The Last Samurai

[avva]

LanguageHat так увлекательно описывает свой восторг от прочтения романа The Last Samurai - первого романа пока ещё неизвестной писательницы Helen DeWitt - что подмывает самому купить и прочитать. И эта цитата из книги тоже замечательна:

The first sentence of this little-known work runs as follows:

Es ist wirklich Brach- und Neufeld, welches der Verfasser mit der Bearbeitung dieses Themas betreten und durchpflügt hat, so sonderbar auch dieses Behauptung im ersten Augenblick klingen mag.

I had taught myself German out of Teach Yourself German, and I recognised several words in this sentence at once:

It is truly something and something which the something with the something of this something has something and something, so something also this something might something at first something.

I deciphered the rest of the sentence by looking up the words Brachfeld, Neufeld, Verfasser, Bearbeitung, Themas, betreten, durchpflügt, sonderbar, Behauptung, Augenblick and klingen in Languenscheidt's German-English dictionary.

Я редко читаю новых, малоизвестных авторов по-английски - просто потому, что так много известных ещё не прочитаны. Но стоит, наверное, иногда делать исключения из этого правила.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I'm delighted to see I've lured you to Ms. DeWitt - I promise you won't regret it! But I was distressed to see (in the brutally clear mirror of your copied quote) that I had added an excrescent u to Langenscheidt in typing those complicated paragraphs. I try to proofread myself, but... anyway, I can't bear letting typos stand, so I corrected it in my entry; I mention it here so that no one comparing your quote and mine (unlikely, but still) will think that you made the typo. Mea culpa.

Steve

Typos

[afuchs.livejournal.com]

You cannot bear letting typos stand and therefore will not regard my remark as a cavil, hopefully -- the "Behauptung" should be "diese", not "dieses."

Unless the typo in the quoted quotation is intentional.

In process of "proof-reading" I feel being enticed, too.

Re: Typos

[(Anonymous)]

Not at all, I'm extremely grateful - my German is not up to snuff, so I wouldn't have noticed it on my own - many thanks, and I'm off to fix it in my entry! (I checked my copy of the book, and I simply mistyped it.)

Steve

[ex-skitalet.livejournal.com]

I definitely recommend reading it, too. My fiancée got it for me for my birthday, and I loved it.

[sinistrorsum.livejournal.com]

На всякий случай (для тех, кто не дошел до Amazon'овского сайта) добавлю, что около тридцати страниц из книги выставлены в свободный доступ здесь (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0786866683/ref=lib_rd_ss_TFCV/002-5024666-0760000?v=glance&s=books&vi=reader&img=1#reader-link).

[sinistrorsum.livejournal.com]

Отвечает на вопросы читателей (http://www.dagbladet.no/kultur/2001/02/28/244523.html) в Dagbladet:

When I was in my teens I loved trying to work out all the different scripts in The Lord of the Rings, which Tolkien had made up himself. The problem is that you can't go on to read something in Elvish, for example. Whereas there really are lots of books in ancient Greek, Japanese and so on. I thought it would be amusing for the reader to have some Greek and Japanese in my book, and it was Tolkien that gave me the idea.

I always loved the story about John Stuart Mill being taught Greek at the age of 3 - and ESPECIALLY the fact that Mill was convinced this could easily be done for any child of ordinary ability. I thought it would be entertaining to imagine what it would actually be like to try to do this - and what the results would be. I always love books that have an element of implausibility, I'm not sure why. If a story seems wildly improbable I find it irresistible. I don't know if you know the shoot-out in The Good, The Bad and the Ugly - I'm always thrilled to find that level of unrealism in a book.