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5PHILOLOGICAL SCIENCES
ТУМАНЯНОВСКИЙ ПЕРЕВОД ПОЭМЫ БАЙРОНА "ШИЛЬОНСКИЙ УЗНИК" В
КОНТЕКСТЕ ВРЕМЕНИ
Мнацаканян Е.
доктор филологических наук, доцент, старший научный сотрудник, РА НАН институт литературы имени М. Абегяна
THE TRANSLATION OF BYRON'S "SCHILON PRISONER'' BY TOUMANYAN IN TIME
Mnatsakanyan Ye.
Doctor of Sciences Philology Senior Researcher at the Institute of Literature of the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7156362
АННОТАЦИЯ
В статье представлена оценка одного из переводов армянского поэта Ованеса Туманяна - единственного перевода на армянский язык поэмы английского поэта Джорджа Байрона "Шильонский узник", данная литературными критиками своего времени, а также современным читателем, переводчиками, литературоведами. Этот перевод Туманяна был признан многими критиками своего времени одним из блестящих образцов армянской переводной литературы. Сегодня перевод, прошедший более чем столетний путь, продолжает знакомить армянского читателя с гениальным произведением Байрона. В статье поднимается вопрос, сохранил ли этот перевод свою художественную ценность и удовлетворяет ли эстетическим требованиям читателя 21-ого века. Чтобы ответить на этот вопрос были исследованы и представлены в статье мнения критиков, современников Туманяна, а также проведен небольшой опрос среди переводчиков, студентов и туманяноведов, сделаны сопоставление и анализ результатов.
Статья состоит из вступления, теории литературы, методики проведения исследования, представления результатов, анализа и выводов. В выводах представлены конечные результаты исследования и анализа.
ABSTRACT
The article represents the appraisals given to the only Armenian translation of English poet George Byron's "Schilon Prisoner" done by Armenian writer Hovhannes Toumanyan. The appraisals include not only reflections by Toumanyan's contemporaries, but also present-day readers, translators and specialists of literature. Many critics considered this translation by Toumanyan as one of the brilliant pieces of translated literature it possesses a deep philosophical background of sound argumentation. The article focuses on the importance of whether the translation has kept its literary and philosophical value and still meets the needs of artistic readers in the 21st century. To answer this question, the critics' opinions of Toumanyan's time were studied, a small interview was conducted with translators, students, scientists, and the comparative analysis was done.
The article consists of introduction, literature review, research methodology, representation of results and analysis, and conclusion.
Ключевые слова: Ованес Туманян, Джордж Байрон, "Шильонский узник", перевод, литературная критика 20-ого века, современнная критика, высокая оценка, опрос.
Keywords: Hovhannes Toumanyan, George Byron, "Schilon prisoner", translation, philosophical argumentation, XX century literary criticism, high appraisals, interview.
Introduction
Many famous writers, and among them the great Armenian poet Toumanyan, have born the influence of Byronism era. Byron's literary heritage has become a subject of translation in numerous different languages. The translation of Byron's "Schilon prisoner" is the only translation of this work in Armenian up to now.
This article is an attempt to study the value of the translation of this wonderful literary piece after a hundred years. The article concludes that even today, the translation of Byron's Schilon prisoner is considered the only source for Armenian readers to get acquainted with this work.
The great Armenian Poet Toumanyan always praised the role of translation art very highly in the process of driving closer the nations, understanding cultural of spiritual values and developing cultural connections. He states that "in order to know the nations well and respect them, there isn't anything greater and franker than literature that illustrates the soul and the potential of the country" [23, p. 542]. In the light of this, Toumanyan has given a share to translations in every collection of his poems.
Among these translations, the poem Schilon prisoner has its unique place. This translation has been highly appreciated by the literary critics of the time. It is the only Armenian translation of the poem up until
now. Consequently, it is quintessential to understand whether it still bears the same literary and philosophical value as it had hundred years before. In order to find this out, research was carried with a study of the criticism towards the translation in Toumanyan's time, as well as an inquiry among translators, students and scientists who study the work of the Armenian poet. The results were compared and analyzed.
Literature Review
Translation of literary pieces has its own place and value in the discipline of literature. As a separate branch of literary discipline, translation has always had one quintessential issue: that of a fiction adequacy to original that in its turn encompasses questions on linguistics, literature, culture poetry and so on. In light of the existing forms of translated literature, (literary adequate, free translation, descriptive translation, mediated translation, reproductive translation and so on), the most successfully translated ones are considered the pieces that are close to the original not only in context, but also in fiction style.
