Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0018901, Thu, 3 Dec 2009 12:12:09 -0200

Subject
[NABOKOV-L] Vladimir Nabokov in "To Pushkin" (On Translating
Eugene Onegin)
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Dear List,

After having been informed by Dmitri Nabokov that what I set down as a jingle was "in fact, a serious poem, which appeared, in slightly different form, with a second verse and under the title 'On Translating Eugene Onegin,' in Poems and Problems," I hasten to share the correction with the List.*
Actually, the word "jingle" came from Georg Steiner. Cf. "No Passion Spent -Essays 1978-1996", Faber&Faber, 1996, page 201** If one considers that in its rough draft (written for Dmitri, on Dec. 1953, Ithaca, N.Y) VN notes that "this is the rhyme-scheme of 'Onegin'," the application of the word "jingle" to the poem is extremely inadequate.

The copy of both ( P&P and the holograph of its original) shall be soon posted to the List., in separate. A rare opportunity to see and read one of VN's original manuscripted page.

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*- (cf.message of Nov.3,2009 to the List)
** - G.Steiner wrote: "One thinks of the long, lamentable history of successive 'translations' into English and American English of Dante and Goethe. Nabokov's jingle is a mordant summation: 'What is translation? On a platter...'"

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