Re: [xmca] 'Psychology of Art' and 'Literature and Revolution' (Gumilev, The Word: "bees" quotation)

Perhaps, one of the places where Kozulin's (1986)
translation of LSV's 'Thought and Language'
surpasses Minick's (1987) translation of LSV's
'Thinking and Speech' :) --

is exaclty the quotation on the penultimate page
(pp. 255 & 284 respectively):

And as the bees which have sunk into their silent
Yule season,
So do dead words sink.

The two lines are taken from N. Gumilev's 'The
Word' (Slovo), for the full text in Russian see
http://www.gumilev.ru/main.phtml?aid=5000400 ;
consider also the two English (
http://www.gumilev.ru/main.phtml?aid=5000955 &
http://www.gumilev.ru/main.phtml?aid=5000957 ), a
German (
http://www.gumilev.ru/main.phtml?aid=5001020 ),
as well as six other translations into a number
of European languages available.

As we can see, closer to the original is
Kozulin's version (1986):

... and like bees in the deserted hive
The dead words have a rotten smell.

Cf. poetic translation by Alexander Shaumyan (ref
above):

And like dead bees within a hive deserted,
Lifeless words give off a foul smell.

As to the "silent Yule" in Minick's translation
as well as the other textual liberties, -- the
most ironic interpretation would be that tha
translator confused "ulej" (hive) with "Yule".
Seriously though, I think that this in fact was
an attempt at a poetic translation, which does
not have to be literally close to the original,
and I don't think I am in a position to judge how
successful it was.

Finally, in Minick's defence, I believe, the
"sink" in the phrase "So dead words sink" is a
typo and should read as "stink".

--- Mike Cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:

> That is a very interesting hypothesis about the
> mandelshtam epigraph, Anton.
>
> Notice the wildly different translation of
> chertog, all the way to Pluto's
> place.
> In the text that follows where he is less
> poetic and states straight out
> that the thought is
> completed in the word we have his "literal"
> interpretion..... I think.
>
> I am less certain about the final fragment
> about bees. Here David's thoughts
> re the
> importance of Hellenistic tradition seem
> plausible, and I am still uncertain
> about
> translation.
>
> Thanks to all who have helped with this
> detective work which makes us all
> think a lot harder about the ideas involved and
> their implications for our
> current state of thinking and action.
> mike
>
> On 6/7/07, Anton Yasnitsky
> <the_yasya@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > --- Mike Cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > ... the
> > > sebo-croatian translation
> > > appears very close to the epigraph in
> english
> > > in lsv (but not the swallow in
> > > Russian where blind
> > > swallow=word
> >
> > > ... Minnick seems really off base-- or
> using
> > > different text/poem)
> >
> > Vygotsky's "Ya slovo pozabyl, chto ya xotel
> > skazat'/ I mysl' besplotnaya v chertog tenej
> > vernjotsya", to me, looks like a quote from
> > Mandel'shtam's 'Swallow', [possibly
> deliberately]
> > misconstrued so that the first line is taken
> from
> > the first (What had I wanted to say? I
> > forgot./The blind swallow flies back to
> Pluto's
> > palace) and the second one - from the
> penultimate
> > verse of the original Mandel'shtam's poem
> (but I
> > forgot what I want to say/ and the unbodied
> > thought goes back to the palace of ghosts, --
> for
> > the full text see the post above;
> alternatively,
> > for the text in both languages see here:
> >
>
http://max.mmlc.northwestern.edu/~mdenner/Demo/texts/swallow.html
> > ).
> >
> > I believe, there is noting to blame Minick
> for;
> > my guess, the quotation was for some reason
> (i.e.
> > deliberately, - perhaps, because of the
> > censorship problems, or maybe involuntarily,
> due
> > to, say, the author's illness) corrupted
> already
> > in the 1934 edition, by Vygotsky himself.
> >
> > Also, there is possibility that there was
> another
> > version of the poem, as the editors to the
> > Russian 1982 edition claim, although we don't
> > really have much evidence yet in support of
> this
> > interpretation.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > On 6/7/07, Ana Marjanovic-Shane
> > > <ana@zmajcenter.org> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > In the translation to Serbo-Croatian, in
> two
> > > verses by Mandelstam (who is
> > > > not mentioned by name)
> > > > it is:
> > > > "I forgot the word I wanted to say,
> > > > and the *disembodied thought* will return
> > > into the hall of shadows"
> > > >
> > > > Gumilev is also not named and remains
> just "a
> > > poet"
> > > > The translation of his verses is the
> > > following:
> > > > "And like bees in a deserted hive,
> > > > dead words reek"
> > > >
> > > > And then the text continues with:
> > > >
> > > > "But, if thought is not embodied in word,
> it
> > > remains a Stygian shadow, a
> > > > "fog, a clang, a gawk", as another poet
> > > says."
> > > >
> > > > Absolutely fascinating
> > > > Ana
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Mike Cole wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I am almost certain that we are dealing
> with
> > > different version of the same
> > > >
> > > > poem, Natalia.
> > > > Anton's site gives blind swallow. But the
> > > later editions of M&R use the
> > > > term
> > > > "word" in
> > > > place of blind swallow. I will forward
> the
> > > Gumilev to you with a question
> > > > in
> > > > a min.
> > > >
> > > > can you post on xmca??
> > > > mike
> > > >
> > > > On 6/7/07, Natalia Gajdamaschko
> > > <nataliag@sfu.ca> <nataliag@sfu.ca> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, 7 Jun 2007 10:53:07 -0700
> > > mcole@weber.ucsd.edu wrote:
> > > > > This is amazing, Anton.That poem is NOT
> in
> > > Tristia in the "Complete
> > > > Poetry"
> > > > > volume. (Or I cannot find it there).
> But
> > > what blew me away was the
> > > > Russian
> > > > > of the Swallow:
> > > > >
> > > > > ñ ÓÌÏ×Ï ÐÏÚÁÂÙÌß, ÞÔÏ Ñ ÈÏÔ*e*Ìß
> ÓËÁÚÁÔØ:
> > > > > óÌ*e*ÐÁÑ ÌÁÓÔÏÞËÁ ×ß ÞÅÒÔÏÇß Ô*e*ÎÅÊ
> > > ×ÅÒÎÅÔÓÑ
> > > > >
> > > > > Literally, isn't this:
> > > > >
> > > > > I forget the word I wanted to say,
> > > > > And the blind swallow returns to the
> hall
> > > of shadows.
> > > > > (I am not sure of the word, chertog,
> and do
> > > not have a Russian-English
> > > > > dictionary to hand.
> > > >
> > > > Hi Mike,
> > > > Chertog ---- is a palace , royal palace
> (or
> > > hall) or zamok, dvorec. And
> > > > yes, swallow is blind.
> > > > Cheers,
> > > > Natalia.
> > > >
> > > > ------------------------------
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> _______________________________________________
> > > > xmca mailing list
> > > >
> > >
> >
>
xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.eduhttp://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > **
> > > > ------------------------------
>
=== message truncated ===

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Received on Tue Jun 12 15:15 PDT 2007