Tolstoy and Mayakovsky are translated into language, despite the fact that Belarusians can easily read them in the original. Pushkin was translated into Belarusian by Yanka Kupala and Yakub Kolas, and our contemporaries continue to translate it. What is this: Russophobia or the norm of literary life?
If the level of language proficiency allows you to read Hemingway, Baudelaire and Goethe in the original, then the translator is definitely a third wheel. When you come to the Louvre, you won’t look at postcards with the Mona Lisa instead of enjoying the original by Leonardo? But the situation with the Russian language is different: although we all understand it and read it (for example, this article), there are a lot of translations of Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Gogol into the language.
Maybe translators shouldn’t waste time on something that is clear without them? Perhaps, in conditions when the Russian-speaking component of a Belarusian’s life greatly outweighs the Belarusian-speaking one, Russian classics also in Belarusian are, in principle, superfluous?
“Right now, maybe there is no need [to translate Russian literature into Belarusian]: almost everyone can read Russian classics in the original language. And this money can be used for translations from other languages, says Dmitry Gomon, candidate of philological sciences, associate professor. “But in the future, when Belarusian will be the only language of the state and education, then, of course, it will be necessary to translate: this is a classic, so it will still need to be read.”
About nonsense and mutual enrichment
About this theme: How to legally read Kafka in BelarusianThe arguments in favor of translating school textbooks or technical literature into Belarusian are quite clear. Nose works of art, where not only the content is important, but also the author’s style, everything is more complicated. And yet, only Pushkin was translated into Belarusian by Yanka Kupala, Yakub Kolas, Maxim Bogdanovich, Piatro Glebka, Ales Dudar, Rygor Sinitsa, Arkadz Kulyashov... Belarusian translations of Russian classics are appearing now, warming up the area in the sacrum area citizens who look away with love eastern border RB.
“I once attended an evening where the author read his translations into Belarusian of A. Pushkin’s poems. Everyone clapped for him and said eulogies. “I stood up and said that the translations are not bad and I can appreciate this, since, probably, unlike most of those present, I speak Russian and can read A. Pushkin in the original,” Andrei Gerashchenko, a journalist, once said information portal"Young Rus'". - This was perceived almost as an insult to the translator. But why - the translation was originally intended so that some work could be read by people who do not speak the original language. Why translate works of world literature into Belarusian if there are Russian translations, since all Belarusians speak Russian, and a much smaller number of our fellow citizens speak Belarusian?! Moreover, why translate Russian texts into Belarusian?”
What some (like Mr. Gerashchenko) explain as Russophobia, others consider a completely normal phenomenon. Doctor of Philology, Chairman of the St. Petersburg Association of Belarusians Nikolai Nikolaev is confident that it is possible and necessary to translate Russian writers into the Belarusian language. “Belarusian culture has its own values, although there are also gaps, including in translations of Russian literature. It is necessary that all Russian classics be presented in the Belarusian language, and Belarusian authors in Russian. This work must be systematic, then Russian and Belarusian literature will be mutually enriched.”
About this theme: A dozen Belarusian pearls with history Mutual enrichment is a good word, but here it sounds slightly hypocritical. This remark is perhaps the only call we found to translate Belarusian authors into Russian for Lately. And the progress of the Russian reader’s acquaintance with Belarusian literature is no more noticeable than the horseshoe on the foot of a flea from Leskov’s “Lefty”. Yes, yes, Russian classics.
"Gata in"ektsyya v lasnuyu kultury i mova"
Prykhіlnіkaў thoughts, that transfers from the Russian language to the Belarusian language, our knowledge is large, chum tykh, hto lichyts geta bezgluzdzitsa. Andrey Khadanovich is a poet, translator and compiler of foreign literature and BDU - a teacher who re-publishes the world, because such translations enrich the language, and for re-publishing it is a good school:
“The translation of Russian literature is as useful to us as the translation of other foreign literature. First of all, this is a sign of our self-esteem: we interpret Russian language and Russian culture as close, or as close as the other ones - this time. On the other hand, you see, and on the other hand, these are some treasures that can be used for gain. This is because for the translator himself there is a literary education, and for language and culture itself there is this certain capital of wealth. For such people, we polish the steel and create some new, progressive magic. Language and culture are the richest, which is most important for the majority of different types of transfers.
