September 30 – World Translation Day

My mobile phone tells me that today is “World Translation Day”…. Never paid attention to this. But ever since I have begun to stray into the landscape of Slavic/Russian literature, I have begun to realize the importance of translations and translators.

The richness of Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat would never have been known to a wider audience without the efforts of Fitzgerald, Peter Avery, John Heath Stubbs & Swami Govinda Thirtha.

Richard Peaver, Robert Chandler, Constance and Edward Garnett, Larissa Volokhonsky, Kathleen Cook-Horjuy, Miachael Frayn have opened wide swathes of Slavic writings to the world. Similar must be the case with French and Continental European literature.

I once had an opportunity to talk to the Late U.R.Ananthamurthy about the poverty in Indian translation landscape and was not very convinced with his answers.The world of literature would have been a much poorer place without these bridge builders whose labour of love, curiosity and dedication offers us these easy pathways into enchanted lands of alternate reading experience.

Feel immense gratitude for their contribution.

Mightier Than Sword – Ford Madox Ford

After James Wood’s “How Fiction Works”, this book by Ford Madox Ford has done the most for setting the direction and the near future duration of my reading. While, “How Fiction Works” gave me an understanding of the “structural innards” of what I read, “Mightier Than Sword” gives me a guidance on who I should read and why …. The “What” and the “Who” together make the reading experience complete….For anybody interested in knowing some of the important writers of the 20th century, their works, personalities and styles, here is a superb book by Ford Madox Ford. He covers:. Henry James, Turgenev, Thomas Hardy, H.G.Wells, John Galsworthy, Stephen Crane, Theodore Dreiser, W.H.Hudson, D.H.Lawrence and Swinburne. Written in a style that is easy, chatty, occasionally gossipy yet full of easy scholarship. Joyous feeling in knowing how much of the literary landscape is being opened out for lay readers like me….

A Hero Of Our Time – M. Y. Lermontov

The little understanding that I have about Slavic literature can be summed into two aspects viz. 1. That there is a core group of writers of acknowledged fame starting with Pushkin and covering some notables like Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Turgenev, Chekhov, Gogol, Sholokov, Pasternak, Solzhenitsyn, Aitmatov etc. 2. That they are somehow different, elevated and peculiar in the way they write and the themes they deal with.

That understanding appears to be expanding now. Three new writers I have encountered in the recent past and who I have begun to believe are no less than the ones mentioned above include M. Y. Lermontov, Nikolay Leskov and Mikhail Bulgakov. While the respective bodies of work of these three writers appears to be limited, the impact that they have managed to generate appears to be disproportionately large.

I happened to read Lermontov’s – “A Hero Of Our Time” and was really impressed with the quality of story telling and ability to dwell into the complexities of human relations and the derivative thinking thereof. Set in 19th century, Georgia of USSR and written as a loosely strung garland of stories (Bela, Maxim Maximych, Taman, Fatalist and Princess Mary) centered around the main character Pechorin whose unexplainable inclination to be free, unconstrained and unencumbered lead him to a kind of self centered nature with its attendant display of behaviour and consequences in relationships (a loose reference to Byronic Character). In Pechorin’s own words:

I often ask myself, as my thoughts wander back to the past: why did I not wish to tread that way, thrown open by destiny, where soft joys and ease of soul were awaiting me?… No, I could never have become habituated to such a fate! I am like a sailor born and bred on the deck of a pirate brig: his soul has grown accustomed to storms and battles; but, once let him be cast upon the shore, and he chafes, he pines away, however invitingly the shady groves allure, however brightly shines the peaceful sun. The livelong day he paces the sandy shore, hearkens to the monotonous murmur of the onrushing waves, and gazes into the misty distance: lo! yonder, upon the pale line dividing the blue deep from the grey clouds, is there not glancing the longed-for sail, at first like the wing of a seagull, but little by little severing itself from the foam of the billows and, with even course, drawing nigh to the desert harbour?

It is not that Pechorin is not aware of this aspect of his personality for at one place in a moment of frank admission he tells the audience through his extensive diary notes:

For a long time now I have been living, not with my heart, but with my head. I weigh, analyse my own passions and actions with severe curiosity, but without sympathy. There are two personalities within me: one lives—in the complete sense of the word—the other reflects and judges him; the first, it may be, in an hour’s time, will take farewell of you and the world for ever, and the second—the second?.. The reader is left to guess this aspect of his personality

But Pechorin also has his compromises and therein lies the backdrop to his actions.

