Quote:
|
Originally Posted by !@#$%!
on the subject of translations: i would love to post a favorite passage here from the guerney version. then ask others to post OTHER translations so we can compare the merits of each one.
let me start w/ the fly episode-- of course!!!!
--
oh fuck! i didnt bring the book! what a fucker.
i hereby reserve the space for doing this later. i got the guerney 1965 print btw. so post your own.
|
---
Robert A. Macguire (Penguin Classics) translation:
On entering the hall, Chichikov had to squint for a moment, because the glare from the candles, the lamps, and the ladies' gowns was fearsome. Everything was flooded with light. Black tailcoats flitted and scurried about, singly and in clusters, here and there, just as flies scurry about on a gleaming white sugarloaf on a hot summer day in July, while an aged housekeeper breaks and divides it into glittering lumps before an open window, and the children, all gathered round, look on, their curious eyes following the movements of her coarsened hands raising the mallet, and aerial squadrons of flies sent aloft by a gentle breeze boldly wing their way in, like rightful owners, and, taking advantage of the old woman's poor sight and the sun that is bothering her eyes, swarm over the tasty pieces, here singly, there in thick clusters. Sated by the riches of summer, which in any event sets out tasty dishes at every turn, they have decidedly not flown here for the purpose of eating, but merely to display themselves, to strut back and forth over the heap of sugar, to rub their back or front legs against each other, or to use them to scratch under their wings or, extending both front legs, to rub them together above their heads, then turn about and again fly off, and again fly back in fresh, importunate squadrons.
---
Sorry if there are excerpts from Eric's Trip in there somewhere. I'm not a very focused person.