KAP DOCHKA

[Robert Chandler]

Dear Sasha,

What you say here is nicely put:
> In my opinion, it's true to say that it is Pushkin, not Savel'ich, who
> is amused by such rhyming...

Now I just have to find a way of translating it that doesn't give the
impression that Savelich thinks he is being terribly clever!

Poka,

R.



> 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.
> 
> 
> --Dear Robert,
> 
> It seems to me that you uncovered (in the example provided above) the
> use of symmetrical compositions in "Kapitanskaia dochka". Pushkin's
> works are full of such symmetrical compositions. Kap. dochka has a lot
> of inner rhymes of this kind; they form certain semantic clusters. In
> this particular case, the "rhyme" acts as a part of the binary
> opposition of the wolf-sheep imagery.
> In my opinion, it's true to say that it is Pushkin, not Savel'ich, who
> is amused by such rhyming...
> Efim Etkind wrote a book on symmetrical compositions in Pushkin's
> works. I'm sure you could find in the SSEES library. If not, you could
> check my review of this book for further details (Efim Etkind¹s book
> ³Simmetricheskie kompositsii u Pushkina², SEER, vol.68, 1, January
> 1990, pp.110-11.).
> 
> All very best,
> Sasha
> 
> 
> =============================================
> Alexandra Smith (PhD, University of London)
> Lecturer in Russian
> School of European Languages and Cultures
> The University of Edinburgh
> David Hume Tower
> George Square
> Edinburgh EX8 9JX
> UK
> 
> tel. +44-(0)131-511381
> fax: +44- (0) 650-3604
> e-mail: Alexandra.Smith at ed.ac.uk
> 
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