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Fw: Rozhdestvo, rozhdestvenno, Rozhdestveno, Rozhestveno, etc.
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MessageNABOKV-L thanks Dmitri Nabokov for both his enlightening note and his good wishes for the Russian Xmas which is today Jan.7th.
-----Message d'origine-----
De : Nabokov
Envoyé : mercredi, 8. janvier 2003 00:28
À :
Cc : '
Objet : Rozhdestvo, rozhdestvenno, Rozhdestveno, Rozhestveno, etc.
You might want to post what follows, to be read around the campfire:
I would like to help disentangle the slightly tricky relationships of this family Christmas tree.
Rozhdestvo means "Christmas" (the holiday).
rozhdestvenno is one neuter form of the adjective rozhdestvennyi, as in zdes' ochen' rozhdestvenno (it's very Christmassy here), the other being rozhdestvennoe, as in rozhdestvennoe ukrashenie (a Christmas ornament). It is also an adverb (actually not very far, syntactically, from the first neuter adjectival form, above) as in dom byl ubran rozhdestvenno (the house was decorated Christmas-style). There are other variants and nuances, e.g. rozhdestvenskiy, po rozhdestvenski.
Rozhdestveno [a "d" and one "n"] is a fairly recent variant of the name of the estate of my maternal grandmother's family, the Rukavishnikovs. The mansion had been used by my father for an occasional tryst, and was given to him by his uncle "Ruka" shortly before political events made it impossible for him to inhabit it. Having been once nearly destroyed, it was painstakingly rebuilt and was to be shown and presented to me during my first visit to Russia, in June, 1995. It was destroyed once again by fire not long before my arrival (it was built entirely of wood -- one reason why it was, I am told, the last large structure of its kind to survive intact as long as it did). It has since been rebuilt again, promised to me again, but that is where, after I had signed various official papers, things have stopped. I have shed no tears because I've had enough hassles with real estate in Sardinia, Florida, and Switzerland. Anyway, I would have used it more or less as it is being used now: for cultural events in honor of my father. I could also, in theory, have laid claim to elaborate properties in Spa and Rome, but have not bothered. Nearby Vyra had belonged to my maternal grandfather, had become the Nabokovs' summer place, and was totally destroyed by hyperkinetic belligerents. As happens with language, the name Rozhestveno was gradually corrupted, in everyday speech and writing, by its proximity to "Rozhdestvo" and "rozhdenie" ("birthday") into a half-way form with a "d" and one "n". On the other hand, Rozhestveno had its own, older form of "Christmas" to mimic:Rozhestvo. And one can dig further.
My father wrote the short story "Rozhdestvo" ("Christmas") pub. in Russian in Rul' in two installments, Jan. 6 and 8, 1925; pub. in English in Details of a Sunset and Other Stories, tr.DN in collaboration with the author, McGraw-Hill, 1976; collected in The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov, ed. DN, Knopf, 1995. He also wrote "Rozhdestvenskiy rasskaz" ("The Christmas Story") pub. in Russian in Rul', Dec. 25, 1928; pub.in Eng., tr. DN, in The Collected Stories, ed. DN, Knopf, 1995.
It is possible that Françoise Richard saw the endings of the two installments and concluded they were different endings for the same story.
VN wrote two poems entitled "Rozhdestvo" ("Christmas"), one in 1921 ("Moi kalendar' polu-opalyi..."), another in 1923 ("Svecha prozrachnaia migaet...").
S Rozhdestvom Khristovym,
DN
,
-----Message d'origine-----
De : Nabokov
Envoyé : mercredi, 8. janvier 2003 00:28
À :
Cc : '
Objet : Rozhdestvo, rozhdestvenno, Rozhdestveno, Rozhestveno, etc.
You might want to post what follows, to be read around the campfire:
I would like to help disentangle the slightly tricky relationships of this family Christmas tree.
Rozhdestvo means "Christmas" (the holiday).
rozhdestvenno is one neuter form of the adjective rozhdestvennyi, as in zdes' ochen' rozhdestvenno (it's very Christmassy here), the other being rozhdestvennoe, as in rozhdestvennoe ukrashenie (a Christmas ornament). It is also an adverb (actually not very far, syntactically, from the first neuter adjectival form, above) as in dom byl ubran rozhdestvenno (the house was decorated Christmas-style). There are other variants and nuances, e.g. rozhdestvenskiy, po rozhdestvenski.
Rozhdestveno [a "d" and one "n"] is a fairly recent variant of the name of the estate of my maternal grandmother's family, the Rukavishnikovs. The mansion had been used by my father for an occasional tryst, and was given to him by his uncle "Ruka" shortly before political events made it impossible for him to inhabit it. Having been once nearly destroyed, it was painstakingly rebuilt and was to be shown and presented to me during my first visit to Russia, in June, 1995. It was destroyed once again by fire not long before my arrival (it was built entirely of wood -- one reason why it was, I am told, the last large structure of its kind to survive intact as long as it did). It has since been rebuilt again, promised to me again, but that is where, after I had signed various official papers, things have stopped. I have shed no tears because I've had enough hassles with real estate in Sardinia, Florida, and Switzerland. Anyway, I would have used it more or less as it is being used now: for cultural events in honor of my father. I could also, in theory, have laid claim to elaborate properties in Spa and Rome, but have not bothered. Nearby Vyra had belonged to my maternal grandfather, had become the Nabokovs' summer place, and was totally destroyed by hyperkinetic belligerents. As happens with language, the name Rozhestveno was gradually corrupted, in everyday speech and writing, by its proximity to "Rozhdestvo" and "rozhdenie" ("birthday") into a half-way form with a "d" and one "n". On the other hand, Rozhestveno had its own, older form of "Christmas" to mimic:Rozhestvo. And one can dig further.
My father wrote the short story "Rozhdestvo" ("Christmas") pub. in Russian in Rul' in two installments, Jan. 6 and 8, 1925; pub. in English in Details of a Sunset and Other Stories, tr.DN in collaboration with the author, McGraw-Hill, 1976; collected in The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov, ed. DN, Knopf, 1995. He also wrote "Rozhdestvenskiy rasskaz" ("The Christmas Story") pub. in Russian in Rul', Dec. 25, 1928; pub.in Eng., tr. DN, in The Collected Stories, ed. DN, Knopf, 1995.
It is possible that Françoise Richard saw the endings of the two installments and concluded they were different endings for the same story.
VN wrote two poems entitled "Rozhdestvo" ("Christmas"), one in 1921 ("Moi kalendar' polu-opalyi..."), another in 1923 ("Svecha prozrachnaia migaet...").
S Rozhdestvom Khristovym,
DN
,