In his book "The Art of Translation" N. Lyubimov writes that the ideal option is when the translator is united with the author and this process requires searches, aims, flexibility, living through the original through sharp sight, hearing and even smell. Revealing the creative identity of the author, the translator also opens up his identity, but in a way that it does not hide the author's identity.[17, p. 125]
Translation is a creative process, which is probably more challenging and responsible that the work carried out by the author. If the poet has a creative freedom, and can freely perch over the form and context, the translator is limited within the borders of translation rules and criteria. This means that on the one hand the translator should keep the form and context of the literary piece and the identity of the author. On the other hand, however, the translator should do possibly acceptable and comprehensible translation for the readers of the target language. Here is where the question of identity of the translator rises.
Since 1880s until the end of his life, Toumanyan has translated more than 80 works of poetry and prose, which are vivid in terms of not only the line "geographical spread" [10, p. 110] , but also topic variety. In contrast to the widely accepted view of the scientists, which claimed that the translator is obliged to know the target language and its specifics very well Toumanyan did some translations form the medium language, form Russian. By doing so, he broke the system of accepted rules and proved the possibility of exceptions. His contemporaries write that he always wanted and made efforts to learn English. Pedagogue, writer and teacher Asatour writes in his memoirs that "Toumanyan took English classes from the English vice-consul Mourtag. How well he has done, I do not know, however I know that he learnt English in order to translate the "Schilon Prisoner"" [13, p. 342].
Actually, how productive were these classes is hard to say, but Toumanyan did fulfil his decision of
translating the "Chillon Prisoner" by Byron from Russian into Armenian in 1893-1895, which was published in a separate book in Tiflis in 1896 (23 pages).
In light of the translation theory, the identity of the translator is first of all revealed by the piece chosen for translation. This is especially true about Toumanyan's choice of Chillon Prisoner. The poem is the most important work that developed Toumanyan's great interest towards the works of famous English poet.1 This period is called a "period of Byronism" [22, p. 774] in Toumanyan's works. According to literary critic A. Ka-rinyan: "Toumanyan's "Byronism" was a rather unique Byronism, because for the great poet of the Armenian nation, Byron was not so much a singer of universal sorrow, but rather a singer of complain and revolutionism" [14, p.20].
According to Toumanyan's daughter, Nvard Toumanyan, "The poet loves Byron's and Beranzhe's songs. He bought many publications by his favorite writers in Russian and foreign langauges. He read them with the help of dictionaries and translated" [24, p.67-68] .
In 2004, Gardwell published his work "Understanding Byron in Europe", in the first and second volumes of which, the author addressed Toumanyan's translations of Bryon's works considering it not an accidental choice. He writes "It is possible to say that this period is considered to be the Byronism era in Touman-yan's works, which was not only due to Toumanyan's personal interest, but the overall enthusiasm towards Byronism" [7, p. 54]. "Lord Byron was an ideal" [19, p. 225] writes the founder of the autobiographical method, famous French writer and critic Sent Byove. He surely insists that the Byron's novels inspired many poets of the time.
Getting involved in Byron's works helps young Toumanyan notice the valuable ideologies of individual's freedom and express his critical soul towards the reality. This is where Toumanyan feels the deep philosophy of Byron's piece. The philosophical argumentative reasoning is what keeps Byron's hero alive in prison.
At that time the Chillon Prisoner coincided with young Toumanyan's moods and personal ideologies. In this case two things are important "The spiritual character of the writer and his problem of individuality, which is depicted in his writing" [8, p.17], and the understanding of the work by the translator.
The Russian theorist Kosikov is sure that "however hard you try to think about a certain writer, his inner world, understanding and will are what at the basis of his works" [15, p. 26]. Probably, the same can be said in case of the selection of a literary piece for translation.
Brutyan claims "Homo Sapiens is homo argumen-ticus". This means that argumentation has universal character, and every person individually experiences it. The scientist also adds that "there can be different interpretations of argumentation, but argumentation itself is the same for all people and differs only according to
1 In 1893-1896s, Toumanyan also translated 'Child Harold's Song' from the first part of Byron's 'ChildHarold'sMission' (after 13th couplet) and 'To Iness' (after 84th couplet).
people's intellectual or logical abilities" [5, p. 90]. Many literary critics noticed the fact that in reality Tou-manyan was able to understand all the philosophy behind the Chillon Prisoner and reflect it correctly in his translation.
Initially, Toumanyan got acquainted with this poem by the famous translation of Zhukovsky, about which Belinski wrote "here, strangely, in the tender sadness and miserable sufferings, our Russian poet was able to find a strong armor in his soul, to express the terrible, underworld tortures, which were outlined by the lightening-brush of the great English poet" [2, p. 209].
