Vladimir Nabokov

Boyd, Brian. Aligning with Pushkin. 2018

Author(s)
Bibliographic title
Aligning with Pushkin
Publisher, city
Periodical or collection
Eugene Onegin
Page(s)
7-20
Publication year
Comment

Commissioned introduction to unique printing of VN's translation of Eugene Onegin: Cyrillic original, interlineated with stress-marked transliteration (by Nabokov poetry and prosody expert Stanislav Shvabrin), with Nabokov's revised translation on the inner half of each page--a version ideal for those who know no or only some Russian and want to savor Pushkin's sounds and Nabokov's sense. Unfortunately the edition is limited and expensive. 

Abstract
The introduction explains how the layout of this edition at last fulfils or even exceeds Nabokov's hopes for the presentation of his translation, and compares Canto 1 Stanza 2 in Nabokov's translation and Pushkin's original with translations by Deutsch, Arndt, and Johnston, and with one new translator, Douglas Hofstadter, who has emerged after VNAY compared Nabokov and Pushkin with Deutsch, Arndt, and Johnston on a different stanza in the center of the poem.