debate about which translation to choose.  Many like the translation by Pevear and Volokhonsky (Vintage Classics) while others prefer the one by Anthony Briggs (Penguin).  I chose the P & V one but may take a look at the Briggs one just to compare styles.

[ejp626]

1 hour ago, Brad said:

I've been watching War and Peace and lately I've had an interest in the Napoleonic Wars (even before the program aired in teh US) and, well, I've decided to take the plunge.  Yes, you got it: War and Peace.

Reading War and Peace may have been discussed before but obviosly a major undertaking.

In thinking about whether to do it, I came across a couple of articles that may be of interest for those thinking about it:

Seven Reasons You Should Give War and Peace a Chance

Why Read War and Peace

In doing a little research there is apparently some debate about which translation to choose.  Many like the translation by Pevear and Volokhonsky (Vintage Classics) while others prefer the one by Anthony Briggs (Penguin).  I chose the P & V one but may take a look at the Briggs one just to compare styles.

Good luck with that.  I've basically always found the P & V translations to be the best, though I've only read their Anna Karenina, The Master & Margarita, Demons and Notes from Underground.  I'll probably get around to War and Peace in a couple of years.

[Larry Kart]

32 minutes ago, ejp626 said:

Good luck with that.  I've basically always found the P & V translations to be the best, though I've only read their Anna Karenina, The Master & Margarita, Demons and Notes from Underground.  I'll probably get around to War and Peace in a couple of years.

Sorry but the P/V translations are pretty bad, a triumph of hype. But don't take my word for it; see this from Gary Saul Morson, who really knows his stuff:

https://www.scribd.com/doc/40906160/The-Pevearsion-of-Russian-Literature

 

 

[A Lark Ascending]

War and Peace is not a difficult book - just long. Until the last 200 or so pages (can't be exact - it's 40 years since I read it). There Tolstoy shifts off the story to a long philosophical treatise. I got through about half of that section and then admitted defeat. A pity as I'd made it that far (mainly on trains going to interviews). I really enjoyed the bulk of it, especially the depictions of battlefield chaos and the fog of war that enveloped everyone from ordinary soldier up to the supposed tacticians. I felt 'Anna Karenina', which I read just before, had the edge just because it had a unity to it without that preachy voice at the end. I don't re-read many books but I'd like to read them both again...maybe the end of W&P will make more sense at 60 rather than 21!     

[Leeway]

Most translations have their strong and weak points, including P&V. I've read War & Peace twice now, the last time in the Rosemary Edmonds translation, and found it perfectly satisfactory. Probably not best to obsess over any particular translation. Recently I had a chance to compare Bulgakov's Master & Margarita in 3 translations: P&V, Ginsburg, and Burgin. P&V occasionally came off stiff; Ginsburg reads very well but her text was imperfect; Burgin reads well also but leaves nuggets of text untranslated. P&V does have some useful notes. Hard to say which was the best. I would not automatically default to P&V if other translations are more available. 

[A Lark Ascending]

I only read Schnabel's version. 

[Brad]

1 hour ago, Larry Kart said:

Sorry but the P/V translations are pretty bad, a triumph of hype. But don't take my word for it; see this from Gary Saul Morson, who really knows his stuff:

https://www.scribd.com/doc/40906160/The-Pevearsion-of-Russian-Literature

 

 

Unfortunately, that comes with a fee.  Would love to read it.

[ejp626]

18 minutes ago, Brad said:

Unfortunately, that comes with a fee.  Would love to read it.

Yes, I am not going to sign up to Scribed to find out what axe Morson has to grind.  I can say that I read 3 translations of Master and Margarita, alternating chapters like Leeway, and I thought P & V was the best.  I don't read Russian, so I can't speak to the accuracy, but this one seemed to convey the ideas the most clearly and generally had more felicitous phrasing -- for me.  Though I did copy over in the margins a few places where I thought Burgin was better.

It is clear that some people get very heated when there are different translations to choose from, but it seem that some of these people are expecting some Platonically perfect translation, which is of course absurd.  For at least a subset of these critics, only reading in the original is acceptable.

