Russian Rossetti - Translating the Untranslatable

The following article was recently published in an Australian journal "Translation". It is primarily intended for the English speaking reader and some of its points may seem obvious to the Russian reader and superfluous to the Russian translator. However, I decided to post it here believing that it may be of some interest to someone.


      Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882) occupies a unique place in English literature. A poet, a painter and a translator, he created significant work in all of the above areas. An eccentric Londoner, he was three quarters Italian, a private man who left England only on very few occasions, never visited Italy, rarely exhibited his paintings, preferring to deal directly with rich buyers, and published his first volume of original poetry in 1870, at the age of 42. 
      Now, after a long period of re-evaluation and semi-oblivion, Rossetti enjoys a relatively stable position in English culture. His name does not shine in the first rank of English poets, but everyone who loves English poetry knows him and his main work.
      This is not the case in Russia. To many Russian readers the name Rossetti means little or nothing. This situation is paradoxical because English literature is enormously popular in that country. Thanks to the efforts of generations of brilliant translators, the works of other nineteenth-century poets such as Byron, Keats, Shelley, Coleridge and many others became widely known, loved and respected by common readers in the course of the twentieth century. Unfortunately, Rossetti’s work did not join that of his compatriots and only now are Russian translators beginning to notice his poetry.
      It is possible to indicate reasons for this “negligence”. Rossetti was indifferent to politics and almost totally oblivious to the social issues of his time. Moreover, he made a conscious effort to dissociate his poetry, both in language and imagery, as far as possible from everyday reality. Heavy use of archaic vocabulary, complex metaphors, a manner of expression that often cannot be understood with ease, an extremely well developed system of personifications, certain deliberate vagueness of imagery – these features make his original work difficult to read and even more difficult to translate.
      Russian translators of the Soviet era paid little attention to Rossetti, who was commonly regarded as a decadent, unable to contribute anything to progressive culture. A professional translator would only waste his time and effort producing work with a miniscule chance of ever being published, and an amateur translator lacked the necessary skill and knowledge to understand Rossetti’s language, let alone recreate his poetry in Russian, an alien language.
    In this article I shall give only a general outline of certain problems of translating Rossetti’s sonnets.
      For any Russian translator of Rossetti’s poetry the tremendous difficulties of dealing with it become immediately apparent. The Rossettian sonnet has so little in common with the Russian sonnet – the result of a very different tradition – that one may begin to wonder whether building a bridge between them is possible at all.
      Before we deal with the Rossettian sonnet, let us consider – very generally – the main differences between the English and Russian sonnet.

English sonnet:
1)  Flexible rhythm, rhythmical pattern not clearly emphasised
2)  Metre not strictly adhered to
3)  1 or 2 extra syllables in a line are easily tolerated
4)  One common vowel (even one common sound) is enough to form a rhyme (be – he, me – eternity)
5)  Eye-rhymes are widely used (wind – behind, mood – blood, love – prove)
6)  Masculine and feminine rhymes do not follow a strict pattern in the sonnet
7)  Vowels are divided into long and short, which leads to great flexibility in the sonnet line
8)  Same parts of speech when rhymed do not create an unfavourable impression
9)  Due to natural shortness of English words, the capacity of a single line is large
10) Accent in a word can be easily shifted if the considerations of rhythm or rhyme demand it

Russian sonnet
1)  Strict rhythm, with clear pattern calling for scansion
2)  Strict metre, no deviations are possible
3)  No extra syllables are ever tolerated
4)  Every vowel produces its own unique sound and must be supported by at least one common consonant to form a valid rhyme (davno - okno, togda - pruda)
5)  The concept of eye-rhyme is unknown
6)  Masculine and feminine rhymes must follow a strict pattern in a sonnet
7)  All vowels have the same value
8)  Same parts of speech in general form unimpressive rhymes, which is particularly noticeable in a concise sonnet form. Certain rhymes should be avoided altogether, i.e. between infinitives or personal pronouns
9)  Russian words are naturally long. Due to this, the capacity of a single line is rather small
10) Accent in a word can be shifted only in exceptional cases and doing so is not encouraged

Given the above inherent differences between the varieties of the sonnet form itself, it soon becomes clear to a translator of any English sonnet that:

1. It is impossible to translate everything the poet says.
2. Sacrifices must be made.
3. There will be inevitable gaps which will have to be filled with material not found in the text.
 
With Rossetti, further definite conclusions become apparent.

