I came across several photographs of hockey player Evgeni Nabokov aparelled
in sportive full glory.
Although the picture I selected is practically
unrelated to Vladimir Nabokov, his regal armour, in its voluminous whites, golds
and reds, reminded me of certain depictions of "Prince Igor." The defensive
costumes (EN's and Igor's)struck me as belonging to the category of
coincidences...(I wonder if the modern world Evgeni Nabokov would be flattered
by this comparison.*)
"The Song of Igor's Campaign" was translated into
English by Nabokov in 1960.
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* A breakfast-reader's experience with V.N's translation of this poem
(signed by "Hamilton" at
http://daughterofben.wordpress.com/2013/02/26/not-so-heroic-prince-igor/) makes
a reference to the
Kalevala, but not to the debates about its sources
and authenticity. I cannot remember what was Kinbote's opinion about
ancient epics, but he does express a few misgivings,mainly directed at the
reception by their genteel readers...
Not-so heroic Prince Igor.
26 February
2013 Tags: breakfast reading, Nabokov.
"I spent much of last year reading a lot of medieval poems over
breakfast — with the exception of the last month or so when Russian writers have
snuck in a place at the table. The Song of Igor’s Campaign neatly
covers both. I’m a bit out of my depth on this one, so I don’t really know how
to comment on it. The poem is a relatively short one for the genre (861 lines in
Nabokov’s translation) and stylistically a cross between the Finnish epic
Kalevala and other heroic songs. The central figures in Song of
Roland and Song of the Cid, however, are errant in all the
different meanings of that word, but are more or less celebrated and
admired. Prince Igor, in contrast, seems very much an anti-hero. I’m interested
in finding other representations of him in Russian literature. Nabokov, however,
presents him as the leader of a disastrous and unnecessary campaign which ended
in the defeat of his army and the subsequent invasion of parts of Russia, and
ultimately sums him up: “History remembers Igor as an insignificant, shifty, and
pugnacious prince (74n2)."