[HutchFan]

I've read War & Peace in a couple different translations, and -- naturally -- translators do make a difference. That said, I think some critics and readers of Russian can make too much of these differences. Garnett's translation was the first version I read, and it's usually looked down upon now. In comparison, the Pevear and Volokhnosky translation does seem less "Victorian."  Tolstoy himself approved Maude's translations, and Briggs has his advocates. 

Just read the darn book, I say. Even if a given translator misses some aspect of the novel -- whether it's fudging on tone or meaning -- the greatness of Tolstoy's achievement is going to come shining through. Besides, there are all sorts of other barriers to fully understanding the book that are just as important as the translation (if not more so). For example, Tolstoy could assume that his readers would know about Russia's conflicts with Napoleon; it was common knowledge. But, when I first read the book at 19, I knew very little of Napoleon's life and campaigns and even less about 19th century Russia. That made for a bit of a tough slog at the beginning. But as I progressed none of that stuff mattered. The universality of Tolstoy's characters and his stunning portrayal of life carried the day.

BTW: Under the spell of Tolstoy, I studied Russian for a few years in college. I wanted to read him and all the rest in the original Russian. Sadly, my language skills never got that far. Even so, I'm glad to have read many Russian writers in English -- even if I'm missing out on something. Sure, every work of art loses something in translation, but it hasn't been enough to keep them from being among my favorite books.

 

One other thing: Here's some interesting reading on the topic of translating Russian literature: The Translation Wars by David Remnick (not behind a pay wall).

Edited February 2, 2016 by HutchFan

[ejp626]

Agreed.  It is far more important to read these books than to obsess over translation.

Speaking of other barriers, I am almost done with Faulkner's Go Down, Moses.  That is a tough slog, and in some places I have no idea exactly who is talking to whom and whether this is a conversation that happened in the past or it is an imagined conversation.  Either seems plausible.  I was reasonably well-versed in the Civil War and the Reconstruction Era, but I can imagine these novels will feel more and more foreign as time passes, though racial strife seems eternal in the heart of America. 

I can only imagine the difficulties in trying to translate this, let alone The Sound and the Fury, and then the critics coming along and saying what a mess the translators had made of Faulkner.

Edited February 2, 2016 by ejp626
spelling error

[A Lark Ascending]

Talking of tough slogs I'm finding 'Moby Dick' hard going. Can only manage it 10 pages at a time so I'll be lucky to finish it by the summer. There are times when I get really engaged....and then you get chapters of deviation that go on for ever. I think I can see why it has a literary reputation - it seems very modern in places, almost changing its form for a chapter or two e.g. the section where he has the entire crew commenting almost like in an opera. Seems like a book to study rather than read for pleasure. I vaguely recall DH Lawrence writing very enthusiastically about the book. 

I'm determined to finish it having given up once before - unusual for me as I generally won't persevere after a certain point with books I'm not enjoying (unless it's something I have to read for professional reasons. No longer an issue!) 

Edited February 2, 2016 by A Lark Ascending

[Larry Kart]

This Morson piece about P/V's work is accessible, at least to me:

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

Let me know if you're interested but the link doesn't work, and I'll see what I can do. About it being "more important to read these books than to obsess over (I would say care about) translation," I would say, if the translation is inept, what are you in fact reading?

This piece might be instructive:

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2004/10/no-way-madame-bovary/303488/

I particularly like this bit:

'Any translator must be unusually alert to what is alive or dead about his own use of language or else he will do an injury to Flaubert's style far more serious than merely failing to reproduce its pulse and lilt. When Flaubert seems to be saying that Charles's off-putting first wife is long in the tooth, the translator had better be careful about calling her long in the tooth, which in English means "old": Flaubert is just saying that her teeth are long.' (Thus that she is in that respect unattractive.)

 

 

[HutchFan]

36 minutes ago, Larry Kart said:

This Morson piece about P/V's work is accessible, at least to me:

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

Let me know if you're interested but the link doesn't work, and I'll see what I can do. About it being "more important to read these books than to obsess over (I would say care about) translation," I would say, if the translation is inept, what are you in fact reading?

