The best Russian translators

The modern reader does not always think that the works of the great foreign masters of fiction become accessible and understandable thanks to the work of talented translators. It is these people who help to understand the thoughts contained in the lines of the works of foreign authors, to get acquainted with the style features of their work. The work of translators makes it possible to enjoy reading books created by writers and poets from different countries and cultures.

Instruction manual

The translation into Russian of the remarkable works of classical foreign literature begins in the eighteenth century. Among the famous domestic writers and translators are V. Zhukovsky, I. Bunin, N. Gumilev, A. Akhmatova, B. Pasternak, K. Chukovsky, S. Marshak, E. Evtushenko and many others. All of them are talented masters of the word of art, having a high level of education and culture.

The poet and translator V. A. Zhukovsky, Pushkin’s “teacher” and educator of the tsar’s heir, began his activities as a translator, following the spirit of classicism. The poet was looking for means of depicting heroes that would most fully convey their inner world, and in his own way sought to uncover the meaning of the original. V.A. Zhukovsky gives himself complete freedom, so the "alien" works acquire his personal bright personality. The texts of translated works, often deviating from the original, determine the poetic personality, the nature of the romantic poet. Russian readers recognized Byron, Schiller, W. Scott, Goethe through translations of Zhukovsky. In the native language, the old Russian poem “The Word about Igor's Regiment” and “Odyssey” by the ancient Greek singer Homer sounded.

An excellent translator was the famous poet and writer I. Bunin. In the close to the original, the unsurpassed arrangement of “Songs of Hiawatha” by Longfellow, awarded the Pushkin Prize of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the writer retained the musicality and simplicity of the language, the author’s artistic and visual means, even the arrangement of poems. To date, the Bunin translation of Longfellow's poem, based on Native American mythology, is considered the best. The outstanding master of poetic translation I. Bunin introduced the Russian reader to Byron, A. Tennyson, the lyrics of A. Mitskevich, T. Shevchenko and other poets.

B.L. Pasternak, a representative of the Silver Age, said with confidence that the impression of life should be reflected in the translation and it should represent an independent work of art. The poet was not attracted by the resemblance to the original. Translations of foreign authors close to him brought unprecedented luck: this is highly valued by Goethe Pasternak (the central place is occupied by the Faust tragedy); Shakespeare, whose translation of the tragedies acquired the impression of wealth and power of images; Rilke, through his work, helps the poet to see the whole universe as a whole. Boris Pasternak translated many works of Slavic poets, among which the original Boleslav Lesmyan and Vitezslav Nezval can be noted.

Since childhood, the translation of poems has been S.A. Marshak, who later chose to translate into his native language the most significant works of art. The translations created by him embody all the charm of the original: they preserved the national character of the foreign author, especially the era. English and Scottish old ballads, Shakespeare's sonnets, the poetry of Wordsworth, Blake, Stevenson found in Marshak a great translator of English literature. The Scottish poet Robert Burns, according to A. Twardowski, thanks to a translator, became Russian, remaining a Scotsman. Burns' books, talentedly translated by Marshak, were noted: he received the title of Honorary Citizen of Scotland. For half a century, the main goal of Samuel Yakovlevich Marshak was a passionate desire to introduce the masses of people to the masterpieces that make up the treasury of world literature.

K.I. Chukovsky, a well-known children's writer and literary critic, is the author of a wonderful translation of Mark Twain’s favorite books by children. The translation activity of K. Chukovsky was accompanied by the works of the famous English writer Oscar Wilde.

V.V. Nabokov was the author of translations of the classics of our literature, such as Pushkin, Lermontov, Tyutchev, and his own works into English, he also translated many works of foreign writers into Russian. V. Nabokov believed that in order to maintain the rhythm of the text, all the features of the original in the translation, accuracy must be followed. In exile, Nabokov became an English-language writer and stopped creating works in his native language. And only the scandalous novel "Lolita" was released in Russian. The writer probably wished that the translation was accurate, so he decided to do it personally.