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Lucy Day Werts
People have different purposes in reading, and different esthetic taste, but here’s what I recommend based on what I’ve learned about the available War and Peace translations.
My first choice would be the Maude/Mandelker translation. This edition from Oxford is now the most recent, and seems like a good balance between smooth, non-modernized English and text updated to correct errors. It contains notes and other reader aids, and is available as a hardcover, paperback, or ebook.
Fans of Pevear & Volokhonsky will choose theirs, as it claims to be the most authentic, albeit at the cost of smoothness.
If you don’t want old-fashioned language like Maude and you don’t want a raw literal translation like P&V, try Briggs or Dunnigan; if you want to read the book for free or as cheaply as possible, look for a download or paperback copy of the Garnett text or original Maude text.
For links and to find out more about the various translations of War and Peace, visit We Love Translations: World Literature in English, at:
https://welovetranslations.com/2021/0...
My first choice would be the Maude/Mandelker translation. This edition from Oxford is now the most recent, and seems like a good balance between smooth, non-modernized English and text updated to correct errors. It contains notes and other reader aids, and is available as a hardcover, paperback, or ebook.
Fans of Pevear & Volokhonsky will choose theirs, as it claims to be the most authentic, albeit at the cost of smoothness.
If you don’t want old-fashioned language like Maude and you don’t want a raw literal translation like P&V, try Briggs or Dunnigan; if you want to read the book for free or as cheaply as possible, look for a download or paperback copy of the Garnett text or original Maude text.
For links and to find out more about the various translations of War and Peace, visit We Love Translations: World Literature in English, at:
https://welovetranslations.com/2021/0...
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