English Casual Bookclub in Paris discussion
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The Master and Margarita
On different English translations of The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
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Tania
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Aug 05, 2016 05:09AM
some thoughts about some English translations
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What's interesting are the notes, at the end of the book.
For each chapter there are explanations about untranslatable Russian play of words, trivias about symbolic things that are happening, mistakes that Bulgakov did, etc.
+1 for this translation :)
From an email sent to book club members this summer:I spent about 6 hours examining different translations and comparing them with the original and concluded that Alpin's version is the best (https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margari...).
For those who want to find out more about different translations, here is an explanation.
The first English translation was made by Mirra Ginsburg (https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margari...) and based on the first, censored Soviet edition. This means that some sentences and almost one whole chapter are missing (about 12%). And these are the passages which were the most critical about the Soviet government - this is why they were censored - so their absence may change your perception of the book. On the other hand, the translation itself is a very good one, maybe the best because it conveys the tone of the Russian text very successfully so it maybe be a good idea to read it alongside another version.
All the other translations are from a complete, uncensored version.
Glenny's (https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margari...) reads very smoothly (just like the original) but is not very faithful to the text. For some reasons he omitted whole words or translated them in a quite strange way.
Pevear and Voloknonsky's translation is very accurate but somehow they managed to take all the joy... irony out of the book. I came out dry and the beneath-the-surface satire for which this book is so famous is not perceptible at all.
Finally, two translations that combine both accurateness and the right tone are Diana Burgin and Katherine Tiernan O'Connor's (https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margari...) and Alpin's (https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margari...). The first seems to be not available on Kindle (but exists as an epub) and anyway, there's something about the latter (Alpin's) that makes it my favourite. It's also the most recent one and contains helpful footnotes.
It may help you understand the book better if you bear in mind that it is set in the Soviet Union in the 30s and abounds in satirical allusions to Soviet realities (atheism, poets with I-had-a-crappy-childhood pseudonisms to name a few) and discrepancies between seemingly perfect appearances and the ugly truth. The footnotes can thus be gamechanging and show you the hidden layers (yes, in plural) of the book.
Thanks Tania...I started checking which translation I have read, but then I realized that you refer to english translations when I actually read it in French.I wouldn't put you again, into 6 hours work of checking French translations :)... but do you think there is a preference between French and English translations?
