Eugene Onegin: A Novel in Verse: Commentary: Commentary v. 2 (Bollingen Series (General)) (Paperback)

How, I may ask, would I know, a non-Russian speaker? I'd love to feel some of what Pushkin was feeling as he contemplated each new verse, and each new chapter. I feel it when I read a novel in English, or a poem in English. The challenge to the translator, I think, is to put me in Pushkin's driving seat the same way. I want to feel so excited by the flow of the words that I feel I want to learn some Russian to get even closer to Pushkin, in the original. I think Nabokov does this as no other translator of Pushkin. He teaches me a bit of Russian, a bit of consciousness I desire that I can only get in Russian.

I first came across excerps from Nabokov's translation in Hofstader's On the Music of Language. Hofstader knows some of a lot of languages, and I think reads a translation next to the original, having some Russian already. He really slates Nabokov, for his purpose. But mine is different, and so may be yours. If, like me, you want a translation that leads you to go on to Russian, get Nabokov's. Then use this companion volume, of his notes, to pick up more and more detail. I refer anyone to Nabokov's notes to Chapter Eight, Verse Four of the original. He quotes the Russian, and the English, line by line, side by side. His translation tries to get the feeling not of the rhymes, but of the argument making its point in often declamatory, typically expressive Russian sound. He tries to get near the sound of every other word but the rhyme. Most other translators go for a rhyme but then a very loose translation of the line leading up to it. Nabokov doesn't rhyme at all. With him you get 75% Pushkin, and lose the rhyme. With others you get the last 25%, but lose at least 75% of overall imitation of the texture.

Sure, you lose some exact meaning, and that's what a practised Russian speaker misses in this translation, perhaps. But who knows a language who learns it from tutors? Learn it from the poets, and their quirkiest translators. And be seduced that way into the love of language, through the love of poetry, as you were in your own language by nursery rhymes.

Nabokov doesn't attempt to rhyme, or even make the English pretty (if you're after the general feel of EO, go for Johnstone's adequate Penguin Classics translation). Instead, he provides an imposing compendium of explications, marginalia, facts, linguistic points that explain academically what a Russian would intuitively grasp when faced with the text. Whilst this does not sound like much fun, if you do take the trouble to read his translation in tandem with the commentary (and, even if you only have a shaky grasp of Russian, the original), you will be rewarded with a profound knowledge of not only every detail of the book (making the Russian verse sparkle anew), but of Pushkin, his times, his country, literature as a whole, and, somehow, of life itself.

In short, Nabokov somehow manages to turn his commentary into not only the single most authoritative guide to EO, but a work of literature in its own right. It's full of fascinating insights on just about every topic imaginable, and opens up the enigma of Russia better than any history book, or indeed most novels.

What's more, Nabokov's language is just exquisite, making each factual insight shine like a small lyric poem in itself. This sounds hyperbolical, and how such an effect is acheived, I don't know, (I am a very impatient reader, and find academic text boring on the whole) but I could not put this down when I read it - and came away feeling utterly enriched.

Especially recommended for Russian students (the translation's very literal, saving a lot of dictionary time) - but also for inquisitve English speakers alike; this is the best way into an utterly amazing novel.