Larry, I just read the article. No problems with access for me.

I can only assume that Morson is overstating the problems with P&V. Of course, I can't know this for sure, since I don't read Russian.  I'm dependent on others to tell me which is best. And there are many, many professors of Russian Literature who have endorsed P&V's translations.

Also, I didn't mean to imply that translations don't matter. Of course they matter. The very act of translation changes the meaning of any work of art.  But, in context, in the big scheme of things, I wonder if Morson is making these issues out to be mountains when in reality they are mole-hills. It's not like P&V are universally regarded as inept charlatans. As I said, many experts recommend P&V's translations. (And, by experts, I don't mean Oprah!  )

There's always going to be disagreements about precisely these sorts of things in academic circles. ...I don't care to get caught up in it.

 

Edited February 2, 2016 by HutchFan

[Brad]

Thanks Larry, I was able to access the article.  I don't know if Morson is overstating the problem as I suffer from the same disability as HutchFan.  However, I did find persuasive the passages he cited, much preferring the non - P & V translation.  What I found amazing is how professional translators could arrive at such different translations.

The term "marketing of Pevear and Volokhonsky" on the last page of the article is interesting because when you go to Amazon, the first edition of War and Peace that you see is theirs.  Obviously the publishers have to pay for that space.  Just as in a grocery store, you have to pay for prominent shelf space.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Brad

[Larry Kart]

This translation of “The Master and Margarita” by Diana Burgin and Katherine Tiernan O'Connor is quite good:

 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-Mikhail-Bulgakov/dp/0679760806/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1454447418&sr=1-1&keywords=the+master+and+margarita

 

Compare it to Peaver’s and I think you’ll see the difference:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-Penguin-Classics/dp/0141180145/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1454447418&sr=1-4&keywords=the+master+and+margarita

 

A comment from a native Russian speaker on P/V’s “The Master and Margarita”:

 

‘Pevear & Volokhonsky’s translations are awful travesties of the original Russian meaning and nuance. They succeed by virtue of seeming “weird” where the original text uses a completely commonplace idiom, or, vice versa, missing something unique to the writer’s style and replacing it with a pedestrian cliche. Readers who have no Russian think the “clunkiness” of the translation is a window to the original writer’s peculiar style and idiom. Unfortunately, they’re being deceived. The clunkiness is almost always the invention of the translators. The issue isn’t whether the original was “smooth” or not; it’s that it wasn’t smooth in ways entirely different than those ignorantly made-up by this team.

 

‘I’m sorry if these words seem too strong; I have strong opinions on the issue. Any native speaker of Russian who appreciates the original texts and knows English well enough will find it painful to read the original and P&V’s translation side-by-side. I tried to do that in 2003 and briefly reviewed their translation of Bulgakov in my blog (in Russian).

 

‘The examples cited in that blogpost and comments show that time and again P&V use a literal translation of an idiom or a common expression, resulting in a weird English phrase or a weird syntax that both obscures the original meaning, and makes the sentence stand out gratuitously, giving the reader some of that desired “clunkiness.”

 

‘E.g. when Bulgakov speaks of “нечистые силы” (nechistye sily), a traditional, entirely commonplace Russian expression for demons or evil spirits, he’s not introducing an interesting new metaphor. Now “нечистые силы” is literally “unclean powers”, but even saying that is a bit of a stretch, as the word “unclean”, “нечистые”, has over the centuries become synonymous with “demonic” in any religious/mystical context, so much so that there’s a noun back-formed from it, нечисть, referring solely to all the forces of evil as a collective noun. Arguably, then, even a strictly literal translation of “нечистые силы” should be “demonic powers” rather than P&V’s “unclean powers”, which is simply weird, confusing, unidiomatic where the original text, *on that particular occasion*, is completely idiomatic.

