TRANSLATION PROBLEMS: REPLIES

[Jules Levin]

At 06:31 PM 4/11/01 -0700, you wrote:
>>>>    I have noticed something. I have heard "drug" being used in the
>>>> sense of a "boyfriend". Perhaps, it may be a new usage.
>>
>>I quote from Zhukovskij's Svetlana (1808-1812):
>>Kak mogu, podruzhki, pet'?/ Milyj drug daleko;/ Mne sud'bina umeret'/ V
>>grusti odinokoj.
>>
>>I doubt that Svetlana is referring to a platonic acquaintance.
>
>Why not? Weren't those "gadan'ja"?

The poem involved "gadan'ja", but at that point Svetlana was describing her
own actual situation.
Far be it from me to question the innocence of Russian maidens, but I
assume that we would never read explicit references, and must read between
the lines.  I suggest that the phrase "umeret' v grusti odinokoj" is a
significant hint.  Also, I am sceptical about the reality of "platonic"
except as a literary affectation among high society elements.  Also, the
concept must be different for men and women.  A friend once claimed that
for a man, a "platonic" friendship is either pre- or post- "non-platonic".
I have a feeling that Pushkin would agree.  (Of course, there are other
considerations, e.g., patronage, social connections, etc., and certainly
after the guys get old and wise...but the women in Svetlana were "devushki".)

>Those days it was "drug serdca", now, on the other hand...
>
>Maybe there are studies about sexual habits in Alexandrian or Nikolaevan
>Russia, similar to those that exist for Victorian England, maybe I am
>totally wrong (about "serdechnyj drug" and my apologies to Jules Levin). I
>seem to remember reading it somewhere years ago that about one third of
>women marrying in Victorian times were pregnant. I never heard of such a
>study on Russian territory.
>
Apparently this was a normal phenomenon among European peasantry (I assume
the %% were raised by bottom-up behavior, not top-down).  One motive was
supposed to be that fertility was so important that demonstrating it
trumped virginity.

Jules Levin

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