Translations into Russian from other Soviet languages

[Robert Chandler]

Dear all,

In 1961 Vasily Grossman spent two months in Armenia, in order to "translate" a 1400 page war novel by Rachiya Kochar, "Deti bol'shogo doma".   While there he spent much of the time working together with the author and with the translator who had prepared the "podstrochnik" he was using.

This entire story is - I now realise - much stranger than it appears.  A Russian translation by Арусь Тадеосян had been published only five years before, in 1956, by no less a publishing house than VOENIZDAT.  Neither Grossman nor Semyon Lipkin, who tells this story at length in his memoir about Grossman, show any sign whatsoever of being aware of this previous translation.

I find this deeply puzzling.  Does anyone have any thoughts?  Fyodor Guber (Grossman's stepson) assures me that it was not unusual for literary works from other Soviet languages to be translated into Russian more than once.  But even if this is so, it does not account for Grossman and Lipkin both appearing to be ignorant even of the existence of the previous translation. 

All the best,

Robert


Robert Chandler, 42 Milson Road, London, W14 OLD

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