HIndenburg YET again

[Anne Schumann]

Dear all,

I believe the Russian passage is really stunning. Just to add a German point of view: Hindenburg is well-known as high military official in WWI (victorious in some legendary battles in the east, Tannenberg and the like), as an old (gerontocratic?) monarchist who happened to become president (and coffin bearer) of the first German republic. His government had to manage the catastrophic economic crisis of 1929 and seems to have become increasingly weak, opening the doors to a radicalization of German politics and culminating in the fact that he made Hitler Chancellor of the soon defunct Weimar Republic (there even is a symbolic picture of this event taken in Potsdam, Sans-Souccis, as far as I remember). So Hindenburg really is a highly symbolic character and his mention in the Russian text opens up a whole new symbolic space. The zeppelin, it seems, was named Hindenburg to honour him and is probably much less important here.
My 2 cents.

Regards,
Anne-Kathrin Schumann
Leipzig/Vienna

-----Original Message-----
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list [mailto:SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of Robert Chandler
Sent: Monday, May 07, 2012 10:24 AM
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Subject: [SEELANGS] HIndenburg YET again

Dear all,

And it continues to get more complicated.  It has been pointed out to me that, while H. was still a general, his cheeks were quite normal. It was only when he became a Field Marshal and President that his jowls became so heavy.

A good example of the difficulty of adding even an apparently simple and uncontroversial word to a translation!

All the best,

Robert

Robert Chandler, 42 Milson Road, London, W14 OLD

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