      Archaic vocabulary

      Rossetti uses heavily archaic language – auxiliary verbs, personal pronouns, verb endings, reductions. These features constitute an important aspect of his poetics. Doubly so, since for him such devices were not a mere poetical convention characteristic of his time, but the means of creating his own language form, as far removed from everyday speech as possible. Unfortunately, reproduction of such language within the system of modern Russian is not feasible. It may be argued that necessary obsolete forms could be borrowed from the Old Russian and the Slavic languages. But such a method would never prove to be effective. Firstly, the translator would have to go too far into the past and thus ruin the immediacy of communication with the modern reader. Secondly, such an approach would result in the Rossettian sonnet sounding too “biblical” as Old Russian and Slavic are primarily the languages of the Bible and the church writers. Thirdly, such an approach would not be historically correct, as poetical Russian of the nineteenth century was much closer to the spoken language than poetical English of the same period. Therefore, the only realistic conclusion is: Rossettian archaisms have to disappear from the Russian translation. The only consolation for the translator is the fact that Rossetti himself is inconsistent and alternates between archaic and contemporary vocabulary within “The House of Life”. Here are two passages from Sonnets 3 and 13, the former containing archaic forms and the latter written entirely in modern English:

O thou who at Love’s hour ecstatically
    Unto my heart dost evermore present,
    Clothed with his fire, thy heart his testament;
Whom I have neared and felt thy breath to be
The inmost incense of his sanctuary;
    Who without speech hast owned him, and, intent
    Upon his will, thy life with mine hast blent,
And murmured, “I am thine, thou’rt one with me!”

“I love you, sweet: how can you ever learn
    How much I love you?” “You I love even so,
    And so I learn it.” “Sweet, you cannot know
How fair you are”, etc.
 

      Indentation

      Indentation is a common feature of the English sonnet. It is used to emphasise its rhythmic structure. However, it is uncommon for the Russian sonnet. In the past, several translators of English sonnets tried to employ indentation, or rather to mechanically copy it from the original, but such a practice did not prove effective and indentation had never been widely accepted. Study of Rossetti’s manuscripts shows that he did in fact indent his sonnets even in manuscripts. On the other hand, some of the sonnets which are inscribed on his paintings and drawings are not indented. In my view, this fact can serve as a justification for the total removal of indentation from Russian translations. The structure of the Russian sonnet is clear enough without the need for an additional emphasis, and indentation would only distract the modern reader from receiving Rossetti’s poetical message. This decision comes at a certain price – Russian translations lose the flexible shape of the originals.

      Conjunction of identical or similar consonants

      One of the main goals for a sonnet translator is the creation of a certain sense of the “roundness” or “compactness” of the form itself. Given the natural length of Russian words, it is important to make them fit together perfectly, with the continuous, uninterrupted flow of music. Anything that breaks or hinders this natural flow should be avoided. Conjunction of identical or similar consonants, common for the Rossettian sonnet (as it is for any English sonnet) should not be reproduced in Russian, as two identical or similar Russian consonants would create an impediment within the line.

      Interjections and exclamations

      Another typical feature of the Rossettian sonnet is a wide use of interjections and exclamations – o!, ah!, oh!, lo!, nay!, alas!, etc. Such rhetorical devices were typical of English poetry of Rossetti’s time and earlier and seemed natural for the contemporary English reader. However, if translated into modern Russian, they would produce a far greater impact than they were initially intended to. A Russian “ah!” is much more powerful than an English one and is mostly used to create a comic, grotesque effect. The same is true for all other interjections. Exclamation marks should also be eradicated from the translation, with only the essential ones preserved. The reason is the same – the abundance of exclamations would create an unnecessarily artificial, theatrical effect alien to the very nature of the Rossettian sonnet. In this case, faithfulness to the letter of the original would lead to the corruption of its spirit.

      Avoidance of literal translation of certain expressions

      It is important to understand that any translation is a bridge not only between languages, but also between periods and cultures. Certain expressions acquire additional meaning as language or culture develop. Often such a meaning corrupts the author’s initial message or acquires an undesirable connotation. Rossetti’s language is quite vulnerable in this respect, which often makes literal translation not the best option. Here are a few examples from “The House of Life”. “Whose passionate hearts lean by Love’s high decree // Together on his heart for ever true…” - the expression “passionate hearts”, if translated literally, would sound banal in modern Russian, almost vulgar. “Hands which for ever at Love’s bidding be…” - this sentence would acquire in any modern language an undesirable sexual undertone, which obviously was not Rossetti’s intention. The same is true for the following passage: “Lo! they are one. With wifely breast to breast // And circling arms, she welcomes all command // Of love…” In the following sentence – “So shut your eyes, and feel my kiss // Creep…”, the verb “creep”, if translated literally, would create an unpleasant emotion, an association with an insect, in the mind of a Russian reader, which of course must be avoided. In many instances, literal does not automatically mean faithful. The translator should find equivalents which both correspond to the author’s message and are free from unwanted meanings.