 

‘A more systemic example is their consistent use of “here” where the original text is saying “then”. E.g. “Here the second oddity occurred, touching Berlioz alone”. Russian has two words for “here”, “здесь” (zdes’) and “тут” (toot); they are entirely synonymous in that role, but “тут” can also be used to link sentences describing events occurring one right after the other, that is, a sentence that starts with “тут” is analogous to an English sentence that starts with “then” in a similar role - and there’s nothing spatial about this use of “тут”. When P&V consistently translate “тут” in the meaning of “then” as “here”, it’s a gaffe that produces sentences that seem a bit weird or jarring (especially after many repetitions of this “here"), while there was nothing weird or jarring in the original syntax.

 

‘These are just two random examples out of a dozen that one could find on any given page. It’s the principle of the thing rather than an exception. P&V seem to start with a completely literal word-by-word translation by Volokhonsky, one that doesn’t even preserve common idioms; it is then perhaps edited into shape by going after some clunkiness here and some inventiveness there, in total ignorance of what’s interesting or unique about the original author’s style or idiom.’

[jlhoots]

Hanya Yanagihara: A Little Life

[Brad]

Just finished Roth's The Emperor's Tomb.  A fine book (although I know it's received some criticism), some of the writing is just beautiful and some of it is very funny.

Reading Roth is like a paean to an Austria that once was before WW I came.

[A Lark Ascending]

Finally finished this after a long trek from early December. Interesting enough to keep me to the end though can't say I was enthralled. I don't think it was the author's fault (it's part bio of Dodgson and Alice Liddell, part exploration of the influence of the books on contemporary culture) - more that Carroll led a pretty uneventful life. Once you get beyond the two Alice books and his dodgy (!) and well known obsession with young girls there really isn't a great deal to reveal. 

Finished this afternoon. Superb book - kept me gripped throughout. My knowledge of Washington never went much beyond the national mythology - this book only deals with his military career but it was interesting to discover an ordinary human being. Ferling writes a very balanced analysis of him, highlighting his strengths and successes but clearly spelling out his weaknesses and frequent indecision. I've got Ferling's political history of the period on the shelf to read later in the year.   

[Leeway]

I found this Trollope novel, the third in the Barsetshire Chronicles, to be rather a let down. Trollope tries to cover three topics in the novel: family blood; money and marriage; and alcoholism. In the end, he really doesn't come to grips satisfactorily with any of them. I found the novel padded and repetitious; the seams show in many places. Trollope's mechanical way of writing is in evidence here.  It was a bit of a chore to get to the end. 

[ejp626]

I just finished Murakami's After the Quake, which was quite entertaining -- short and snappy.

I'm currently reading Steve Earle's I'll Never Get Out of this World Alive, which is sort of a companion piece to his CD of the same name (or vice versa).  It's pretty good so far, as we follow a doctor who has lost his license and now caters almost exclusively to treating whores and their johns for VD and occasionally providing abortion services.  He's a hard-core junkie to boot, haunted by the ghost of Hank Williams.  He and some neighbors are about to go on a short "pilgrimage" to see Jackie Kennedy as she shows up in San Antonio.  I should add that it is 1963 and JFK is still alive.  As I said, pretty interesting and good pacing.

Edited February 9, 2016 by ejp626

[Niko]

On 5.2.2016 at 11:09 PM, Brad said:

Just finished Roth's The Emperor's Tomb.  A fine book (although I know it's received some criticism), some of the writing is just beautiful and some of it is very funny.

Reading Roth is like a paean to an Austria that once was before WW I came.

imho, if you wish to proceed with Roth, I would read one of the books about the "Jewish villages in the East" next, like Tarabas, Hiob, Weight and Measure (my favorite) or Leviathan - the other "gone world" Roth knew very well ...  the remaining parts of the Trotta saga (without explicit Trottas) are The String of Pearls (his last novel, set in 19th century Vienna but with a similar hero, Franz Taitinger) and The Flight without End (a relatively early  novel where Franz is still called "Tunda" instead of "Trotta" and where you can still feel Roth as one of the best-paid journalists of his time) (the later works are not novels written by a journalist but rather novels where stuff just happens - the earlier ones like Hotel Savoy or Flight without End are an interesting contrast)

[BillF]

The third Donna Tartt novel I've read - and very good.

[Leeway]

DeLillo's still-amazing riff on modern society and culture.