KAP DOCHKA, end of chapter 9, khot' shersti klok

[Robert Chandler]

Dear Alina,

I appreciate that the phrase is not inherently in any way humorous.  What
interests me is its humorousness IN CONTEXT.  Pyotr has just been given a
sheepskin coat, and then Savelich talks of 'klok shersti'.  But somehow this
kind of humour seems uncharacteristic of Savelich.  Or am I wrong?

R.




> I think it was in this article http://links.jstor.org/sici?
> sici=0037-6752(198321)1%3A27%3A1%3C1%3ATSATIT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-P that
> Sergei Davydov was linking тулуп, платок, платеж etc. In other words,
> nothing is accidental in Pushkin.
> 
> As for the phrase itself, it's quite common and not humorous at all,
> I would say.
> 
> Alina
> 
> On Jan 12, 2007, at 6:04 PM, Robert Chandler wrote:
> 
>> Dear all,
>> 
>> In the last lines of chapter 9 Savelich comes out with an odd
>> variant of the
>> more usual ‘s parshivoi ovtsy khot’s shersti klok’.
>> 
>> "Вот  видишь ли, сударь", - сказал старик,  - "что  я не даром подал
>> мошеннику челобитье:
>> вору-то  стало совестно, хоть башкирская долговязая  кляча да
>> овчинный тулуп
>> не  стоят и половины того, что они,  мошенники, у нас украли, и
>> того, что ты
>> ему  сам изволил  пожаловать;  да всe же  пригодится, а с лихой
>> собаки хоть
>> шерсти клок".
>> Transliterated, the last line is ‘da vses zhe prigoditsya, a s
>> likhoi sobaki
>> khot’ shersti klok’.
>> 
>> How comical is this?  I mean, is it just an acceptable variant of
>> the normal
>> saying, or is Savelich getting laughably muddled?  What is the
>> relationship
>> between the tulup and the shersti klok, or is that not intended?
>> 
>> My draft translation is:
>>  “His heart knows shame after all – not that a spindle-shanked
>> Bashkir nag
>> and a sheepskin coat are worth half of what the bandits stole and
>> what you
>> were pleased to give the rascal yourself.  Still they’re better
>> than nothing
>> – and there’s worse to be got from a vicious dog than a tuft of fur.”
>> 
>> But the last words no longer seem right to me.  They seem self-
>> consciously
>> clever in a way that is quite wrong for Savelich.  I could, of
>> course, just
>> change ‘fur’ to ‘hair’.
>> 
>> Best wishes,
>> 
>> R.
>> 
>> 
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> 
> Alina Israeli
> LFS, American University
> 4400 Massachusetts Ave., NW
> Washington DC. 20016
> (202) 885-2387  
> fax (202) 885-1076
> aisrael at american.edu
> 
> 
> 
> 
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