So, you want to read Dostoevsky’s darkest and most hilarious novel, a controversial political satire, the title of which has been variously rendered as The Possessed, The Devils, Devils, and Demons? By all accounts, it’s intense! You’ve got five in-print English translations to choose from, seven in total.
There’s an inherent contradiction in The Nine Cloud Dream. Or is there? Does this dream-journey undermine its supposed moral lesson? Or can an apparently hedonistic tale succeed in promoting transcendental Buddhist values? Read it and decide for yourself.
What does it mean to say that “Manuscripts don’t burn”? The publication history of Bulgakov’s black comedy reflects the difficulties artists face under authoritarian governments, yet justifies the author’s faith that no authority can stifle the creative flame.
I found so much information on translations of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame that I had to split this post into two! Part 2 focuses on 7 translations published after 1900 and gives information about a few related books.
I found so much information on translations of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame that I had to split this post into two! This part talks about the book’s title and “lost” chapters and gives information about 8 translations published before 1900.
How hard can it be for translators to just “get it right”? Quite hard, since there’s no single objectively correct equivalent for a lot of the words and expressions they handle. Consider any idiomatic expression, such as an informal term of endearment, and you’ll quickly see how hard it can be.
Time marches on. Should we cast aside older translations in favor of newer ones? Sometimes they seem to have all the advantages! But do they really?
“The Idiot has merits that equal, and, in some cases, surpass those of Dostoyevsky’s other masterpieces…. The Idiot was also Dostoyevsky’s personal favorite.” —Gary Rosenshield
I found so much information on translations of The Three Musketeers that I had to split this post into two! Part 2 focuses on 9 translations published from 1950 to 2018, and gives information about a few related books.
I found so much information on translations of The Three Musketeers that I had to split this post into two! Part 1 of this post talks about the enduring appeal of the novel and gives information about 7 translations published from 1846 to 1903.
