CC BY
36
Джон А. Тейлор
John A. Taylor
American Populism, Captain Daniel Shays, and The Wizard of Oz
"Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore." That is one of the most famous lines in all of American cinema. Perhaps you will recognize that it comes from the 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz. Dorothy tells it to her little dog Toto when they get to Oz. Dorothy speaks for many contemporary American people these days. Some people think we are in a new and undiscovered situation, but they need not worry. Political power in America is now in the hands of a representative of our oldest and most familiar type of American politician, the populist. In this paper, let me tell you first about American populism and the Wizard of Oz. I will discuss Shays' Rebellion. At the end of the paper, I will connect our past to today's American populism.
If you know the Wizard of Oz movie, then that is good because therefore you already know a bit about populism. That famous movie was a satisfactory exposition of populist thought. Of course, they based the movie on the 1900 novel by L. Frank Baum. The Russian writer Alexander Volkov reinvented the Oz story for Russian readers, and his books are still very popular with Russian children. Perhaps his book is even better known here in Russia than either the American movie or the Baum novel because so many children read Volkov without knowing that he borrowed the story. [Волков]
In The Wizard of Oz, both the American book and the movie, you find a full and complete exposition of populism. Most of what I say here about Wizard of Oz and populism is common knowledge in the United States. I myself was taught about populism and the Wizard of Oz in high school and university. These things are also all over the Internet now, but I think most Americans still learn this information in school and university. Following my own educational experience, therefore, I will divide my discussion here of populism and the Wizard of Oz into two parts, the high school part and the university part, simple and advanced.
Here is the high school version of populism and the Wizard of Oz. First of all, the plot. Dorothy is a young girl in Kansas, an American state on the Great Plains in the mid section of the country. A cyclone picks up the little house with Dorothy and her dog Toto still inside, and the cyclone sets them down in the land of Oz, an imaginary kingdom. Dorothy and Toto meet witches good and bad, and they also meet a tin woodman, a scarecrow, and a lion. The tin man lacks a heart, the scarecrow brains, and the lion courage. Dorothy wants to go home to Kansas. They decide to follow the Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald City where they hope the wizard of Oz will be able to grant their desires. Dorothy wears magical
slippers. She and the others have adventures, but at last they meet the wizard who at first appears great and powerful The wizard rules the whole country. At the first meeting, he appears to each of them in a different guise, but chance reveals that the wizard is only an ordinary man who has all along used various tricks to fool people. He is in short neither great nor powerful - nor evil - but just an ordinary humbug American politician. He used the stupidity and guile of people to trick them into obedience.
In an important detail of the plot, the movie differed from the book. The detail concerned Dorothy's magic slippers. In the book, the were silver, but in the movie they were changed to ruby in order to make best use of color. The detail is important to our interpretation of the Wizard of Oz. Let us now turn from the plot to discuss this interpretation. We are still at the high school level, of course.
For the high school version of populism and The Wizard of Oz I refer you to "The Wizard of Oz: Parable on Populism" by Henry M. Littlefield. As the article itself stated, the author was a teacher at Mount Vernon High School in the state of New York when he published it. [Littlefield]
I also refer you to current controversy. As I write this paper, powerful people say that the US dollar is overvalued, and they want it to go lower against other currencies especially the Chinese RMB. They say that the strength of the dollar is "killing" American jobs. They want our government to slap tariffs on goods from countries or companies which they believe are unfair in their trade practices. [Craig]
The world of the Wizard of Oz sounds very familiar, therefore. Appearing in 1900, Baum's Wizard of Oz reflected economic and political controversies of its day, especially the debates over the gold standard and over the tariff question or protectionism. Things have not changed very much. Bankers then were part of a coastal elite which profited from the gold standard and from some tariffs. They wanted strong government, protection of property and the sanctity of contracts, continued hard money, and some tariff protection. Farmers in Kansas, like Dorothy's Aunt Em and Uncle Henry, were at a disadvantage, and they wanted the federal government in Washington to make silver into legal currency, creating a bimetallic monetary system. William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska, a state similar to Kansas, said in 1896, "they shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold," and the phrase made him famous.
This is the point of Dorothy's silver slippers and of her journey on the Yellow Brick Road. They are both part of the allegory about populism. She follows the golden road in her magic silver slippers, and they eventually set her free. Meanwhile she discovers that the bankers are ordinary folk whose power and duplicity are mere humbug. They are a threat only to weak and heartless people. When people have courage,
brains, and a good heart then those things make them safe against the deceits and humbug wizardry of those in power. This argument is populism in a nutshell.
The high school version connected The Wizard of Oz to the specific controversies of Baum's own day. The college version of the argument agrees with that analysis but also maintains that populism is older than the controversies of Baum's day. Populism contributed to the formation of the present federal government.
Here then is the university account of populism. It centers on the 1786 and 1787 rebellion of Captain Daniel Shays. That rebellion was the origin, model, and type of all subsequent American populism, academic historians usually say. A study of Shays' Rebellion illuminates not only The Wizard of Oz but also Trump's recent victory, therefore. That is not an opinion or a judgment. It is simply a fact.
You will need a bit of background about Captain Shays, no doubt. No Alexander Volkov made Shays familiar to Russian readers. Shays lived in western Massachusetts in the area around Springfield and Northampton, and he was an officer in the revolutionary American army during the War of the American Revolution. General George Washington's protégé the marquis de Lafayette awarded Shays a ceremonial sword in recognition of his service, a high honor. However, Shays was wounded in the war, and furthermore his army salary went unpaid. With this background, Shays received the approbation of his neighbors when they rebelled against in 1786. Shays reluctantly agreed to lead their rebellion, and it took its name from him. (Note the final "s" in the correct spelling of Shays. The possessive is Shays' therefore, and Shay's is a misspelling.)