This is not a matter of Rasiya and this is not given in the first place and often in another step. This is a new way of expressing your culture and language. Nowadays, a large number of autara-transformations have grown up, which produce new languages that are extremely secretly hidden, and can be re-translated from the original. ense, I know, Russian translations are important for other efforts to work on me , and the most important, the most significant things would be translated from Russian. The hundreds that are beneficial for our culture, and not ideological smetztse. The translation will be varta, like any other varta!
“We will understand ourselves better if we read this translation”
Olga Zueva, Candidate of Philological Sciences and Chairman of the Council of Young Scientists of the Faculty of Philology of BSU, finds several answers to the question “why”:
About this theme: "Huevo" in the salad and "hule" on the table. Language surprises for tourists in Spain, the Czech Republic and Greece “In a global sense, the question seems to me to be speculative, since the answer is obvious: “Yes.” The Translator's Charter, adopted in 1963, begins with the following words: “Whereas translation in modern world established itself as a permanent, ubiquitous and necessary form of activity; that by making possible spiritual and material exchange between peoples, it enriches the lives of peoples and promotes better understanding between people…". Thus, translation from one closely related language to another, even in conditions of huge sociocultural inequality of these languages (one is world, the other regional, and under a drip) is necessary, as it “enriches the life of peoples and promotes better understanding between people.”
A Russian person who speaks Belarusian will perhaps understand a Belarusian better if he reads a translation of Russian classics into Belarusian. We will understand ourselves better if we read this translation. It's very idealistic and romantic, but in the end the world is largely run by idealists and romantics.
It had a global meaning. Now local. What is the target audience“consumers” of the translation being carried out? Offhand I'll throw out a few:
1. A Belarusian patriot is perhaps even an extreme nationalist who tries to read non-Belarusian texts in the Belarusian language. Especially Russian speakers! Translation is required.
2. Researcher of the poetics of artistic speech - specialist in literary theory. Translation is required.
About this theme: Mova ў roce. Kur"yozy uzhyvannya 3. Linguist-researcher (including the translator himself). Just give him/her more texts. By the way, translation can open up gaps in both languages, unexpected expressive abilities Belarusian language, the potential of resources, for example, dialect speech. That is, translation enriches the language. Translation is required.
4. The translator himself, of course. Literary translation is a creative act, with all these torments of creativity, insights, self-realization, etc. Translation is required.
In addition, translation helps to retain information. It is more reliable if the text is translated into many, many languages - it is like many, many copies of it. But these are already the interests of the language from which they are translating.
Translation is not needed for those who see it only as a linguistic exercise. From the series: translate Dostoevsky into the languages of the small peoples of Siberia, the last speakers of which are 80 years old. Everyone has different views on the viability and prospects of the Belarusian language and Belarusian society, hence the sprechki.
I turn skeptics to the enthusiasm of the Translator’s Charter.”
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Do Russians need to know Belarusian in order to survive in the country, and how do they feel about it - they asked, believe it or not, Russians.
IRINA
writer, journalist
“TRASYANKA HAS ITS OWN CHARM: IT IS RARELY LIVING SPEECH”
I have been living in Belarus for 7 years now and have noticed that it is usually the norm when a person speaks Russian and is answered in Belarusian, and vice versa. In my opinion, in a country with two official languages, this situation is quite harmonious and does not bother anyone. The languages are related, so a lot of things are intuitive to me, and if I don’t know the meaning of a particularly tricky word, then I don’t hesitate to ask or look in the dictionary.
The Belarusian language is very melodic, melodious, and I really like the construction of phrases. I can pronounce a few phrases in Belarusian, but Trasyanka drags me on. By the way, it has its own charm: it turns out to be an extremely lively speech. It’s easier for me to write in Belarusian than to speak, but I understand it by ear almost one hundred percent.
