Sep 5, 2014 - Do we really need another English translation of Anna Karenina? This is a bit like asking whether we need a new recording of Beethoven's Ninth.
*讀Thomas Mann 1939年為Random House版Anna Karenina 作序，
Leo Tolstoy 原作; Constance Garnett俄譯英; Thomas Mann 序; Philip Reisman 插圖
內容很不簡單，很有洞見。搞不清楚Mann 懂不懂得俄文：他說，托爾斯泰的俄文當藝術，精益求精，這點即使在大打折扣的英譯本，都還可以感受到：......
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina
Translations into English[edit]
- Anna Karénina, Translated by Nathan Haskell Dole (Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., New York, 1887; Walter Scott Publishing Company Ltd., London, 1889)
- Anna Karenin, Translated by Constance Garnett. (1901) Still widely reprinted. Revised by Leonard J. Kent and Nina Berberova (New York: Random House, 1965). Revised version reprinted by Modern Library.
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1918)
- Anna Karenin, Translated by Rosemary Edmonds (Penguin Classics, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, 1954)
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Joel Carmichael (Bantam Books, New York, 1960)
- Anna Karenina, Translated by David Magarshack (A Signet Classic, New American Library, New York and Scarborough, Ontario, 1961)
- Anna Karénina, Translated by Margaret Wettlin (Progress Publishers, 1978)
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (Allen Lane/Penguin, London, 2000)
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Kyril Zinovieff and Jenny Hughes (Oneworld Classics 2008) ISBN 978-1-84749-059-9
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Rosamund Bartlett (Oxford University Press)[8]
- Anna Karenina, Translated by Marian Schwartz (Yale University Press)[8]
Comparisons of translations[edit]
Writing in the year 2000, academic Zoja Pavlovskis-Petit compares the different translations of Anna Karenina on the market. Commenting on the revision of Constance Garnett's 1901 translation she says: "The revision (1965) ... by Kent & Berberova (the latter no mean stylist herself) succeeds in 'correcting errors ... tightening the prose, converting Briticisms, and casting light on areas Mrs Garnett did not explore'. Their edition shows an excellent understanding of the details of Tolstoy's world (for instance, the fact that the elaborate coiffure Kitty wears to the ball is not her own hair–a detail that eludes most other translators), and at the same time they use English imaginatively (Kitty's shoes 'delighted her feet' rather than 'seemed to make her feet lighter'–Maude; a paraphrase). ... the purist will be pleased to see Kent & Berberova give all the Russian names in full, as used by the author; any reader will be grateful for the footnotes that elucidate anything not immediately accessible to someone not well acquainted with imperial Russia. This emended Garnett should probably be a reader's first choice."
She further comments on the Maudes' translation: "the revised Garnett and the Magarshack versions do better justice to the original, but still, the World's Classics edition (1995) ... offers a very full List of Characters ... and good notes based on the Maudes'."
On Edmonds's translation she states: "[it] has the advantage of solid scholarship ... Yet she lacks a true sensitivity for the language ... [leading] to [her] missing many a subtlety."
On Carmichael's version she comments: "this is a–rather breezily–readable translation ... but there are errors and misunderstandings, as well as clumsiness."
On Magarshack's translation she comments: "[it] offers natural, simple, and direct English prose that is appropriate to Tolstoy's Russian. There is occasional awkwardness ... and imprecision ... but Magarshack understands the text ... and even when unable to translate an idiom closely he renders its real meaning ... This is a good translation."
On
Wettlin's Soviet version she writes: "steady but uninspired, and sounds like English prose written by a Russian who knows the language but is not completely at home in it. The advantage is that Wettlin misses hardly any cultural detail."
[9]
In
In Quest Of Tolstoy (2008), Hughes McLean devotes a full chapter ("Which English
Anna?") comparing different translations of
Anna Karenina.
[10] His conclusion, after comparing
seven translations, is that "the PV [Pevear and Volokhonsky] translation, while perfectly adequate, is in my view not consistently or unequivocally superior to others in the market."
[11] He states his recommendations in the last two pages of the survey: "
None of the existing translations is actively
bad ... One's choice ... must therefore be based on nuances, subtleties, and refinements."
