podkidnoy durak

[Emily Saunders]

Dear Mr. Chandler,

The term "pokidnoy durak" was new to me, but I have played a lot of  
just "durak," "perevodnoi durak," and have heard of the somewhat  
libelously named "chukchansky durak " -- the Russian Wikipedia site  
refers to this variant as "Francuski Durak."  Having read the website  
description of "pokidnoy durak" it looks as if it is just plain ol'  
"durak" as I played it with friends as a college student.

Unfortunately, I can think of no easy English equivalent to this game.   
I would be very curious to know if anyone else knows of perhaps an old  
and forgotten card game that Austen's folk may have played that  
resembles it, but my guess would be that a European card game (ie.  
non-Anglo) may be a closer cousin.

Things that I can say:  This is not a trick-taking game (so Bridge,  
Hearts, Spades, Whist, etc. are not good translations); neither is it a  
game like Rummy where you try to collect cards, and it is not Cribbage.  
  It is not a betting game (well, I can't think how one might bet in  
"durak") so Poker won't help.  Old Maid (unless Old Maid once had  
different rules) is not close because that involves grabbing cards from  
your opponents' hands; and Go Fish is not anywhere close.  The closest  
game I can think of is -- and this is a VERY distant cousinship -- is  
Crazy Eights since the goal for both is to get rid of cards and to  
"cover" the last card played with a card of the same number or suit  
(durak allows up to six to cover and in Crazy 8's you draw from the  
deck if you can't play rather than picking up the stack of played  
cards, and there are a few other major differences).  Unfortunately, I  
imagine that Crazy 8's would probably would sound out of place in your  
context.

Why not just skip the issue and say that "the lightly wounded spent  
their time playing cards and flirting with the middle-aged nurses."   
You say that this does not come up again in the story, so the exact  
nature of the card game is not of great relevance.  That would be my  
suggestion at any rate.

Regards,

Emily Saunders

On Apr 18, 2006, at 7:24 AM, FRISON Philippe wrote:

> Dear Mr Chandler,
>
> Here is a link to a site with this card game:  
> "http://w3.vitebsk.by/games/durak/"
>
> And here is a link to an explanation of the rules:
>
> http://games.mnogo.ru/durak/
>
> As I am not an English-speaker, I cannot suggest a proper British ot  
> an American equivalent.
>
> But the game seems to me slighly more elaborate than the French  
> "Mistigri", or its British "Old maid" card games,
> but this latter name would bring us back to Onegin's thematic...
>
> Philippe
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Slavic & East European Languages and Literature list  
> [mailto:SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU] On Behalf Of Robert Chandler
> Sent: mardi 18 avril 2006 15:55
> To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] away from Onegin; on to "vicarious" and to  
> CARD GAMES
>
>
> Dear all,
>
>> I think it would be worthwhile if contributors to the list might give
>> consideration to moving on to the rich trove of other commonly held
>> intellectual interests.  This topic is, of course, vital and
>> inexhaustible
> (and no one should be
>> silenced ever in the history of humankind), but we could return to it
>> even more refreshed than we now are if we took a break and argued
>> about something else.
>
> I second Professor Condee's wise proposal and will take the  
> opportunity to repeat my own recent small and, I hope, easily  
> exhaustible question about the card game called 'podkidnoy durak':
>
> This card game figures at least twice in Vasily Grossman's last  
> rasskazy.  A sentence in the story 'V Kislovodske' begins,  
> Легкораненые играли в подкидного дурака, крутили любовь с пожилыми  
> сестрами....  (Legkoranenye igrali v podkidnogo duraka, krutili  
> lyubov' s pozhilymi sestrami...)
>
> Any suggestions as to how I should translate this?  The game is not  
> going to be mentioned again in this particular story.
>
> Thanks in advance - and best wishes,
>
> Robert
>
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