Gnedich E-Book

Maria Rybakova

• Herausgeber: Glagoslav Publications B.V.
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 97

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Maria Rybakova’s Gnedich captures the reader’s attention in its first stanzas with a striking allusion to Homeric Greece: “The rage that killed so many/the wretched rage of Achilles/who knew that he would perish/ that he would perish young. This is a novel-in-verse about the first Russian translator of the Iliad, the romantic poet and librarian Nikolai Gnedich (1784-1833). Since Gnedich spent almost his entire life translating Homer’s epic poem, Maria Rybakova has chosen verse as the most appropriate stylistic means in recreating his life. To the English-speaking world, this genre of poetic biography is best exemplified by Ruth Padel’s Darwin – A Life in Poems.

Like the Iliad itself, the novel consists of twelve Songs or Cantos, and covers the life of Gnedich from his childhood to his death. It depicts the lives of Gnedich and his best friend, the poet Batyushkov, who is slowly losing his sanity, and incorporates motifs from their poetry, from Homer’s epics, and from Greek mythology, as well as magnificent images of imperial Russia and the Homeric world. The space of the novel covers snowy Russian villages, aristocratic St. Petersburg salons, magnificent Italian landscapes, and the austere Greece of Homer’s heroes.

Rybakova conjures a fittingly romantic vision of the dramatic lives of Gnedich and his best friend. A major part of the novel is the moving correspondence between the two poets. Philosophical reflections on the fate of the individual are intertwined with poignant stanzas devoted to the great but unhappy love to the tragic actress Ekaterina Semyonova that consumed Gnedich. The novel culminates in Batyushkov’s final breakdown in the lunatic asylum and Gnedich’s ruminations on Russia’s tragic future fate.

The poetic language of Gnedich is refined: it combines the clarity of Rybakova’s syllabic verses and the sophistication of her metaphors with distinct, novelistic depictions of certain landscapes, people, and their interactions.

The novel is spectacularly designed: Rybakova’s style resembles a movie projection with stop-cards at the key moments in Gnedich’s life, his long conversations with his friend, and particular striking sceneries. It creates a novelistic effect on the tale about Gnedich’s life, spanning over twenty years. The narrative is often interrupted by streams of consciousness and reminiscence by its main heroes. At the same time, it continues the traditions of Russian classic literature with its attention to detail and the psychology of the characters.

A significant part of the novel is dedicated to the description of Gnedich’s friendship with Konstantin Batyushkov, a talented poet of the Pushkin epoch. Gnedich, disfigured by a childhood disease, was a librarian at the Imperial Library in St. Petersburg and became famous through his translation of the Illiad. Batyushkov, an officer of the Russian Imperial court who participated in military campaigns, as well as one of the best poets of the beginning of the 19th century, went through deep crisis and mental illness. The friendship between the two becomes one of the themes within the novel.

Rybakova builds the novel-in-verse’s plot around Gnedich’s translation of the Illiad into Russian. The narrative progresses from the adult Gnedich’s recollection of his childhood in a small country estate in Ukraine in the first Song, his illness and discovery of the magnificent Greek epic about the siege of the Troy that changed his life forever, to the completion of his work on his translation as a final victory over his life’s circumstances. The titanic work on the translation continued for almost twenty-two years (1807-29).

Leseprobe

Gnedich

Maria Rybakova

“Gnedich”

by Maria Rybakova

Translated by Elena Dimov

Book created by Max Mendor

Published with the support of the Institute for Literary Translation, Russia

© 2015, Glagoslav, Nederland

Glagoslav Publications Ltd

88-90 Hatton Garden

EC1N 8PN London

United Kingdom

www.glagoslav.com

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-1-78437-956-8 (Ebook)

This book is in copyright. No part of this publication may be  reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Song I

The rage that killed so many,

the wretched rage of Achilles

who knew that he would perish,

that he would perish young,

yet he, Gnedich, will die lonely

and will probably also die young.

(It is better this way — otherwise

lonely old age—

they say it is worse,

than lonely youth,

even though then you had nothing to eat

and sat alone every evening,

and even when you did have money

and went to the brothel, women shied away

but then grew accustomed to you

because you were kind

and sad — and life was passing by, where every day

was death.)

