Dostoevsky anyone?

[IntravenousJava]

I have acquired a fair number of Dostoevsky's works over the years and am contemplating a rereading. However, I'm tired of being limited to my own unchallenged perspective. If there is anyone who would be willing to read, reread, or at least comment on one of the following works, please do so.

The Adolescent (a.k.a. A Raw Youth)
Bobok
The Brothers Karamazov
The Christmas Tree and a Wedding
Crime and Punishment
The Devils (a.k.a. The Possessed)
The Double
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man
The Eternal Husband
The Gambler
A Gentle Creature
An Honest Thief
The House of the Dead
The Idiot
The Landlady
Mr. Prokharchin
A Nasty Story
Notes from Underground
The Peasant Marey
Polzunkov
Poor Folk
White Nights

Unless anyone suggests an alternative selection or order, I shall most likely begin with Poor Folk and proceed chronologically thereafter. Ideally, I would love for someone to undertake this odyssey with me, but I understand the enormous commitment that would entail, so I'll take whatever I can get.

[dfloyd]

and I commend your undertaking; but I would stick to these: The Brothers Karamazov, The Possessed, Crime and Punishment, and The Idiot. I have read others such as The Gambler, A Raw Youth, House of the Dead, and The Eternal Husband. I read the Constance Garnnet translations, revised by Avrahm Yarmolinsky. What I found to be interesting and amusing was to listen to an audio cd while reading the books. Most of the audio books use the Garnnet translations so unabrdged audio books are easily found.

[Der Wegwerfer]

the Garnet translations are horrible, go with Peavar or
david magershank (sp?)

[IntravenousJava]

I know the importance of good translation cannot be overstated. Most of the works in my collection are either Constance Garnett or David Magarshack, but in no case do I have both versions of the same work, so I would not presume to say which is better (especially since I know almost nothing of the Russian language). What I do know is that I would rather be guilty of reading a poor translation of Dostoevsky than never to have read him at all.

[mal4mac]

The Garnet translations are, generally, highly respected in literary circles, and I like the ones I've read. If you want to attempt to de-throne Garnet you need to provide a few arguments, not just call them 'horrible'. Both Garnet and Magarshack get accused of 'domesticating' the language - this doesn't bother me, but if you seek to get as close to the Russian language as possible you might want to try others.

If you want to get others involved, why not start with the best/most-popular work? I'm planning to re-read Notes from the Underground soon, why not start with that? Then move on to The Brothers Karamazov...

[Denizen]

A word of advice: Dostoevsky is interminable. Just don't read him. I have The Brother's Karamazov, Crime & Punishment, and The Idiot. The plots are really quite interesting, but Dostoevsky's style is just... boring.

[IntravenousJava]

If you want to get others involved, why not start with the best/most-popular work? I'm planning to re-read Notes from the Underground soon, why not start with that? Then move on to The Brothers Karamazov...

I have no objection. Notes... is one of my favorite works by any author. I have no illusions about enticing others to read as much as I plan to. I am happy with whatever participation and feedback I can get.

[kiki1982]

Concerning Garnett, that discussion I had about the translation of the word 'zloy' in Garnett's translation of one of Dotoyevski's novels (can't remember which one) should say it all.

The problem with Garnett is that she was the very first to make Russian literature availbale in English and thus accessible. That still is her great merit, but spcialists agree that her translations are easily readable and that's it. Although her Russian was maybe good, (apparently) where it was too difficult to understand she just put something she thought it meant or left it out altogether. Where, as a typical Victorian, she decided that what was written was too 'improper', she just edited it to suit her audience. That's pretty stark. No hard feelings towards her, I mean she was 19th century and we have other principles now, but the fact remains that you are reading a toned down version of the original.
Much as I respect Victorians, sometimes their zeal was a bit much...

[mal4mac]

Concerning Garnett, that discussion I had about the translation of the word 'zloy' in Garnett's translation of one of Dotoyevski's novels (can't remember which one) should say it all.


