Translations of The Lord of the Rings into Russian
Many translations of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings have been made, starting with illegal samizdat printings. Versions were circulated from 1965; an abridged version of volume 1 appeared in 1982; and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, many versions were printed, each with its own merits and demerits.
History[edit]
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The first effort at publication was made in 1965, but to comply with literary censorship in Soviet Russia, the work was considerably abridged and transformed. The ideological danger of the book was seen in the "hidden allegory 'of the conflict between the individualist West and the totalitarian, Communist East'", while Marxist readings in the west conversely identified Tolkien's anti-industrial ideas as presented in the Shire with primitive communism, in a struggle with the evil forces of technocratic capitalism.[1]
Russian translations of The Lord of the Rings circulated as samizdat and were published only after the collapse of the Soviet Union; they then came out in great numbers to satisfy the demand from Tolkien fandom in Russia.[1] Many unofficial and partly fragmentary translations are in circulation. The first translation appearing in print was volume 1 by A. A. Kistyakovsky and V. S. Muravyov in 1982.[2]
List of translations[edit]
| Translation | Publication | Translator | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1966 | 1990 | Z. A. Bobyr | Short retelling condensed to 1/3 of the novel's length,[2] published as "Повесть о Кольце" (1990), "Властители Колец" (1991) Mark Hooker writes that the version is "almost universally dismissed as a hack job by the present generation of Russian Tolkienists ... [but] a daring effort" in its time.[2] |
| 1976 | 2002 | A. A. Gruzberg, A. V. Zastyrets (poems) | Complete samizdat translation,[2] as "Повелитель Колец"; published in 2002 in Yekaterinburg. |
| 1970s | unpublished | S. L. Koshelev | fragments |
| 1982, 1991–1992 | A. A. Kistyakovsky (prologue and first book), V. S. Muravyov (second book, poems) | In 1982, only the first volume was published in abridged form due to Soviet censorship. For about a decade, this was the only version of The Lord of the Rings publicly available in Russia. The full translation appeared in 1991-1992. It was used in the 1991 Khraniteli television play of The Fellowship of the Ring.[3] No appendices. | |
| 1984 | 1991 | N. Grigoryeva, V. Grushetsky, I. B. Grinshpun (poems) | |
| 1980s | unpublished | N. Estel | |
| 1980s | 1991 | V. A. Matorina; В.А.М. | the translation dates to the mid to late 1980s, first published in 1991 with Amur, Khabarovsk, 2nd ed. Eksmo, Moscow. Matorina worked from bootlegged microfiche copies of the Library of Foreign Literature, Moscow, and the translation was in limited circulation in manuscript form. |
| 1985 | 2002 | A. V. Nemirova | the translation dates to the period 1985-1987, 1991–1992 and appeared with Folio, Kharkiv in 2002. |
| 1989 | unpublished | A. I. Alyohin | Audio record of a Russian translation of volumes 2 and 3, based on the Polish translation of Maria Skibniewska. |
| 1994 | Mariya Kamenkovich, V. Karrik, S. Stepanov (poems) | based on the translation by Matorina ("В.А.М."), Kamenkovich and Karrik provide a detailed commentary on the themes of Christianity and Germanic mythology as they appear in the work. | |
| 1990s | unpublished | K. Kinn | fragments |
| 1990s | unpublished | I. Zabelina | |
| 1999 | L. Yahnin | abridged retelling for children. | |
| 2000 | V. E. Volkovsky, V. Vosedoy | ||
| 2002 | M. Belous | retelling |
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^ a b Markova, Olga (2004). "When Philology Becomes Ideology: The Russian Perspective of J.R.R. Tolkien". Tolkien Studies. 1. Translated by Hooker, Mark T.: 163–170.
- ^ a b c d Hooker 2011a.
- ^ Cole, Brendan (1 April 2021). "Russian 'Lord of the Rings' TV Adaptation from 30 Years Ago Discovered, Put on YouTube". Newsweek. Retrieved 5 April 2021.
Sources[edit]
- Hooker, Mark T. (2011a). "Nine Russian Translations of The Lord of the Rings". In Honegger, Thomas (ed.). Tolkien in Translation. Cormarë. Vol. 4. Zurich: Walking Tree Publishers. pp. 119–152. ISBN 978-3-9521424-6-2.
- Hooker, Mark T. (2003). Tolkien Through Russian Eyes. Zurich: Walking Tree Publishers. ISBN 978-3-9521424-7-9. OCLC 54771230.
Further reading[edit]
- Zuyev, Viktor (18 August 2017). "В поисках идеального перевода "Властелина колец"" [In search of the perfect translation of The Lord of the Rings]. Disgusting Men (in Russian). Archived from the original on 18 May 2022. Retrieved 20 November 2022.