It is known that Byron wrote the Chillon Prisoner in 1816, after visiting the castle-prison in Geneva, Leman, where he heard about the independence martyr of Switzerland and Republic hero Fransua Bonivar's tortures. The latter was sent to prison by the Duke of Savoy Karl the 3rd and the story of revolutionary people setting him free. The poem tells the reader the story of Bonivar's suffering soul, due to which the story becomes a symbol of freedom soul. In the end of the 19th century, the British poet's militant soul captured young Toumanyan.
Byron very carefully studied "the suffering and nobel nation: Armenian's ancient and rich culture, people, "whose values are results of peace and the shortcoming that of capture". He stresses in a painful mannner the hard luck of the Armenian nation, which was not exempt from "defectiveguilts" [18, p. 337].
At the end of the same century, Toumanyan acted similarly against the injustice and dictatorship. Moreover, it is natural that the singer of the "Armenian sorrow " was fascinated with the sorrow of the singer of "universal sorrow".
The translation of the Schilon Prisoner was basically positively accepted by the literary critics of the time. It is widely accepted that when dealing with the translation of fiction literature, there is no unique understanding, that is, it is impossible to have an understanding identical to the author. There is no objective understanding of the text, as the reading and the interpretation are based on the factor of "experienced reader", there is an "objective text" and "subjective understanding" [6, p. 19].
As Antoine Berman notices that "speaking about translation means to speak about life, luck and character and shape of the poems, which depict our life". [3, p. 145] Moreover, to evaluate a translated piece of literature it is quintessential to have critical sence, which is "something, unusually unique" [9, p. 183].
The Armenian poet, writer Shirvanzade thinks highly of Toumanyan's translation of Chillon Prisoner. In 1896, in the sixth issue of "Taraz", he publishes a critique on this work. Shirvanzade starts with interesting views of the translation. He is sure that Toumanyan is able to translate "high poetry", but at the same time advises him not to do translations of pieces the original language of which he doesn't know.
Of course, the translation of Byron's work is considered positive, but the preference is to see the translation of Byron's works by an Armenian who knows
English, and has poetic skills. After these insights, Shirvanzade concludes, "but as we don't have this, we can be only thankful for Toumanyan's present translation. Generally, this translation seems rather successful in terms of poetic fluency and lightness, if we don't take into account some small mistakes" [23, p. 49] .
In "Ardzagank" magazine, Shirvanzade suggests two important prerequisites for a good translation. First, besides the knowledge of vocabulary, he suggests the translator to have an art taste: "It is not the whelm of words that makes a language. One should know about the structure of the language, be well aware, and know the language very well. This is the first. Second, knowing a language and being a successful translator are also different things. It is not enough to know the language. One should also have abilities, artistic taste, and sensitivity in order to successfully translate poetic pieces. If these qualities are missing the translation will be word for word, expression for expression, idea for idea, but it will be dry, without heart and soul so that the reader will not be able to fully feel the beauty and poetic tenderness of the work. If a critique, led with these strong requirements appreciates and values the translations of young Toumanyan, it is quite clear that he is satisfied with them" [20, p.430].
It is interesting, that "Chillon Prisoner" was included in Toumanya's poems collection for the second time in 1903. This time Toumanyan addresses to the English specialist, engineer Andreasyan asking him to compare his translation with the original and find the flows. On May 9, 1903, Andreasyan presents his ideas. The first lines of his letter start with his surprise:
"I have read your Chillon, and compared it with the original. It is just surprising, how without knowing English you could provide us with such a translation. Almost word for word, without pitfalls, with a live Armenian language, with such correct lines, close to original, even the length, even the rhyme is in tune with words" [11, p. 291].
Speaking about separate chapters of Chillon, An-dreasyan gives his comments on each and makes certain suggestions by providing his own translations of some lines. He writes that:
"The Sonnet and The First Song are just amazing. In the Second Song, you have given freedom to yourself by moving far from the original, although you barely spoiled anything by doing it. Even the word "terrifying", may sound better next to the iron chain than the word cankering (meaning eating, worn out) in the original, because the author immediately says "and his cruel fangs eat", "they are worn out" and so on. However, you have changed the "new light" into "bright light" and even more into "unusual light". In addition, you have finished the chapter with verbosity. Instead of the last four lines that you have translated, there are two lines in the original" [11, p. 291].
At the end of the letter, most probably answering the hesitative question by Toumanyan whether to include "Chillon Prisoner" in his third collection of poems or not, the reader writes to Toumanyan in a completely decisive manner "I should say you only one thing, you don't have a right to deprive us from the opportunity to read this masterpiece in Armenian" [11, p.