Homer says: youth is always frightening,

and the memory of it is the most dreadful of all.

Sing, goddess, it is your amusement —

to sing our sorrows, our pain is your glory,

but when you come to me

pretending to be an actress

I will agree to suffer, said Gnedich,

and looked in the mirror with one eye.

In the dark hole of glass he saw

either the Cyclops or the hero-lover,

then Homer, then suddenly no one really,

just furniture and the sickly candle

(without even the hand that held it), myre alge, woes unnumbered,

a thousand sorrows, much grief,

algos is pain, algeo — I suffer,

but in Greek even suffering is good,

and in Russian it is nothing but pain.

The pain is etched upon me

(Gnedich says)

and now everyone reads: don’t come to him,

don’t love him,

but take pity on him,

even though he does not need your pity.

He hurled many strong souls into the invisible world…

Who? Achilles. Let us not be distracted,

(the sound of hoofs outside the window, the piercing voice of a tradeswoman)

into the gloom of Hades — god and place — an invisible god,

for the invisible one is dead,

dead as one who is afraid to be looked at,

one at whom they are afraid to look,

one whose reflection

even the mirror prefers to blink away as a tear

so it will not obscure the world,

perfect and everlasting.

He hurled souls to Hades and bodies

to dogs and to hungry vultures

so we would be divided after death,

as a butcher does in the marketplace:

souls there, bodies here

(and both are gloomy),

my face was beautiful, Gnedich says,

and then became ugly,

but as for my soul —

I don’t know.

I suspect it is invisible,

and probably also dead,

herein Jove’s will is accomplished,

my life is counted, my death

is assigned. I did not have love.

I did not have glory. Only words

I was left with — Greek —

to bind them with the Russian ones.

He often thinks about the daughter of Chryses, unnamed.

Her father came for her and she disappeared,

following her father without a word

and would not be seen with any heroes anymore.

This virgin without a name

belongs to her father, and he belongs to Apollo,

and all of them are in the transparent sphere, where only devotion exists,

only awe, only prayer.

She, having descended from the ship, dissolves

in the hands of her father

as wallpaper fades,

as walls crumble, as moisture evaporates,

without passion, without a name.

If he could also erase himself from the horizon

without pain…

But no, he is retraced, scratched out, he is cut

in the marble like the letters.

I turn to the mirror —

try to read it, but nothing is clear,

there are no chroniclers for me

(he smiles and ties his silk scarf

around his neck).

The elder walks at the edge of

the bustling sea,

polyphloisbos

where the waves accrue on the sand with a splash,

with foam, with thunder — and crawl back with a hiss;

silent, he is walking on the shore

in the never-ending noise of the abyss.

The sea does not listen to man,

but man thinks

he understands the language

in which the water talks

to him.

Every time they brought a note from her

he searched for the word “yours.”

God of mice, hear my prayers,

let her fall in love with me!

(The god of mice does not answer,

but quietly scratches in the corner

and rustles the wallpaper

all night.)

The ghosts of actors wander in the theater,

the shadows of heroes wander in Troy,

the shadows of words wander in the soul.

While you are asleep, she loves you,

Homer speaks to you, both of you can see,

both are alive, and life is beautiful

(but awakening heroes are crying

and ghosts are fading away).

After the sickness passed, they still didn’t allow him

to see himself in a mirror for a long time,

but he was so happy that he had recovered he didn’t care

because delirium — even if you are just twelve —

takes you to places

that are too dark.

He did not remember tulips in bloom there,

nor rivers of forgetfulness flowing.

He remembered only the grey air,

as though the earth was enveloped in clouds

and no sky. When he woke up

and started to catch with one eye

the light that flowed from the window

between the flower curtains

and heard the rooster’s cry and the bark

of fleetly-bounding dogs, oh, how he wanted to hug

them all!

Because over there in the gray sky-less air,

there was no one near. No chicken, nor cats

nor Avdotya, nor warm milk,

not even the cobweb, trembling,

when the window pane was open,

absolutely nothing at all: only he alone,

but how can one be that way — at twelve years old —

all alone —

and there?

