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    A Desperate Character: Bilingual Edition (English – Russian)
    A Desperate Character: Bilingual Edition (English – Russian)
    A Desperate Character: Bilingual Edition (English – Russian)
    Ebook105 pages55 minutes

    A Desperate Character: Bilingual Edition (English – Russian)

    By Ivan Turgenev

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    About this ebook

    Instead of memorizing vocabulary words, work your way through an actual well-written novel. Even novices can follow along as each individual English paragraph is paired with the corresponding Russian paragraph. It won't be an easy project, but you'll learn a lot.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPublishdrive
    Release dateJun 21, 2018
    A Desperate Character: Bilingual Edition (English – Russian)
    Author

    Ivan Turgenev

    Ivan Turgenev was a Russian writer whose work is exemplary of Russian Realism. A student of Hegel, Turgenev’s political views and writing were heavily influenced by the Age of Enlightenment. Among his most recognized works are the classic Fathers and Sons, A Sportsman’s Sketches, and A Month in the Country. Turgenev is today recognized for his artistic purity, which influenced writers such as Henry James and Joseph Conrad. Turgenev died in 1883, and is credited with returning Leo Tolstoy to writing as the result of his death-bed plea.

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      Book preview

      A Desperate Character - Ivan Turgenev

      Garnett

      I

      I

      ...We were a party of eight in the room, and we were talking of contemporary affairs and men.

      ...Нас было человек восемь в комнате — и мы разговаривали о современных делах и людях.

      I don’t understand these men! observed A.: they’re such desperate fellows.... Really desperate.... There has never been anything like it before.

      Yes, there has, put in P., a man getting on in years, with grey hair, born some time in the twenties of this century: "there were desperate characters in former days too, only they were not like the desperate fellows of to-day. Of the poet Yazikov some one has said that he had enthusiasm, but not applied to anything — an enthusiasm without an object. So it was with those people — their desperateness was without an object.

       — Не понимаю я этих господ!  — заметил А.,  — они отчаянные какие-то! Право, отчаянные... Ничего подобного ещё никогда не бывало.

       — Нет, бывало,  — вмешался И., уже старый, седоволосый человек, родившийся около двадцатых годов нынешнего столетия,  — отчаянные люди водились и прежде; только не походили они на нынешних отчаянных. Про поэта Языкова кто-то сказал, что у него был восторг, ни на что не обращённый, беспредметный восторг; так и у тех людей — отчаянность была беспредметная.

      But there, if you’ll allow me, I’ll tell you the story of my nephew, or rather cousin, Misha Poltyev. It may serve as an example of the desperate characters of those days.

      He came into God’s world, I remember, in 1828, at his father’s native place and property, in one of the sleepiest corners of a sleepy province of the steppes.

      Да вот, если позволите, я вам расскажу историю моего двоюродного племянника, Миши Полтева. Она может служить образчиком тогдашней отчаянности.

      Явился он на свет божий, помнится, в 1828 году, в родовом поместье своего отца, в одном из самых глухих уголков глухой, степной губернии.

      Misha’s father, Andrei Nikolaevitch Poltyev, I remember well to this day. He was a genuine old-world landowner, a God-fearing, sedate man, fairly — for those days — well educated, just a little cracked, to tell the truth — and, moreover, he suffered from epilepsy.... That too is an old-world, gentlemanly complaint.... Andrei Nikolaevitch’s fits were, however, slight, and generally ended in sleep and depression.

      Мишина отца, Андрея Николаевича Полтева, я ещё хорошо помню. Это был настоящий старозаветный помещик, богобоязненный, степенный человек, достаточно — по тому времени — образованный, немного, правду сказать, придурковатый, да и к тому же страдавший падучей болезнью... Это тоже старозаветная, дворянская болезнь... Впрочем, припадки у Андрея Николаевича бывали тихие, и разрешались они обыкновенно сном да унылостью.

      He was good-hearted, and of an affable demeanour, not without a certain stateliness: I always pictured to myself the tsar Mihail Fedorovitch as like him. The whole life of Andrei Nikolaevitch was passed in the punctual fulfilment of every observance established from old days, in strict conformity with all the usages of the old orthodox holy Russian mode of life.

      Сердца он был доброго, обращения приветливого, не без некоторой величавости: я себе всегда таким воображал царя Михаила Фёдоровича. Вся жизнь Андрея Николаевича протекла в неукоснительном исполнении всех с давних времён установившихся обрядов, в строгом соответствии со всеми обычаями древне-православного, святорусского быта.

      He got up and went to bed, ate his meals, and went to his bath, rejoiced or was wroth (both very rarely, it is true),

      Он вставал и ложился, кушал и в баню ходил, веселился и гневался (то и другое, правда, редко),

      even smoked his pipe and played cards (two great innovations!),

      даже трубку курил, даже в карты играл (два больших новшества!)

      not after his own fancy, not in a way of his own, but according to the custom and ordinance of his fathers — with due decorum and formality. He was tall, well built, and stout; his voice was soft and rather husky, as is so often the case with virtuous people in Russia; he was scrupulously neat in his dress and linen, and wore white cravats and full-skirted snuff-coloured coats, but his noble blood was nevertheless evident;

      не так, как бы ему вздумалось, не на свой манер, а по завету и преданию отцов — истово и чинно. Сам он был высокого росту, осанист и мясист, голос имел тихий и несколько хрипловатый, как оно часто бывает у русских добродетельных людей; соблюдал опрятность в белье и одежде, носил белые галстухи и табачного цвета длиннополые сюртуки, а дворянская кровь всё-таки сказывалась:

      no one could have taken him for a priest’s son or a merchant! At all times, on all possible occasions, and in all possible contingencies, Andrei Nikolaevitch knew without fail what ought to be done, what was to be said, and precisely what expressions were to be used; he knew when he ought to take medicine, and just what he ought to take; what omens were to be

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