Subject
chuckrick/xuxrik/shchogol'/shchegol (fwd)
Date
Body
Don's information on xuxrik = schegolek brings to mind a Mandel'shtam poem
I have always liked. The 1967 Mandel'shtam Collected Works has three
variants of the poem, written in winter 1936,in Voronezh. I quote the
second variant, as the most apposite to Don's note:
Detskii rot zhuet svoiu miakinu,
Ulybaetsia, zhuia,
Slovno shchogol' golovu zakinu
I shchegla uvizhu ia.
Khvostik lodkoi, per'ia chorno-zholty,
I nagrudnik krasnym shit.
Chorno-zholtyi, do chego shchegol ty,
Do chego ty shcheglovit!
A childish mouth chews its chaff,
Smiles while chewing,
Like a dandy* I toss back my head
And I see a goldfinch.
Its tail is like a boat (?)**, its plumage black and red,
And its bib is sewn with red.
Black and red, how much of a goldfinch you are,
How dandified you are!
*My dictionaries give only the "dandy" meaning for shchogol' (of which
DBJ's/Dal's shchegolek is of course the diminutive), not the bird name. I
assume M. intended the "dandy" meaning. Or both at once: like a dandy and
like a bird? The adjective in the last line is also problematic, apparently
M's neologism, since all my dictionaries have "shcheglov_a_t" for "foppish,
dandified." Maybe the connatation of the last line is "How
dandified/goldfinch-like/redshank-like you are." I'm not being entirely
facetious here; M's poetry is packed with multiple (possible) meanings.
**Literal translation. Am I missing a metphorical or colloquial usage of
"boat" here?
Earl Sampson (esampson@cu.campus.mci.net)
I have always liked. The 1967 Mandel'shtam Collected Works has three
variants of the poem, written in winter 1936,in Voronezh. I quote the
second variant, as the most apposite to Don's note:
Detskii rot zhuet svoiu miakinu,
Ulybaetsia, zhuia,
Slovno shchogol' golovu zakinu
I shchegla uvizhu ia.
Khvostik lodkoi, per'ia chorno-zholty,
I nagrudnik krasnym shit.
Chorno-zholtyi, do chego shchegol ty,
Do chego ty shcheglovit!
A childish mouth chews its chaff,
Smiles while chewing,
Like a dandy* I toss back my head
And I see a goldfinch.
Its tail is like a boat (?)**, its plumage black and red,
And its bib is sewn with red.
Black and red, how much of a goldfinch you are,
How dandified you are!
*My dictionaries give only the "dandy" meaning for shchogol' (of which
DBJ's/Dal's shchegolek is of course the diminutive), not the bird name. I
assume M. intended the "dandy" meaning. Or both at once: like a dandy and
like a bird? The adjective in the last line is also problematic, apparently
M's neologism, since all my dictionaries have "shcheglov_a_t" for "foppish,
dandified." Maybe the connatation of the last line is "How
dandified/goldfinch-like/redshank-like you are." I'm not being entirely
facetious here; M's poetry is packed with multiple (possible) meanings.
**Literal translation. Am I missing a metphorical or colloquial usage of
"boat" here?
Earl Sampson (esampson@cu.campus.mci.net)