What makes the book a deep reading experience is Lermontov’s ability to dwell into the mind of Pechorin, his thoughts about himself, his recognition of the consequences of his thinking and actions, about human condition in general (I ask myself: ‘why have I lived— for what purpose was I born?) and the inherent contradictions therein and while at it give the readers a glimpse of the society of his times and the grand beauty of the Georgian landscape:

What a glorious place that valley is! On every hand are inaccessible mountains, steep, yellow slopes scored by water-channels, and reddish rocks draped with green ivy and crowned with clusters of plane-trees. Yonder, at an immense height, is the golden fringe of the snow. Down below rolls the River Aragva, which, after bursting noisily forth from the dark and misty depths of the gorge, with an unnamed stream clasped in its embrace, stretches out like a thread of silver, its waters glistening like a snake with flashing scales

There is a wonderful command on language and the eye for detailing is really exceptional. The writing at times get so wonderfully complete and transcends the ordinary experience that one begins to feel spiritual without any reference to God and Religion. And personally I value such quality in writing immensely.

The translation by J. H. Wisdom & Marr Murray is exceptionally well done and makes one believe that nothing is lost in translation.

A Lear Of The Steppes – Ivan Turgenev

Some journeys of awareness are convoluted. One starts with a quick and easy destination in mind but it turns out that that destination was just a temporary stop for a much longer, strenuous and a mentally fortifying voyage to a further new destination. And after reaching the intended destination one also realizes with joy that the destination itself is a vast place for many a further surprise explorations. My journey to the body of work of Ivan Turgenev is such a voyage. It started with an interview of Julian Barnes in Paris Review Magazine, where there was a mention of the work of Ford Madox Ford in words that bordered on superlative. Exploration of Ford Madox Ford led me to his book “Mightier Than Sword” in which was an absorbing piece on Turgenev, his body of work along with a special mention of his “A Lear of the Steppes”. Having read this brilliant story, I realize that there is much more of Turgenev that needs to be explored.

Turgenev’s “A Lear of the Steppes” is a take on Shakespeare’s well known tragedy “King Lear” and adapted to the rural setting of the 19th century Russia – a Russia where serfdom was rife with all its ugly warts and on the verge of a potential change. I think this adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy may be the first but definitely not the last. Jane Smiley’s “A Thousand Acres” is a contemporary take on King Lear which takes place on a thousand acre farm in Iowa. Structurally, Smiley’s “A Thousand Acres” is far more closer to King Lear than Turgenev’s story is but in its scope, depth, setting and portrayal of the playing out of the drama,Turgenev’s “A Lear of the Steppes” is exceptional.

So what makes Turgenev’s “A Lear of the Steppes” exceptional?

But before that a small detour: In a brilliant essay on the structure of Shakespearan tragedy, Prof A.C.Bradley emphasizes that the essence of a Shakespearan tragdey lies in the engendering of futility, waste and dereliction in human life due to flawed actions of the drama’s protagonist (particularly the Hero) arising out of his character. In these actions, the Hero is influenced in different contexts by an abnormality of mind, accidents and play of chance that are beyond his control and some times the intervention of the supernatural. It is this broad structure of a tragedy that Turgenev’s “A Lear of the Steppes” fits quite well. Martin Petrovitch Harlov, the main character of the story – physically a man of extraordinary proportions and strength, driven by a impending fear of death ( we never know what drives his thoughts on death) ends up distributing his property between his two daughters much against good counsel. Once out of wealth, schemed both by his daughters and a crafty son-in-law, ends up in utter penury and eventually to his own death in quite harsh and tragic conditions.