Like any language, Belarusian has its own non-equivalent vocabulary - charming, pithy words. They fascinate me; some have been written into my speech forever. However, I easily borrow words from any Slavic languages, since I studied Czech and Bulgarian at school.
I think that if a person who has received citizenship in Belarus knows at least one state language, that is enough. For most, speech skills are still not the main thing, people need them certain professions. It is not so important whether a baker or a carpenter knows any language: they do not chat - they work.
What worries me more is that Belarusians are abandoning their folk instruments: pipes, zhaleks and ocarinas. For example, in Minsk there is only one class in a single music school where these instruments can be mastered. The situation with folk dances is also deplorable, but I find Belarusian dance incredibly beautiful. Perhaps someone will argue with me, but culture is not limited to movo, potato pancakes and embroidered shirts.
TATIANA
student
“Can you do it in Russian?”
I moved to Belarus in 2011. A few months before, I had already been to Minsk and immediately fell in love with this city! IN new school mine class teacher became a teacher of the Belarusian language. It was thanks to her that I fell in love with language. I remember at the very first lesson we were asked to open the letters, but I sat there and couldn’t breathe. Marina Vladimirovna asks: “Tatstsyana, are you okay?” - and I smile, clap my eyes and whisper: “Can I do it in Russian?”
Over time, my vocabulary grew, I was even entrusted with leading an evening of the Belarusian language. I approached this event very responsibly. It was interesting to study the language. Sometimes I even asked my friends to speak Belarusian to me.
The combination of “dz” and fricative sounds were not new to me, since I am from the Bryansk region, and this is an area on the border with Belarus. The intonation of speech was unusual. She looks like a wave. Belarusians seem to sing sentences without paying attention to punctuation. Closer to the point, the intonation, instead of going down, suddenly tends to go up. But over time, this barrier was erased. Now, when I visit Russia, it’s unusual for me to hear the clarity of rising and falling tones in speech.
I am ashamed that my command of the Belarusian language is not good enough. But I will definitely fix it! Now I'm studying Faculty of Philology, and Belarusian begins with us next semester.
ILYA
sound engineer and sound engineer
“THE LANGUAGE IS SO BEAUTIFUL AND MELODIC. IT’S A PITY THAT IT’S GRADUALLY GOING OUT OF CARE”
I’ve been to Belarus many times, and I’m planning to move to you in the near future. I have never experienced any difficulties associated with the language barrier here. True, I did not immediately begin to understand the speaker in public transport, some signs and signs. But I quickly got used to it and got the hang of it. Now I more or less speak the Belarusian language: I understand it well, but there is no conversational practice. I can read it, but my accent is terrible. I would really like to learn Belarusian, this language is so beautiful and melodic. It's a pity that it is gradually going out of use.
I believe that every citizen of the country should speak their native language. It is not necessary to use it in everyday speech, this is everyone’s business, but it is important to know at least minimally. It seems to me that one of the problems is that in addition to the purely Belarusian language, you have Trasyanka and Tarashkevitsa. Sometimes the same word can have several spellings: stsyag - syag, Minsk - Mensk. As I understand it, the opposition uses Tarashkevitsa, which causes a lot of controversy.
I think language should be perceived first and foremost as a means of communication, so I have a positive attitude towards bilingualism in Belarus. After all, it is thanks to this that we understand each other. If someone is comfortable speaking Russian, please, kali pa-Belaruska - dachshund kali laska.
VICTORIA
student
“Bilingualism does not allow the development of language conflict”
I moved to Belarus in 2010 and experienced great difficulties in Belarusian lessons at school, as I had to learn the language from scratch. Now I speak a little language, I can understand what people say. Of course, you need to respect the traditions and customs of the country in which you live. But since I don’t encounter a language barrier here, I’m not going to go deeper into studying the Belarusian language. Although I like Belarusian for its melody and some simplicity in spelling. However, compared to Russian, it has fewer synonyms, so at school I did not always have enough words when writing essays.
I believe that the presence in Belarus of two state languages unites people and prevents the development of language conflict. But at the same time, it upsets me that very few Belarusians speak English. native language.
Photo: from the personal archive of heroes.