295]. Generally, the poet can react to criticism in two ways "agree with it or not agree" [16, p. 23]. The critic cannot "order, but can persuade the author if the latter agrees with the author's point of view" [4, p. 227]. Obviously, this was true in case of Toumanyan's translation of "Chillon".
This translation of Toumanyan has been accepted by many critics of his time as an excellent piece of translated literature. In 1910, Armenian pedagogue and critique Balasanyan writes a reflection about Touman-yan's translations in the first issue of the magazine "HandesAmsorya" published in Vienna. He writes "In 1896, Toumanyan translates Byron's "Chillon Prisoner" and Lermontov's "Mtsirf in separate books. He seems to be talented in translation, too. In some places only one can find tiny deviations from the original" [1, p. 72].
In his book "The Lyricist of native land", one of the critics of the time, Terteryan discusses the creativity in Toumanyan's poetry. He addresses Toumanyan's translations also and writes that the poet, being cut from his native land, suffers in mind and lives with his memories, looks for what he missed and feels as "an imprisoned creature". The same psychological feelings have Byron's hero in "Chillon Prisoner".
"Very few Armenian poets can translate form foreign languages such pieces, which are so dear to their own works. Thus, the translated lines get out of the pen as independent pieces coming from within. Toumanyan is one of these lucky poets. All the translations that he did surprisingly come from his own feelings and emotions" [21, p. 8].
Methodology
As discussed above, Toumanyan's translations have been highly thought of by the literary criticism of the time. However, this paper aims at finding out, whether the 100-year-old translation has kept its literary importance: that is the meaning, the context of the literary piece is kept, and it is understood as a complete literary work which has the same emotional impact on the reader as the original piece.
To find this out a small interview was conducted with the participation of 20 people: eight translators, 7 students of literature department, 5 scientists whose research is focused on Toumanyan's literary works, and specifically translations. The three target groups of participants were chosen based on the idea that the translators will evaluate the translation in the light of professionalism, the students will study this piece of translation as a literary work, and the scientists will spread light on the motives why the poet has chosen particular pieces for translation.
The questionnaire for the interview consisted of the following questions (5 closed and 1 open question):
1. Do you agree that Toumanyan does not know the language of the original had its influence on the translation of "Chillon Prisoner"?
• Yes
• No
• Partially
2. How important is the fact that when translating Toumanyan has chosen a topic dear to his heart?
• Very important
• Important
• Not important
3. Do you think that Toumanyan was able to keep the philosophical value and argumentative mood in the poem when translating?
• Yes
• No
4. Do you agree with the viewpoint of Touman-yan's contemporaries that the translation of "Chillon Prisoner" has a great value in light of content and linguistic- stylistic peculiarities?
• Fully agree
• Partially agree
• Not agree
5. Do you agree with the idea that although Tou-manyan translated "Chillon Prisoner" from Russian, he was able to keep the soul and artistic peculiarities of the English original?
• Yes
• No
• Partially
6. How do you evaluate Toumanyan's translation? Write one-two characteristics, which you believe make the translated piece important today.
Along with the questionnaire, the interviewees were provided with the original of "Chillon Prisoner", the Russian translation, the Armenian translation done by Toumanyan. The interviewees answered the questions after a thorough study of these materials in 3 weeks.
Discussion and results
The first question aimed at finding out whether the fact of not knowing the language of original piece influenced the quality of the translation. All the participants answered negatively, only one of them answered partially. One of the interviewed scientists said that "although not knowing the language of original may effect on the quality of the translation, Toumanyan succeeded in doing a translation with such choice of words that have the same strength of meaning with the original and excellently correspond to the meaning in the original. Toumanyan created a very good reflection of syntactic peculiarities that the original possesses. Moreover, even if there are some sentences, which were translated with some deviation, they didn't effect on the quality of translation. In general, it is possible to say that Toumanyan gave preference to simple words which transferred the essence of this literary piece very vividly".
In answer to the second question "How important is the fact that Toumanyan choose a topic dear to him", all the participants answered that Byron's poem completely coincides with Toumayan's personal and social ideas and moods. According to them, the comparison of the original piece and the translation by Toumanyan allows the reader to see how successfully could the Armenian poet understand the mood in Byron's work and "translate" it into Armenian.
All the participants answered the question "Do you think that Toumanyan was able to keep the philosophical value and argumentative mood in the poem when translating" positively. It suggests that the success of translation was due to Toumanyan's ability to transfer the critical argumentations of the hero.
The participants of the interview were also asked the following question: "Do you agree with the idea of the critics of Toumanyan's time that his translation of the Chillon Prisoner has high literary value in terms of revealing the content and keeping the linguistic and stylistic peculiarities?" All the replies were "fully agree".
