/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.10988719]

What's the best translation of this? The only other Tolstoy I've read was the Pevear/Volokhonsky translation of The Death of Ivan Ilyich. I liked their translation of that a lot (at least the general flow and word choice), but I've heard mixed things about their version of Anna Karenina for some reason.

Also since I'll get around to it eventually as well, what's the best War and Peace translation?

[Anonymous No.10988907]

Yeah P&V are a mixed bag. Volokhonsky translates the Russian fairly literally into English and Pevear tries to smooth things over. They're definitely the most popular translators of Russian atm, and the overall scale of their output is actually really impressive. Their work isn't super "academic," though.

I really dislike Constance Garnett (if you pick up a free copy of something floating around on the internet it'll likely be her work). While it's certainly remarkable that a woman of her background was able to learn Russian, the translations leave a lot to be desired. She basically anglicizes everything and it reads like foppish 19th c prose.

For Tolstoy, I actually really like the Maudes. When I did War & Peace in college we read out of the Maud edition. I've never read their translation of AK, but they'd be my (admittedly blind) recommendation.

[Anonymous No.10988937]

>>10988907
Thanks a lot, very helpful response. I was leaning towards Maudes actually, so I'll go for that.

[Anonymous No.10988950]

>>10988937
You're welcome! :)

[Anonymous No.10989069]

Reached up to part 4 and i detest Anna(cheater) , Vronsky(cheater) , alexi androvith ( cuck ), levin(cuck) ,stephan (cheater) , kitty( annoying) . Is there any likeable characters(except minor characters)?

[Anonymous No.10989115]

>>10989069
This post hurts me.