Hardly :) The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation actually mentions zloy and says her translation of that word, and many others, is more accurate than that of MacDuff! She brings a lot more than "easy readability" and "first comer" to the table.

[mal4mac]

A word of advice: Dostoevsky is interminable. Just don't read him. I have The Brother's Karamazov, Crime & Punishment, and The Idiot. The plots are really quite interesting, but Dostoevsky's style is just... boring.

I also often find him interminable, especially the Idiot, which I read recently, and will not be re-reading (even though it was the Pevear and V translation :))

I much prefer Chekhov and Tolstoy (in any translation!) But Dostoevsky does "go deep", and his main plotlines are interesting. At least "Notes from the Underground" is short!

[IntravenousJava]

Dostoevsky is interminable.

Interminability doesn't scare me. Remembrance of Things Past is my favorite novel precisely because Proust, even more than Dostoevsky, refuses to let go of an idea until he has squeezed every drop from it.

Of course, having two children and a veritable zoo of pets in my household, occasions for adequately processing "interminable" writers are admittedly scarce.

[kiki1982]

Hardly :) The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation actually mentions zloy and says her translation of that word, and many others, is more accurate than that of MacDuff! She brings a lot more than "easy readability" and "first comer" to the table.

The Oxford Dictionary Russian English I have defines zloy as plainly 'bad' including all its derivations mean something along the lines of bad, and all acquaintances who know Russian, Czech, and similar languages agree on that, I thin we can safely say that there is no hatred in the matter. If their own dictionary defines it as just 'bad' then why say something else?
Scrapping orgies in a description of a character being 'given to drunkenness and orgies' is distoriting the character for the purpose of prudishness. It's like saying that Mr Huntingdon in Anne Brontë's novel is sometimes a bit tipsy...

And, again, if Nabokov, who was praised for bis translations, says that Tolstoy and Dostoyevski are the same under her hands (something which Larissa Volkhonsky was also surpried about: she did not recognise what Pevear was reading until he told her it was Dostoyevski), then I doubt that she actually does bring more to the table than being the first.

[mal4mac]

The Oxford Dictionary Russian English I have defines zloy as plainly 'bad' including all its derivations mean something along the lines of bad, and all acquaintances who know Russian, Czech, and similar languages agree on that, I thin we can safely say that there is no hatred in the matter. If their own dictionary defines it as just 'bad' then why say something else?


The Oxford Guide reviewer says it's a notoriously difficult word to translate. I wouldn't trust my English friends, or an average English dictionary, on difficult English words used in the 19th century by a notoriously difficult author. I'd trust an expert. What are experts for? Does the Higgs boson exists? Should I ask the bloke down the pub, look it up in my dictionary, or ask an expert?

Garnett doesn't get off without criticism in the Oxford Guide, but she 'holds her own'. You can't say that she, or any other translator, is a certain first choice - swings and roundabouts...



And, again, if Nabokov, who was praised for bis translations, says that Tolstoy and Dostoyevski are the same under her hands (something which Larissa Volkhonsky was also surpried about: she did not recognise what Pevear was reading until he told her it was Dostoyevski), then I doubt that she actually does bring more to the table than being the first.

Nabakov is always rolled out when Garnett is being attacked. Any other experts prepared to diss Garnett?

[Der Wegwerfer]

The Oxford Dictionary Russian English I have defines zloy as plainly 'bad' including all its derivations mean something along the lines of bad, and all acquaintances who know Russian, Czech, and similar languages agree on that, I thin we can safely say that there is no hatred in the matter. If their own dictionary defines it as just 'bad' then why say something else?
Scrapping orgies in a description of a character being 'given to drunkenness and orgies' is distoriting the character for the purpose of prudishness. It's like saying that Mr Huntingdon in Anne Brontë's novel is sometimes a bit tipsy...

And, again, if Nabokov, who was praised for bis translations, says that Tolstoy and Dostoyevski are the same under her hands (something which Larissa Volkhonsky was also surpried about: she did not recognise what Pevear was reading until he told her it was Dostoyevski), then I doubt that she actually does bring more to the table than being the first.

