Brodsky in Great Britain

[David Powelstock]

Olga wrote: " It is, in general, a bit dangerous to assume that those
colleagues of ours who engage in irony are stupider than ourselves."

I would generalize that to include even those who may not (or may) be
engaging in irony.

David Powelstock 

-----Original Message-----
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list
[mailto:SEELANGS at BAMA.UA.EDU] On Behalf Of Olga Meerson
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2008 7:53 AM
To: SEELANGS at BAMA.UA.EDU
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Brodsky in Great Britain

I rather feel that Poluxina's narrowing down so much the circle of those who
could really appreciate the English of Brodsky's endeavours has an element
of tongue-in-cheek irony in it--like many scholars' saying that Nabokov's
translation of "Onegin" works for philologists and Slavists when they need
help with Pushkin's text, rather than for the average enlightened English
reader. It is rather careless to see Poluxina as naive when she engages in
irony. It is, in general, a bit dangerous to assume that those colleagues of
ours who engage in irony are stupider than ourselves. Poluxina loves Brodsky
despite his arrogant pretense that English is as native a language to him as
Russian--not because of this pretense. And she indeed has the right to
assess the peculiar poetic and linguistic result of this pretense as subject
to her philological hermeneutic. Why treat her insight into this paradoxical
linguistic, and even poetic, effect as necessarily stupider-than-thou?
o.m.   

----- Original Message -----
From: Boris Dagaev <boris.dagaev at GMAIL.COM>
Date: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 5:04 pm
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Brodsky in Great Britain

> It is truly fascinating how desperate her love for Brodsky is. She 
> eveninvites philologists to become critics: "???????? ???????????? 
> ???????????????? ?????? ????????? ????? ?? ???? ????????, ??? 
> ?????????? ????
> ??????, ??? ????????? - ??????? ??????????, ? ????????????? - ???????
> ??????." ("naibolee avtoritetnuju ocenku anglijskih stihov 
> Brodskogo mogli
> by dat' filologi, chej anglijskij jazyk rodnoj, ch'ja professija - 
> russkajaliteratura, a special'nost' - russkaja pojezija.")
> 
> However painful it is for her to agree with Craig Raine et al, 
> Polukhinashould have kept a wide berth of criticism. Instead, she 
> pushes ridiculously
> vacuous (supposedly uplifting?) justifications: "[??] ????????? ? 
> ???????????????????? ????????? ????? ?????????? ??????. ? ??? 
> ????????? ????? ?????,
> ?? ??? ???? ????? ???????? ? ?????, ?????? ? ??????????." ("[On] 
> nahodilsjav sostojanii postojannogo izumlenija pered anglijskim 
> jazykom. I kak
> predannyj sluga jazyka, on nes svoe bremja smirenno i gordo, 
> uprjamo i
> blagorodno.") Had Brodsky's trademark forced humility, boundless
> stubbornness and affected nobleness run a little longer, he 
> would've become
> another McGonagall. She should humbly thank God Brodsky didn't live 
> as long.
> 
> Boris
> On Sun, Jun 15, 2008 at 5:46 PM, Alexandra Smith 
> <Alexandra.Smith at ed.ac.uk>wrote:
> 
> > Dear colleagues,
> >
> > Those of you who are interested in Brodsky might be curious to read
> > Valentina Polukhina's fascinating article on the reception of 
> Brodsky in
> > Great Britain. It was published in the journal on poetry "Storony 
> sveta":> http://www.stosvet.net/9/polukhina/
> >
> > All best,
> > Alexandra
> >
> >
> 

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