Text 03

When uncle in good earnest, sickened

(His principles were always high),

My own respect for him was quickened,

This was the happiest thought, said I.

He was a pattern edifying!

Yet Heavens! How boring and how trying

To tend a patient night and day,

And never more a step away!

And then – how low the craft and gross it!

I must amuse a man half-dead,

Arrange the pillows for his head,

And bring, with a long face, the doses,

And sigh, and wonder inwardly:

When will the devil come for thee?

My uncle – high ideas inspire him,

But when past joking he fell sick,

He really forced one to admire him,

And never played a shrewder trick.

Let others learn from his example,

But God, how deadly dull to sample

Sick room attendance night and day,

And never stir a foot away,

And the sly baseness, fit to throttle

Of entertaining the half-dead,

And smooth the pillows down in bed,

And gloomy serves the medicine bottle,

And sighs, and asks oneself all through:

When will the devil come for you?

My uncle keeps to honest systems:

By falling ill without jest,

He made me love him with insistence,

And could invent yet nothing best.

Well, his example gives a lesson,

But, goodness me, it's so stressing

To sit with him all day and night,

Not stepping out of the sight!

And what insidiousness you show

When you amuse half dead a man,

Arrange his pillows, and then

You give him drugs in sadness, though

You sigh, but think for own whim:

When will the devil come for him?

My uncle always was respected,

But his grave illness, I confess,

Is more than could have been expected:

A stroke of genius, nothingless!

He offers all a fine example.

But, God, such boredom who would sample

As day and night to have to sit

Beside a sick-bed – think of it!

Low cunning must assist devotion

To one who is but half-alive;

You puff his pillow and contrive

Amusement while you mix his potion;

You sigh and think with furrowed brow:

"Why can't the devil tale you now?"

Let us look at the translations in greater detail. Each line in the original text has not more than 8–9 syllables; each second syllable is stressed, the 8th syllable is never rhymed with the 9th one. Lines 1–3, 2–4, 5–6, 7–8, 9–12, 10–11, 13–14 are always rhymed.

Viewing the variants from this technical perspective, the first one has 15 departures from the original: 5 in quantity of syllables (10-12 instead of 8-9), 2 in rhymes, 2 in stresses, 6 in rhythm. The second is not blameless either: this verse has 13 departures from the original. The third seems to be irreproachable in terms of its technical merit. There are no departures from the original in quantity of syllables or in the number of stresses or rhythm. But does it sound like a Pushkin?

In short, the argument may be exhausted by two axioms, quite contrary to one another. The first declares that authentic translation is impossible: even the best translation is but an echo. The second states that the authentic translation is not impossible. Genuine jewels of translation are few, as ever. Poetry is not pottery.

Many a translation can go to the potter's field and rest in peace there till some Literary Judgment Day.

1.6 Translation: mission impossible?

The ideal way of translating poetry is when two true poets meet, one of whom undertakes the task. That is why many great poets were outstanding translators. The amount of translation work made by great poets is amazing. And it rarely was done for mercantile reasons.

Fyodor Tyutchev, a Russian classic, was not only a poet but a translator too. Now we are going to remember one of his most famous love poems. The poem is accompanied by two English translations (Text 04). One of them was made by a great poet, the other by – shall we say? – a craftsman. Can you tell rubies from rocks?