Officials in Minsk talk about the need to know the Belarusian language, but learning it in the country's schools is not so easy.
You can spend the whole day in Minsk and hear the Belarusian language only in transport when stops are announced. The correspondent was looking into whether young Belarusians have a chance to learn the Belarusian language and whether a school course is enough for this?
Schools - Russian and Belarusian
According to the standards of the Ministry of Education, Belarusian-language schools are those that have at least one class taught in the Belarusian language. As Yulia Vysotskaya, press secretary of the Ministry of Education, explained to DW, almost half of such schools in Belarus (1419) total number average educational institutions(3063) - schools, gymnasiums and lyceums.
Department officials will summarize the data as of the beginning of the current academic year in mid-September. And last year, by official statistics, 128,566 people studied in Belarusian-language schools, and about a million in Russian-language schools. This difference in the number of students is explained by the fact that there are more schools teaching in the Belarusian language in rural areas, and there are few students in them.
In everyday life, citizens of the country call Belarusian only those schools where all subjects are taught in Belarusian from the first to the final grade, and where all school staff communicate with children and parents in Belarusian. And only in such schools can one fully master literary language, believes linguist Vintsuk Vecherko, pointing out that the vast majority of children study in Russian schools.
In addition to statistics for the country as a whole, this is confirmed by the situation in the capital of two million: in Minsk there are 5 gymnasiums with the Belarusian language of instruction, and in another 5 schools there are separate Belarusian classes in which all subjects are taught in the Belarusian language. In total, there are 138 such classes in the city. Belarusian classes, Vysotskaya explained, are opened based on requests from parents: for this, at least 20 people are needed who want to study in the Belarusian language.
Language standards and proportions
The program and methods of teaching the Belarusian language today are virtually the same in all types of schools, but students of Russian schools are not given the skills of a living language, pronunciation, or thematic vocabulary, notes linguist Vecherko. As a result, as he put it, those who nevertheless take possession of the living spoken language, they do this thanks not to school, but to an alternative cultural space - primarily the Internet, rock music and enthusiasts who organize courses, festivals and everything that creates an environment for communication in the Belarusian language.
Today in Belarus there is a single state standard for textbooks and the number of teaching hours in the subjects studied. So, in the first grade of Russian schools there are six hours of Russian language and literature per week, and one of Belarusian. In Belarusian it’s the other way around. Then the number of hours evens out. But this does not matter, Vecherko believes, because in Russian schools all subjects, except the Belarusian language and literature, are taught in Russian, Belarusian is just one of the subjects that can actually be mastered at the level of a foreign language.
With the difference, adds Vladimir Kolas, director of the Belarusian Humanitarian Lyceum, that learning English or Chinese is promising, because it can be useful in life. But learning Belarusian is unprofitable, unpromising, and sometimes dangerous due to associations with opposition activities. In addition, in Belarusian schools, Vecherko continues, teachers of physics, mathematics or foreign languages they often refuse to teach in Belarusian because they were not taught it at university. You can count the number of physical education and labor training teachers who teach lessons in Belarusian on one hand.
The line to get into the Belarusian school has been long since night
The proportion of students in Russian and Belarusian, according to Vysotskaya, corresponds to the real language situation in the country: although in surveys the majority of its citizens indicate Belarusian as their native language, in everyday life they speak Russian. This situation, Kolas notes, is the result of the authorities’ support for the historically established situation: “It’s as if the language policy continues Russian Empire, in colonial dependence on which Belarus was for several centuries."
Meanwhile, competition for admission to the few Minsk gymnasiums teaching in the Belarusian language is growing year by year, parents state. To enroll their children in the 1st grade of the 23rd Minsk gymnasium, parents line up overnight, and last year not everyone was able to get in, Kristina Vitushko, chairman of the board of trustees and mother of a 13-year-old student at this gymnasium, tells DW.
She explains that first of all, the gymnasium is obliged to admit children according to universal education - a system preserved from Soviet times, when each school was assigned a certain district of the city. The gymnasium building is old, small, there are only two first grades, and those who simply happen to be higher on the list of applicants have priority when enrolling in the school.
Why don’t parents push for the opening of Belarusian classes?