Mal4mac: I was simultaneously reading a Garnett translation with another and this is the example I was thinking of.

She deliberately and consciously edited works for the prim and proper Victorian crowd.

that's not translating, that's editing.

I give her credit for being the first to bring recognition and attention to many Russian authors but that was 150 years ago! There are many better options today.

[kiki1982]

The Oxford Guide reviewer says it's a notoriously difficult word to translate. I wouldn't trust my English friends, or an average English dictionary, on difficult English words used in the 19th century by a notoriously difficult author. I'd trust an expert. What are experts for? Does the Higgs boson exists? Should I ask the bloke down the pub, look it up in my dictionary, or ask an expert?

I believe the dictionary, any day.

As it happens, if you look up the definition of the word 'злой', you get two types of meanings, which are obviously meant by Dostoevski so I would leave it there. The first is 'bad', 'wicked', 'evil', 'vicious', 'mean', 'evil' derived from 'зло' as in 'evil' the noun, also used in religious terms.
Then there is the second one (only second mind) that means indeed enraged which gives us the word 'злить' or its intransitive counterpart which means to provoke.

However, Russian is an intricate language and very figurative. So I would not under any circumstances presume that the author meant the toned down version. It is not in the Russian character to mean anything toned down, rather toned up (if that existed). Russians do not do things by halves, they do them squared.
It seems that word is not 'notoriously difficult' at all.

If the 'expert' knew Russian very well, then I would be prepared to believe him, but if he praises Garnett then he probably didn't.


You can't say that she, or any other translator, is a certain first choice - swings and roundabouts...

The first always sets the standard for the rest. Apart from that she is also out of copyright which makes her more elligible than any new one because she is cheaper.
Are those not two very good reasons for preferring her?


Nabakov is always rolled out when Garnett is being attacked. Any other experts prepared to diss Garnett?

A few more Russians had problems with her: Brodsky and children's author Chukovsky who dismissed all of her translations apart from Turgenev, because, in his words, she turned Russian 'vlcanos' into 'a smooth lawn mowed in the English manner'. If Emants is anything to go by in terms of Turgenev, then I can well imagine that such a calm style on the surface is great, but not even a Hardy would stand the transfer.
Rachel May makes a good case for Garnett reverence and also lists some grave interpretations by Garnett, also explaining why they are troublesome. She also argued that Garnett's language for Dostoevsky was too flat and listed some critics who said the same.

If Joseph Conrad said that the Garnett translation of Anna Karenina was great but that the piece itself didn't strike him as particularly brilliant, then I have my doubts about the translation. I mean, here you are talking of someone who would have won the Nobel Prize, had it existed, and an author who is still revered in his mother tongue for his style and his stories. If Hardy was talked about like that in another language you would also doubt that there was something amiss with the translation.

[Aylinn]

I don't know Russion very well but Polish, which is also a Slavic language, is my mother tongue and I can often guess the meaning of the Russion words accurately.

As for zloy, 'злой', this word is very similar to the Polish word 'zły'. I've checked it in the dictionary to be sure and it has confirmed what I strongly suspected.

If I had to translate this word, I would choose 'evil'. As I see that in English 'evil' has also some connection to religion, spirit - from Oxford Dictionary - (of a force or spirit) embodying or associated with the forces of the devil

And this is a strong association. If something or someone is 'zły' - 'evil' it or that person has something satanic to it, is immoral.

This is the primary meaning of this word but the Polish 'zły' has many meanings and one of them is that someone who is 'zły' is outraged, angry, irritated, annoyed, so it is possible that the Russian 'злой' can also be used like that.

I have also checked 'злоба', which is transliterated as 'zloba' and this made me immediately think of the Polish word 'złość'. If I had to translate it, I would chose - anger, outrage, annoyance, irritation.

In conclusion, it is likely that one of the meanings of the adjective 'злой', is synonymous with the primary meaning of the noun 'злоба' but it's not the primary meaning of 'злой'.