Turgenev’s mastery in allowing the tragedy to unfold gradually with the aid of a gentle yet perceptive narrative flow, deep character portrayal, against the backdrop of a changing Russian rural landscape is typical of the great Russian writing tradition. The atmosphere of gradual unfolding of motives and attendant actions, undoing of relationships, leading to (self) destruction of Harlov with no purpose achieved and laying bare the perception of utter waste and meaninglessness of life will always remain etched in my memory as a reader. Turgenev paints a picture of gloom and the relentless march of life without providing us any hints of redemption and salvation. It is this stark reminder of a cul-de-sac that human life and actions lead to (which Shakespeare’s tragedies remind us time and time again) that make Turgenev’s “A Lear of the Steppes” exceptional.

An aspect I like most in fiction is detailing. I am the happiest when detailing furnishes me with small epiphanies of realization and Turgenev is hugely accomplished in this area or at least in this story he demonstrates that faculty immensely. Here are three wonderful instances of this demonstration:

Almost the most vivid impression, that has remained in my memory of that far-off time, is the figure of our nearest neighbour, Martin Petrovitch Harlov. Indeed it would be difficult for such an impression to be obliterated: I never in my life afterwards met anything in the least like Harlov. Picture to yourselves a man of gigantic stature. On his huge carcase was set, a little askew, and without the least trace of a neck, a prodigious head. A perfect haystack of tangled yellowish grey hair stood up all over it, growing almost down to the bushy eyebrows. On the broad expanse of his purple face, that looked as though it had been peeled, there protruded a sturdy knobby nose; diminutive little blue eyes stared out haughtily, and a mouth gaped open that was diminutive too, but crooked, chapped, and of the same colour as the rest of the face. The voice that proceeded from this mouth, though hoarse, was exceedingly strong and resonant.… Its sound recalled the clank of iron bars, carried in a cart over a badly paved road; and when Harlov spoke, it was as though some one were shouting in a high wind across a wide ravine. It was difficult to tell just what Harlov’s face expressed, it was such an expanse.… One felt one could hardly take it all in at one glance. But it was not disagreeable—a certain grandeur indeed could be discerned in it, only it was exceedingly astounding and unusual. And what hands he had —positive cushions! What fingers, what feet! I remember I could never gaze without a certain respectful awe at the four-foot span of Martin Petrovitch’s back, at his shoulders, like millstones. But what especially struck me was his ears! They were just like great twists of bread, full of bends and curves; his cheeks seemed to support them on both sides. Martin Petrovitch used to wear winter and summer alike—a Cossack dress of green cloth, girt about with a small Tcherkess strap, and tarred boots. I never saw a cravat on him; and indeed what could he have tied a cravat round? He breathed slowly and heavily, like a bull, but walked without a sound. One might have imagined that having got into a room, he was in constant fear of upsetting and overturning everything, and so moved cautiously from place to place, sideways for the most part, as though slinking by….

and..

She was a woman of medium height, thin, very brisk and rapid in her movements, with thick fair hair and a handsome dark face, on which the pale-blue narrow eyes showed up in a rather strange but pleasing way. She had a straight thin nose, her lips were thin too, and her chin was like the loop-end of a hair-pin. No one looking at her could fail to think: ‘Well, you are a clever creature—and a spiteful one, too!’ And for all that, there was something attractive about her too. Even the dark moles, scattered ‘like buck-wheat’ over her face, suited her and increased the feeling she inspired

and…

The weather had been disgusting for the last five days. Shooting was not even to be thought of. All things living had hidden themselves; even the sparrows made no sound, and the rooks had long ago disappeared from sight. The wind howled drearily, then whistled spasmodically. The low-hanging sky, unbroken by one streak of light, had changed from an unpleasant whitish to a leaden and still more sinister hue; and the rain, which had been pouring and pouring, mercilessly and unceasingly, had suddenly become still more violent and more driving, and streamed with a rushing sound over the panes. The trees had been stripped utterly bare, and turned a sort of grey. It seemed they had nothing left to plunder; yet the wind would not be denied, but set to harassing them once more. Puddles, clogged with dead leaves, stood everywhere. Big bubbles, continually bursting and rising up again, leaped and glided over them. Along the roads, the mud lay thick and impassable. The cold pierced its way indoors through one’s clothes to the very bones. An involuntary shiver passed over the body, and how sick one felt at heart! Sick, precisely, not sad. It seemed there would never again in the world be sunshine, nor brightness, nor colour, but this rain and mire and grey damp, and raw fog would last for ever, and for ever would the wind whine and moan!