      Love: masculine or feminine ?

      One of the main achievements of Rossetti as a poet is the elaboration of a highly developed system of personifications. For Rossetti, personification is not merely a stylistic device, but an integral feature of his poetics. Rossetti personifies his own emotions and feelings, which helps him to free his mind from their intensity. Following his spiritual guide Dante Alighieri, he personifies the idea of love. The reasons for this are the subject of a separate article. Here it is important to state that personified Love is extremely prominent in the sonnets of Rossetti, being one of the main heroes of “The House of Life”. Unfortunately, this circumstance also constitutes one of the major problems for the translator, the word “love” being masculine in English, but feminine in Russian. There are three words in Russian which may be considered as substitutes for the word “Love”, all of them masculine – Эрот (Eros), Амур (Amour) and Купидон (Cupid). In fact, at the first glance the similarities between Eros (Amour, Cupid) and Love seem encouraging. They are both divine beings, personifications and winged humanoid entities. They both possess human emotions. They both own the same objects – eye-band, bow with arrows, flowers, etc. Their sex is not clearly defined. However, a deeper comparison reveals irreconcilable differences, which make the idea of one’s serving as a substitute for another impossible. These differences can be summarised as follows:

Eros (Amour, Cupid)
1)  Personification of a feeling
2)  Refers to a concrete instance of love
3)  Multiple, i.e. with the beginning of every new feeling, a new Eros springs into existence. There may be as many Erotes as there are feelings consecutively experienced by each individual
4)  Immortal, i.e. even when the feeling dies, Eros born of it does not and continues to exist forever
5)  Does not rule the universe, as far as the hierarchy of the Classical gods is concerned
6)  Does not substitute for the Supreme God
7)  Does not merge with lovers, remains independent
8)  Has mother – Aphrodite (Venus)
9)  Accompanies his mother and serves her
10) Often appears naked
11) Character is unified and follows a certain pattern

Love as Rossetti’s personification
1)  Personification of both a feeling and an idea
2)  Refers to all instances of love
3) Singular, i.e. no matter how many situations involving the feeling of love are experienced, only one personification is responsible for all of them
4)  Mortal, i.e. dies in “The House of Life” as would a human being
5)  Rules the universe
6)  Substitutes for the Supreme God
7)  Physically merges with the lovers
8)  Has no mother
9)  Accompanies and serves no one
10) Never appears naked
11) Character full of contradictions, there is no clear pattern

      The above comparison demonstrates that it is not possible to employ the existing masculine substitutes for the personification of Love in Russian. Besides, Love in Rossetti’s sonnets does not exist on its own, but within the complex system of other personifications. Its substitution with a mythological character would require, for the sake of consistency, an equal substitution of all other personifications with appropriate mythological characters, which would be both painstaking and unnecessary, and would lead to a total confusion of systems. The only solution in this case is to preserve the word “Love” in Russian translation with its feminine gender. Such a solution would not be too radical as Rossetti as a painter is himself inconsistent in the ways he depicts Love. The image of Love in his paintings and drawings ranges from the clearly masculine to the clearly feminine, which demonstrates that he did not have a concretely elaborated image in relation to Love’s gender.

      Sacrifice, context and its employment

      As has been stated before, Russian words, in striking contrast to English ones, are naturally long, which makes it impossible even to dream of translating every word of the English original. Here are a few coupled lines, the first being original lines of Rossetti’s sonnets, the second – their literal translations into Russian:

I love you sweet: how can you ever learn
Я люблю тебя, милая: как ты можешь когда-нибудь узнать

Those envied places which do know her well
Те вызывающие зависть места, которые её хорошо знают

Even as the moon grows queenlier in mid-space
Так же, как луна растёт всё более по-королевски посреди ночного пространства

      At least 2-3 English words will be lost in translation due to the incompatibility of word spans. Fortunately for the translator, Rossetti often seemed to have difficulty filling all the space within the sonnet line. Possibly, because of his Italian background and preoccupation with Early Italian poetry in his early years, he became accustomed to dealing with longer Italian words, and English ones proved to be much too short for him. The number of unnecessary words in his poetry is considerable. He regularly uses superfluous word combinations such as “then when, there where, even so, so in likewise, this my”, etc. Such superfluities are a true gift to the translator, as they can be ignored without any loss of meaning, and badly needed extra space for the accommodation of long Russian words can be easily gained.
      In the case of Rossetti, translation is the art of sacrifice. It is essential, from the beginning, to decide what can be sacrificed and what can be drawn into the context. The following model demonstrates what goes on in the mind of the Russian translator searching for redundant words and selecting them for deletion:

Your hands lie (open) in (the long) fresh grass, -
  (The) finger-(points) look (through) like rosy blooms:
  (Your) eyes smile (peace). (The) pasture gleams (and) glooms
(‘Neath billowing) skies that scatter (and) amass.
(All) round our nest,( far) as (the) eye (can) pass,
  (Are) golden kingcup-(fields) with silver edge
  Where (the) cow-parsley skirts (the) hawthorn-hedge.
(‘Tis) visible silence, (still) as (the) hour-glass.

Out of 62 words in the above passage, 23 words can be sacrificed – more than a third. However, there are two kinds of sacrifice, the first being total deletion, which should be avoided as much as possible, the second being employment of the context, which – fortunately – is limitless.
      Below are the first lines of the same passage, first given in the original, then in Russian translation, and lastly in literal translation back into English:

Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass
  The finger-points look through like rosy blooms

Ладонь твоя росой окроплена,
Раскрылся пальцев розовый бутон

Your palm is sprinkled with dew,
The rosy bud of (your) fingers has opened

      At first translation of the first line seems to be not faithful to the original. But a more attentive reading reveals that the original meaning is preserved completely within the context. The “palm” indicates the presence of the woman’s “hands”, with a shorter singular form substituting for the longer and inessential plural. The fact that the palm is “sprinkled” with dew indicates the presence of grass, “fresh” grass capable of producing dew and “long” grass, sufficient to produce enough dew to cover her hands. A similar method of employing context must be continually used by the translator if a fuller preservation of the original is the goal.

      Filling the gaps

      Gaps which are the natural result of translation should be filled:

      Option 1. Using the contextual reserves of the original, i.e. verbalising what the author implies or hints at.
      Option 2. Using material from the author’s other work; in Rossetti’s case, his other poems, paintings or drawings. If a certain image or expression must be added to fill the gap, it is best to use the author’s own filling material.
      Option 3. Using material from the author’s cultural world; in Rossetti’s case, from his translations of Dante and Italian poetry and other authors who influenced him greatly, such as Blake or Keats. For this reason, the translator must possess the required depth and breadth of knowledge.
      Option 4. Using the translator’s own imagination, provided that a sense of Rossetti’s style and language has been properly developed.

      Of the above options, the first one is the best and should always be striven for; the second is acceptable when the first is impossible; the third should be used only when the first two are impossible, and the fourth should be used only as the last resort.

      The task of translating an author totally alien to the Russian language like Rossetti is an arduous and fascinating one and cannot be fully described in a short article, which I would like to conclude with Sonnet 19 (Silent Noon) from “The House of Life”: the original, my Russian translation and its word by word translation back into English.

Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass, -
  The finger-points look through like rosy blooms:
  Your eyes smile peace. The pasture gleams and glooms
‘Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass.
All round our nest, far as the eye can pass,
  Are golden kingcup-fields with silver edge
  Where the cow-parsley skirts the hawthorn-hedge.
‘Tis visible silence, still as the hour-glass.

Deep in the sun-searched growths the dragon-fly
Hangs like a blue thread loosened from the sky: -
  So this wing’d hour is dropt to us from above.
Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless dower,
This close-companioned inarticulate hour
  When twofold silence was the song of love.


Ладонь твоя росой окроплена,
Раскрылся пальцев розовый бутон.
В глазах покой. Луг светом испещрён.
То пенится, то спит небес волна.
Отсюда нам поляна вся видна,
Калужниц жёлтых светел отворот,               
Купырь к стене боярышника льнёт.
И, как в часах песочных, тишь плотна.

Играет стрекоза на листьях трав,
Лазурной нитью с облака упав,
Откуда к нам слетел крылатый час.
Мы этого певца к сердцам прижмём,
Негромкого, любовным языком
Друг в друге обессмертившего нас.


Your palm is sprinkled with dew,
The rosy bud of (your) fingers has opened.
There is peace in (your) eyes. The pasture is dappled with light.
The wave of heaven now foams, now rests.
From here we can see the whole plane,
The underside of yellow kingcups’ leaves is bright,
The cow-parsley clings to the hawthorn-hedge.
And, as inside the hour-glass, the silence is palpable.

The dragon-fly is playing on the blades of grass,
Having fallen like an azure thread from the cloud,
From where the winged hour has flown down to us.
We shall clasp this singer to our hearts,
Who is not loud, who, by the language of love,
Has made us deathless in each other.