My Unlikely Hobby

 


                                                                                        My Unlikely Hobby

I often spend a warm summer afternoon sitting in a lawn chair in the shade of that tall pine tree in my front lawn while translating a novel or short story from Russian. I have no interest in visiting Russia or communicating with Russians in any way. This hobby developed in a circuitous way. When NASA had offered a free on-site course in Russian, I enrolled in it because I thought it would help me to translate some Russian publications on ionized gases. I had studied German in college, and had maintained and improved on my translating skills by reading German stories and watching a few German language movies. This ability proved to be of some benefit in translating technical articles, but of even greater benefit in communicating with some of the German aerodynamicists who immigrated after WWII.

High school Spanish had been a relatively easy course, college German had been harder in terms of vocabulary and even more so in terms of grammar, but I couldn't even get started on either of those things in Russian until I learned the Cyrillic alphabet. I managed to acquire a minimal familiarity with it, and then started in on the vocabulary and grammar. I soon realized that the task was impossible from a practical pointy of view. German was child's play compared to Russian. The vocabulary had very little in common with English, and the grammar was virtually incomprehensible.

So I gave it up and forgot about it for the rest of my career. And then, a few years ago it again came to my attention. (I was tempted to say, “It again reared its ugly head”). I came across a performance of a Russian folk song on Youtube that swept me off my feet. It was a performance by the St. Petersburg Cathedral Choir, and it hit me just the right way. I searched through Youtube for more Russian folk songs, and then I ordered a book of them, and then I ordered another compilation, and then I began to translate them, using the online Russian keyboard and Google Translate, and then I dug out my old Russian textbook and started working through it. Then I revived my old hobby of sitting on the front lawn with a cold soft drink on my lawn chair tray, and translating. After three years, I graduated from Beginner level stories to Intermediate level, and it took another three years to become comfortable with that level. Even now, I rarely undertake a Russian classic by Dostoevsky or Tolstoy.

In addition to the difficulties of vocabulary and grammar, there is another problem with translating Russian literature. It is turgid, dull, depressing. The Russians seemingly don't know how to write a story with a happy ending; or even one that maintains the reader's interest by action or suspense. However the student is saved from that problem by reading short stories written specifically for students, or by reading literature originally written in English or French and then translated into Russian. Also, I have a huge asset now that I didn't have when I studied German. It is the Dual Language book; also known as the Parallel Text book. The Russian text is printed on one page and the corresponding English text on the opposite page. When I start reading a new book I usually need to refer to the English side several times in translating a single line, but I eventually pick up enough words that I can often read entire lines without having to cheat.

One day when I was looking up something on the internet, one of those annoying pop-up ads caught my eye. It advertised T-shirts with various catchy imprints, one of which was “Я русский шпион” (I am a Russian spy). So I ordered it in full confidence that no one that I ever encountered would know what it meant; but they would be impressed with the Cyrillic lettering. I decided to wear it the next time we went to eat at our favorite family restaurant. We had hardly walked through the door of the restaurant when a young waitress came dashing up to me, laughing. She said, ”Do you know what that means?!”.

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