[12] He eliminates the Maudes for "disturbing errors" and "did not find either the Margashack or Carmichael ever superior to the others, and the lack of notes is a drawback." On Edmonds's version he states: "her version has no notes at all and all too frequently errs in the direction of making Tolstoy's 'robust awkwardness' conform to the translator's notion of good English style."
[13]
McLean's recommendations are the Kent–Berberova revision of Garnett's translation
and the Pevear and Volokhonsky version. "I consider the GKB [Garnett–Kent–Berberova] a very good version, even though it is based on an out-of-date Russian text. Kent and Berberova did a much more thorough and careful revision of Garnett's translation than Gibian did of the Maude one, and they have supplied fairly full notes, conveniently printed at the bottom of the page."
[14] McLean takes Pevear and Volokhonsky to task for not using the best critical text (the "Zaidenshnur–Zhdanov text") and offering flawed notes without consulting C. J. Turner's
A Karenina Companion(1993), although he calls their version "certainly a good translation."
[14]
Reviewing the translations by Bartlett and Schwartz for
The New York Times Book Review,
Masha Gessen noted that each new translation of
Anna Karenina ended up highlighting an aspect of Tolstoy's "variable voice" in the novel, and thus, "The Tolstoy of Garnett... is a monocled British gentleman who is simply incapable of taking his characters as seriously as they take themselves. Pevear and Volokhonsky... created a reasonable, calm storyteller who communicated in conversational American English. Rosamund Bartlett... creates an updated ironic-Brit version of Tolstoy. Marian Schwartz... has produced what is probably the least smooth-talking and most contradictory Tolstoy yet." Gessen found Schwartz's translation to be formally closer to the original Russian, but often weighed down with details as a result; Bartlett's translation, like Pevear and Volokhonsky's, was rendered in more idiomatic English and more readable.
[15]
~~~
http://hcbooks.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-naive-and-sentimental-novelist-by.html
The Naive and the Sentimental Novelist By Orhan Pamuk率性而多感的小說家：帕慕克哈佛文學講堂