In answer to the question "Do you agree with the idea that although Toumanyan translated "Chillon Prisoner" from Russian, he was able to keep the soul and artistic peculiarities of the English original" all the participants answered "yes", only one of the participants answered "partially" Most of the participants agreed with the opinion that although Toumanyan translated the "Schilling Prisoner'" from Russian, he was able to keep the soul and fictional character of the original English piece.
The last open question is a try to identify some peculiarities of Toumanyan's translation that make the translated piece important today. Some explanations are worth presenting to the reader.
One of the students thinks that "Toumanyan's translation is successful, as he tried to keep not only the meaning of the original, which is an important criterion for a quality translation, but other peculiarities also, such as the rhyme, melodicism, rhythm, time, language and so on. Due to the protection of these peculiarities, Toumanyan was able to keep the value of the original poem and literary beauty".
One of the translators also speaks about the me-lodicism and harmony of rhymes stating that. "The translation fully transfers the emotions and feeling of the author. I believe that Toumanyan has made this work to some extent Armenian, using the full and rich word stock of the Armenian language to express the feelings and emotions".
Another translator states that the character of "Chillon Prisoner" is presented in the translation with tender expressiveness and multiple shades of voice. Although the translation is done from a medium language-Russian, Toumanyan was able to do vertical and horizontal deep context analysis, study of linguistic and contextual factors opening up the aesthetics, aim and style of Byron's work.
In some places, Toumanyan has done word for word translation transferring the work of English author to Armenian readers. The contextual composition of the translation is open and understandable for the Armenian reader. This very fact makes us suppose that the Armenian words are so full of multiple meanings that in word for word translation the process of domestication makes that the Armenian translation even more successful. "One should always remember that translation is even older than science. It is also a skill and a completely quality translation, finally is an art".
The hero, who is in deep sufferings, feels inexistence, which is felt both in English text and in Armenian mediated translation. It is stressed by double-sidedness,
dichotomy (light - dark, space-emptiness, life- death) and other two-pole phenomena. All these are characteristics of critical thinking and argumentative approach to different phenomena by a reasoning person.
One of the scientists studying Toumanyan's works writes that Toumanyan had a great linguistic sense and prior to translating any work, he tried to study the culture, history and character of that nation and country, and then he studied the author's life, creative world and character. All this enabled translator Toumanyan to present the Armenian reader a range of successful translations. It applies the work discussed in the questionnaire.
Another scientist is sure that as a translator of "Shillon" Toumanyan has reached the correct composition and correspondence of the original in language, context and stylistic levels, which allowed him to translate poetry and prose.
The translation, similar to the original, has an emotional impact on the reader, which is one of the most important advantages in translation. In light of comparative analysis, it is obvious, that "Chillon Prisoner" was very dear for Toumanyan in ideology and topic, and this allowed him to recompose the lyrics of Byron in passionate and meaningful words.
Conclusion
The data strands gathered through the instruments featured in methodology chapter and the presented discussion of findings support the research question whether the translation has kept its literary and philosophical value and still meets the needs of artistic readers in the 21st century. The translator succeeded in keeping the adequacy of the piece with its original by maximally keeping the form. The context is transferred with such a proficiency that the translated piece is accepted as a complete work and has the same emotional impact as the original.
Under Toumanyan's pen, the worldview and linguistic thinking of the English poet open up very impressively. These opinions correspond to the appraisals given to Toumanyan's translation of "Chillon Prisoner" and presented in the literary review of this paper. The results of the interviews which coinside with the opinions of literary critics presented in literature review (Shirvanzade, Karinyan, Ter-Andreasyan, Terteryan, Balasanyan) show that Toumanyan's translation is well-fitted into Armenian linguitic thinking
As a conclusion, it is possible to state that in spite of its century old life, the translation of "Chillon Prisoner" by Toumanyan remains one of the best pieces of Armenian translation literature and the appraisals given to it a hundred years ago are still true for today. This translation gets more importance when taking into account the fact that it is the only translation of the poem into the Armenian language.
As literary critic Kalantaryan expresses: "No criterion or set of criteria can be enough even in certain cases or certain historical phase. If it wasn't so, there wouldn't be any unread layers in the classical literature. Although, in case of classics, the issue is not only read or unread pieces, but also various and new insights about the same literary piece, dictated by new times and new realities (social, aestetic)" [12, p. 221].
This study will hopefully open up new suggestive approaches and perspectives to study the translation of "Chillon Prisoner" by Toumanyan, the time and situation in which it was carried out by the poet and the reasons for it to become so successful and accepted by Armenian readers.
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