Igor Palynsky, leader of the rock band Sumarok, chairman of the Polotsk city branch of the Francisk Skorina Belarusian Language Society, is also confident that there is a demand for education in the Belarusian language. “This is confirmed by resonant stories when parents sought to open Belarusian-language classes for almost one child. But the problem is that even among those who want their children to study in Belarusian, there are few initiative people,” complains Palynsky.
Kristina Vitushko looks at the situation differently: opening Belarusian classes is not a solution to the problem. She explains the advantage of Belarusian schools over Belarusian-speaking classes in Russian schools: “What is important is not the sign at the gymnasium, but the fact that the nurse, physical education teacher, and other teachers speak Belarusian, that the child will be answered in their native language in the cafeteria, so that there are no stress barriers in time extracurricular activities- in a word, to have a comfortable language environment. There is no such thing in Russian schools."
Anton Somin is a well-known person: he has been organizing the Language Festival in Minsk for many years, and on April 1 it will be held for the sixth time. He now lives in Moscow, where he teaches the Belarusian language.
“IT IS MORE DIFFICULT TO START SPEAKING BELARUSIAN THAN ENGLISH”
Right now it would be more accurate to say “taught.” This was the project “School of Neighborhood Languages”, within the framework of which free courses languages of the CIS. Now the project is temporarily suspended - funding has run out. The courses lasted six months. There was a competition for each language: in particular, for Belarusian - 2.5 people per place (for Armenian, for comparison, 16 people per place).
- Who came to Moscow to learn the Belarusian language?
Motivated people. Most have grandparents from Belarus. One girl is a folklorist who studies the Russian-Belarusian borderlands; she needs him for her work. And there was also a senior accountant, a woman of about 60, who came because she heard from a Belarusian friend what a deplorable situation we had with our language. It's a shame, the language is beautiful - she decided to make her contribution. It was amazing, I took it right away. But in general, there is a demand for language in addition to courses: students periodically come up to me and ask where in Moscow they can learn Belarusian.
- What did Belarusian seem like to them? Simple, complex, funny?
During the classes, I myself looked at the language from a different angle. I saw how people perceive words familiar to us from childhood, and it turned out that there are things that we simply do not notice. For example, on the Internet you may come across the “grab” (“save”) button, but it wouldn’t even occur to us that we could shift the emphasis and read it as “grab.” And the Russians are having a lot of fun! For them, unexpected words that are completely familiar to us also sound funny - “vadaskhovishcha”, “manly”, “zhanochy”.
There were difficult moments, as in any language. The consonant before E causes difficulties: for some reason everyone thinks that it is hard, as in Ukrainian: “Ploshcha NEzalEzhnatsi”, “peramoga”. It takes quite a long time to retrain. The second point is a hard H, they strive to say it softly. And there are no problems with the fricative G, although initially it seems to everyone that there will be.
They begin to understand Belarusian well after two months of studying, but they do not begin to speak for a long time - they are afraid of Trasyanka. It turned out to be a more difficult language barrier than with English or French. There you wait for the moment when you have enough vocabulary, but here you can almost immediately start making Belarusian sounds - and everyone will understand you. There is no need to overcome misunderstandings; there is a need to make Belarusian more pure, reducing the share of Russian.
“IF THEY ARE SUDDENLY SPEAKING BELARUSIAN IN BELARUS, IT WILL BE EXACTLY TRASYANKA”
- Is Trasyanka evil or not?
Last year I translated an article German linguist, who has been practicing grass for many years. He wrote that Trasyanka is a step towards general Belarusianization: if the political situation in Belarus suddenly changes so much that Belarusians start speaking Belarusian, then the output will not be such a pure language, but a mixed one, more like Trasyanka. Literary Belarusian will remain as a target language, but it will be the intermediate language. Therefore, it is wrong to spread rot on those who speak it. It may not sound prestigious to our ears, but this is our “admirable trot”, and we should treat it favorably.
Showed them famous poem“Vetraz” by Sergei Grakhovsky, in which there is not a single word understandable to Russians?