三十歲那年，已讀遍法國重要小說的我首次來到巴黎，立刻趕往自己在書頁中邂逅的地點。我學巴爾札克的主人翁拉斯蒂涅，來到拉榭茲神父墓園（Père Lachaise）高處俯瞰巴黎，愕然發現景致竟是如此尋常。然而在我的小說處女作《貝氏父子》（Cevdet Bey and Sons）中，我還是創造了一個明顯以拉斯蒂涅為典範的主角人物。到了二十世紀，那些充當小說藝術舞台的歐洲主要城市湧入大批懷抱憧憬的非西方作家，這些人透過小說認識了這個世界，也想相信自己的所知所聞不啻是憑空想像。小說愛好者手持一本《唐吉訶德》遊歷西班牙，已是司空見慣的事。當然，諷刺的是塞萬提斯的主角自己也頭腦不清，混淆了騎士文學與現實。被困在小說與現實間的學者專家之中，最令人驚異的莫過於納博科夫，他曾說過所有小說都是童話，卻又試圖編纂《安娜卡列尼娜》註解版以披露小說背後的「真相」。雖然計畫始終未能完成，他仍作了研究，畫出安娜往返莫斯科與聖彼得堡所搭列車的車廂配置圖。他仔細地記錄女性專用車廂的簡單樸素、哪些是分配給較窮乘客的座位、暖爐的位置、窗戶的樣貌，以及莫斯科到聖彼得堡距離有幾英里──凡此種種托爾斯泰忽略未提的資訊。我認為類似的註解對於理解小說或安娜的想法並無太大幫助，但讀起來依然樂在其中，會覺得安娜的故事是真的，會更加相信她的存在，也會暫時忘卻失望與不足之感。
我們作為讀者的努力當中包含一項重要元素：虛榮心，我現在想來談談這個。我已經說過，閱讀小說不像欣賞畫作，不會遇見任何真實事物，其實是靠我們自己將文字轉化為意象並運用想像力讓小說世界成真。每位讀者都會以自己獨特的方式、獨特的影像記住某一部特定小說，當然了，說到運用想像力，有些讀者頗為怠惰，也有些十分勤奮。迎合怠惰想像力的作家會明白地向讀者傳達：每當心眼中出現某一特定影像，應該有什麼感覺與想法。至於信任讀者想像力的小說家則只會以文字形容與定義那些構成小說各個時刻的影像，並將感覺與想法留與讀者。有時候（其實是常常）想像力無法形成畫面或任何對應的感覺，最後我們便對自己說「看不懂這本小說」。不過我們也時常努力地讓想像力動起來，想方設法去想像作者所暗示或是內文想在我們內心創造的影像。正因為我們努力去理解、去想像，不禁慢慢對小說生出一股驕傲的占有慾，開始覺得這部小說完全是為我們而寫，也只有我們真正了解它。
這種占有慾也來自於一個事實：是我們讀者在心眼裡想像之後，才讓小說成真。小說家畢竟需要像我們這種勤奮、寬容、感覺敏銳的讀者，才能讓小說完整實現，讓小說「順利運作」。為了證明自己是這種特殊讀者，我們會假裝忘記小說是想像的產物，而想去造訪事件發生的城市、街道與房屋。這份渴望包含著一股衝動，想更深入了解小說世界，同樣也想看到一切「正如我們所想像」。在真實的街道、房屋與物品中看見（因小說家使用適切字眼而喚起的）適切影像，不僅有助於緩解小說帶來的不足感，也能讓我們讀者因為正確地想像出細節而充滿驕傲。
這種自豪與其諸多變化都是連結小說與博物館，或是連結小說讀者與博物館參訪者的共同感覺。我們現在的主題不是博物館而是小說。但為了說明在讀小說時激發想像力的動機，我要繼續沿用驕傲感與博物館的例子。別忘了，正如同下棋時預測對手的下一步，小說家也總會斟酌讀者的想像力以及刺激這份想像力的欲望與動機。讀者的心可能如何反應？這是小說家最重要的考量之一。
關於博物館與小說的複雜主題，若能分成三部分來討論會容易一些。但是要謹記這三部分相互關聯，而驕傲感則是它們的共同元素。
*****
The Naive and the Sentimental Novelist By Orhan Pamuk (HUP 2010)《率性而多感的小說家：帕慕克哈佛文學講堂》(台灣麥田 2012)
索引的學問不小。以此書的美國哈佛大學出版社和台灣麥田出版社的索引之一條來對比說說：
台灣麥田出版社的索引：
《安娜卡列尼娜》23,59,72,84,86,93,113,132,178,183,189
美國哈佛大學出版社的Anna Karenina 分兩則：請讀者思考為何需要如此區分：
Anna Karenina (Tolstoy), 《安娜卡列尼娜》(托爾斯泰), 61,75~76, 105, 178; knowledge of life and, 173; landscape of novel and, 8~10, 73; Nobokov's annotated edition, 125~126; object time in, 83; as a realist novel, 184; sensory experience in, 45~46. See also Karenina, Anna (fictional character):
和
Karenina, Anna (fictional character): 《安娜卡列尼娜》(小說人物), 12, 47, 64,80, 81,178; gaze of, 178; knowledge from every day experience and, 22; landscape of novel and, 8~10, 73, 84`85; Nabokov's annotations and, 126; reader's identification with, 45~46, 75; transformation of words into images and, 104~105. See also Anna Karenina (Tolstoy),
......被困在小說與現實間的學者專家之中，最令人驚異的莫過於納博科夫，他曾說過所有小說都是童話，卻又試圖編纂《安娜卡列尼娜》註解版以披露小說背後的「真相」。雖然計畫始終未能完成，他仍作了研究，畫出安娜往返莫斯科與聖彼得堡所搭列車的車廂配置圖。他仔細地記錄女性專用車廂的簡單樸素、哪些是分配給較窮乘客的座位、暖爐的位置、窗戶的樣貌，以及莫斯科到聖彼得堡距離有幾英里──凡此種種托爾斯泰忽略未提的資訊。我認為類似的註解對於理解小說或安娜的想法並無太大幫助，但讀起來依然樂在其中，會覺得安娜的故事是真的，會更加相信她的存在，也會暫時忘卻失望與不足之感。