This rebellion was a decisive event in American history because it occurred after the Revolution but during the formation of the present federal government. During the War of the Revolution, the states crafted a document which they called articles of confederation. James Madison of Virginia - who wrote the present US constitution - dismissed the articles. He said they established a mere league of amity and mutual defense. The articles were still in force when Says led his rebellion, and the rebellion pointed up faults in the articles.
When Shays and his neighbors rose in armed rebellion, rich merchants ruled Boston, the capital city of Massachusetts. Many of these merchants had supported the American Revolution, and they profited from the war because of the opportunity it gave them to trade abroad without much interference from any government, but now the war was over, and they wanted stable government, hard money, and high tariffs. Profiting, they had lent money at interest, sometimes to poor farmers in western Massachusetts. The farmers had little cash money, and and the Revolution crushed them with debt and taxes. It did so with Shays
himself. When he got home from the war, wounded and without his pay, he was hounded for debt, and his poverty and hardship forced Shays to sell his precious sword, a sad commentary on his legacy from the War of the Revolution. He joined his neighbors when they demanded that the state government issue paper money and use if for instance to pay the unpaid soldiers. Shays and his neighbors then wished the state government to authorize them to use their paper to pay their debts and their taxes. The paper would depreciate in value, perhaps becoming nearly worthless, you see, but this would not be any disadvantage to the poor debtors, and it would be a hardship only to their rich Boston creditors who had never served in the war and who instead were cosy and comfortable throughout the conflict. The bankers would suffer hardship because they would receive in repayment paper money worth less in real value than the coined money which they had lent initially.
Shays' Rebellion was decisive because it clearly highlighted the weakness of American central government under the articles of confederation. Since states remained fully sovereign under the articles, the state government of Massachusetts was alone and without assistance in the face of civil disorder. The central government under the articles had no warrant to assist the statehouse in Boston. This circumstance hastened approval of the present federal government, giving it power to uphold the republican form of government in the states. The point therefore is that Shays' Rebellion had a powerful effect, shaping subsequent US history. The present strong federal government is partly a legacy of Shays Rebellion. [Vidal]
On the other hand, Shays' Rebellion simply petered out. Dissidents quieted themselves, and the state authorities for their part also shrank from harsh repressive measures. Shays' Rebellion melted away leaving the present American system.
Today we may think we are out of our usual and familiar surroundings. We are not in Kansas anymore. However, things may again go the way of Shays' Rebellion and The Wizard of Oz. Shays' rebels wanted to melt the gilt on the dome of the statehouse to pay the debts of the commonwealth. Our politicians make today's version of those same promises. They may truly make important and lasting changes, but then the popular anger will melt away. Like the wizard of the Oz story, today's politicians will step out from behind the curtain and will reveal themselves as an ordinary people who are tired of it all and who want to go home.
I hope meanwhile we all find our own yellow brick roads and our own magic slippers, be they silver or ruby!
Bibliography
1. Волков А. М. Волшебник изумрудного города: все истории в одной книге. -СПб.: Ленинградское изд-во, 2Q11. - 862 с.
2. Littlefield H.M. The Wizard of Oz: Parable on Populism II American Quarterly. 1964. Vol. 16. No. 1 (Spring). P. 47-58.
3. Craig V. Dollar Slumps After Trump Says Currency Strength 'Killing Us'. -URL: http:IIwww.foxbusiness.comImarketsI2Q17IQ1I17Idollar-slumps-after-trump-says-currency-strength-killing-us.html [Date of access: 25.Q1.2Q16].
4. Vidal G. Homage to Daniel Shays. - URL: http:IIwww.nybooks.comIarticlesI 1972IQ8I1QIhomage-to-daniel-shaysI [Date of access: 25.Q1.2Q16].
С. С. Шимберг, H. В. Удальцова
Передача семантики оценочных суффиксов в переводе с русского на английский язык
В русском языке суффикс является одним из наиболее используемых словообразовательных элементов, поэтому количество суффиксов в языке очень велико. Среди них можно выделить особую категорию - суффиксы субъективной оценки, которые определяются как «суффиксы, служащие для образования форм имен существительных, качественных прилагательных и наречий с особой, эмоционально-экспрессивной окраской и выражением отношения говорящего к предмету, качеству, признаку. Суффиксы субъективной оценки придают словам различные оттенки (ласкательное, сочувствия, пренебрежения, презрения, уничижения, иронии, также реального уменьшения или увеличения)» [2, с. 314].
Частотность употребления оценочных суффиксов в современном русском языке весьма высока и передача их семантики при переводе становится актуальной проблемой, особенно для переводчиков художественных текстов. При этом в пособиях по переводу не уделяется должного внимания этой проблеме. Именно поэтому анализ данного явления может в дальнейшем стать основой для обобщения в теоретических и практических пособиях по переводу.
Глубинной предпосылкой трудностей, возникающих при передаче значений суффиксов, является типологическое различие в строе языков. Так, русский язык по своей природе синтетичен, что означает, что грамматическое значение «внутрь слова» привносят окончания, суффиксы, приставки, внутренние флексии, повтор морфемы, супплетивное видоизменение основы слова. Английский же язык аналитичен, а значит, грамматическое значение выражается посредством предлогов, союзов, артиклей, вспомогательных глаголов, интонации, порядка слов [1, с. 69-7Ü]. То есть те значения, которые в русском языке передаются синтетически, в английском
361