Then he realized that he had become a monster.

We went to the fortuneteller, Gnedich said,

but she did not tell me anything,

rien du tout (he added

in bad French). Whatever she might try to do:

lay out the cards, or burn the wax,

or read the lines on the palm of a hand

or guess the future through birds in the sky,

or pour coffee grounds into a saucer,

or interpret dreams — nothing would come of it.

I have no future.

Je n’ai qu’un livre (I have only one book),

my childhood favorite The Iliad.

I read it only after the illness.

I do not want to remember what I was — before —

(but I heard I was a handsome child

who was loved by everyone; played outdoors

with the children of peasants mostly,

and ran fastest of all. And shouted louder.)

The sorrowful maiden leaves with others,

she always leaves.

The loyal friend Batyushkov used to say:

maidens will always elude.

That’s why we love them,

they are like water,

but do not quench thirst,

we look into them to see our own reflections —

and love ourselves in them,

and rejoice, not knowing

that this dark and dreadful whirlpool

can draw us in.

(Poor madman, how he knew his own life,

even when everything was already lost

he used to say:

I walked, I carried a flagon on my head

full of jewels,

the flagon fell and broke,

what was within it — who can tell now!

and he turned to the wall,

where he saw mountains, valleys, rivers,

battlefields, the ruins of cities,

the faces of dead comrades,

because time became one solid wall

in his room

and the plaster on this wall was crumbling away).

Briseis was taken away because Achilles let her go.

He was silent, she was silent.

Later, Ovid would guess at her hurt,

he would say through her lips: How could you let me go?

and cry.

But Homer made it more dignified: both are speechless,

no scenes, no tears.

My hidden love, Gnedich says,

even if everybody guessed,

I would say nothing; maybe she

would fall in love with my silence —

if she did not love my voice.

(Children’s fairytales: the monster was hiding, hiding,

only allowed others to hear its voice,

but only after it had fallen silent, the sweetheart fell in love with it.

Only after it perished.

If the seed doesn’t die, it will remain alone,

but if it dies, others will love it —

this is what it turns out the priest was saying.

I always suspected there was some meaning in all these stories.

I remember, in Poltava,

when Father Paphnutius was very drunk,

and was crying huge tears during the service,

he was telling the whole truth,

he was like a prophet, but we were all scared.)

Have you ever seen the sea,

endless, looking like the wine’s darkness,

have you spread your hands to the abyss

calling for your mother? She was rising like a mist

on the grey water (Batyushkov and Gnedich

compared their recollections. There were few of them.

They agreed on one thing: a goddess cannot live

with a mortal for a long time, she disappears

to the place where there are mermaids, and shadows, and mothers.

After death women turn into air,

Batyushkov used to say,

and men into earth. Gnedich agreed with him,

but thought, if she suddenly falls in love with me,

maybe I’ll also become air?).

When they were young, they regretted

that their mothers did not see them,

because happiness, and glory, and women

almost fell into their hands,

and later they had to be happy

that their mothers were not there anymore

and they would not notice either derangement,

or how the person becomes

an addition to the desk

in a department office or library.

Both are servants (but thought they were poets),

two bachelors (but thought they were lovers),

two invalids — not imaginary — wandering

along a dark road to gloomy hell,

like Catullus’ sparrow.

Two sparrows —

that’s what they were, as it turns out!

Two ruffled birds — one crooked,

the other mad.

Birds do not go crazy,

only people

who turn into birds,

Philomela without a tongue and

Procne, who killed her son,

became a swallow and a nightingale.

During one of the visits

Gnedich leaned over to his friend,

and the other whispered a secret to him:

to lose one’s mind is to become a bird,

and nodded at the window: do you hear their voices

in the tree tops? They are speaking Greek.

Gnedich had to agree,

so as not to disturb the sufferer.

Then he walked home.

The sun was already setting.

The gods must have partied all day,

Apollo played on the lyre for them

and the muses sang a round.

Then they went to the chambers

built for them by Hephaestus

and rested in the happy sleep

of immortals.

Song II

H