An ordinary literary text with artistic descriptions works even better when it appears among the understandable great amount mismatched words. In the case of “Vetrazem”, you might think: “Oh, he sat down on purpose and chose such words, this can be done in any language.”
And when you give an arbitrary text, which for the most part can be understood, but every third word is incomprehensible, it becomes clear that Belarusian is still not at all the same as Russian. By the way, once I needed to translate the word “pamyarkoўnasts”, I lost my mind! In the end, he explained it as a mixture of “humble, accommodating and pliable.” A very specific word.
“BELARUSIAN TEXTBOOK SAILED ON A SHIP FROM INDIA”
Anton speaks English, French, German, Italian and Polish well. Slightly worse - Arabic, Bulgarian, Maltese, I once learned Swedish:
If you know three or four Slavic languages, then you understand the rest more or less, at least in writing. I’m embarrassed to admit, but when I was at school, I didn’t like Belarusian. It was difficult to learn, he spoke much worse than Russian, and I didn’t like reading it. My interest arose after a trip to the International Russian Language Summer School, when I saw how foreign schoolchildren - French, Italians, Koreans, Macedonians - spoke Russian. For the first time this feeling appeared: we have our own language, separate! Plus, the move had an impact - here you acutely feel that you are different, that your language is different. I began to read Belarusian, develop - and brought the language to the level that I was able to teach and even write a self-instruction manual.
- Self-instruction manual?
It was ordered by the Living Language publishing house, which publishes a whole series. I almost refused, but then I thought that they could offer it to someone who is really bad at it, and I agreed - they’ll write some nonsense! I'm better off. I always wanted to correct errors in existing textbooks and manuals, but at the same time it seemed that this should be done by authors for whom the language is native, who have spoken it all their lives.
The work took a little over six months (including breaks for five years). The book has 224 pages. There are several pictures that I drew myself (they turned out so bad that they decided to leave them). Everything in Belarusian is written in red, and everything in Russian is written in black.
I immediately decided that he would describe not how it should be, but how it really is. For example, the dictionary says that a driver is “vadzitsel”, but almost everyone says “kiroўtsa”. This is the only tutorial that tells you that in addition to the official form of the language, there is an unofficial one, and that the same words in them can be translated differently (for example, “shpatsyr” and “pragulka”).
Interesting fact: the book has traveled more coolly than I have! The publisher prints them in India - it’s cheaper. Then they are loaded onto a ship (along with the Belarusian language, self-teachers of the Kazakh, Ukrainian, and Kyrgyz languages sailed) and sent to Hamburg. Then they are reloaded and sent around Scandinavia to Murmansk. And from there by train to Moscow.
- How did you even get to Moscow?
Through the university. In the 11th grade, I struggled for a long time: I wanted to work with languages (and preferably also with programming). Dad discovered a suitable specialty in Russian universities - “Theoretical and applied linguistics" I graduated from the Russian State University for the Humanities, now I live in Moscow and teach at two universities - the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian State University for the Humanities and the School of Philology High school economy. I am also a researcher there.
Books of different genres. At school we read books about the difficult lot of the people, about the war, about the villagers. And in the seventh grade, my dad slipped me a book by Ales Yakimovich “Eldarada Ask for Help.” I thought: amazing, science fiction in Belarusian? How amazing!
Then I began to read books describing modern reality. I came across Alena Brava’s book “Kamendantsky Hour for Lastavaks”: about a woman who married a Cuban and went to Cuba. Thanks to her, the attitude “Belarusian literature is about the Belarusian village, and about everything else is in Russian” was broken.
Modern literature, in which your contemporaries speak Belarusian, is a greater step towards language than admiration for the unattainable level of language of classical writers. And when it is completed, then you can enjoy the beauty of the language: for example, I really love Bykov. Recently I have been reading Belarusian translations - “Oliver Twist”, two volumes of “Sherlock Holmes”, “The Call of Cthulhu”.
Anton's next step is to release an audio supplement to the tutorial.
It is difficult to learn Belarusian phonetics without examples, so last summer my friends and I voiced all the dialogues from the tutorial. Now we need to find time to put them together and post them.
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