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Re: Left/Levyi
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Alexey, la-canonique: you offer more links and traps than St Andrew¹s!
Fascinated by VN¹s use of the phrase seksual'nyi levsha ("a sexually
left-handed person"), matching the Brit. Idiom ³left-hander² for
"homosexual.² BUT, note the incongruity: the Brit idiom would NEVER use the
predication ³sexually.² It¹s a redundant qualification in slang usage which
rather spoils the SLUR! The whole point is the in-group ³knowing² wink that
the ³left-hander² IS a queer. Outside dictionaries, you say ³left-hander²
and ³queer² leaving the ³sexual² implications UNsaid.
Even when ³left-hander² is used as a religious slur (for Catholics by
Proddies*), it¹s the context that disambiguates. We don¹t hear ³You bleedin¹
religious left-hander.² In fact, my friend Frank Shaw (co-author of our
³Lern Yerself Scouse²) wrote ³The Memoirs of a Left-Handed Customs Official²
without the need to spell out that this referred to his SJ (Jesuitical)
apprenticeship. And to be frank and honest, neither of the ³left-hand²
slurs, sexual or doctrinal, are really widely bandied about these days.
Verbal insults are extremely volatile over space and time, witness the
current debate in the UK over ³golliwog² which displaced the usual
economic-doom headlines.
I wonder if VN¹s seksual'nyi levsha was translated as "sexually
left-handed", leaving the reader to deduce "homosexual?" Usually, idioms are
a major challenge for the poor translator, but here we have levsha that
might well be rendered literally as left-handed As others have noted, the
³left as sinister² seems common to many cultures, so levsha might also ³go²
literally in many other languages.
Can¹t leave the fertile lev-left roots without noting:
Bstat¹ c levoi nogi ³getting out of bed on the WRONG foot²
Levak = LEFTIST: praise for some, but a political SLUR in VN¹s book! And all
because of a quirk in how the French Revolutionary parties were seated in
1789. Also colloq. Levak = Black marketeer (Brit. SPIV). Linguistic
confusion with ³Left² acquiring both good (³Progressive,² ³Liberal²) and bad
(³sinister,² ³false,² ³gauche = awkward²) connotations.
Compare ³The Left was Never Right,² ³The Looney Left² and ³The Left Behind²
(a sarcastic hint that Marxism might in some respects have been er er
discredited.) Not to be confused with those ³left behind² by the Rapture in
the Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins apocalyptic novels. Nor with Bush¹s
brave NCLB (No Child Left Behind) educational project.
IMPORTANT: ALEXYEY, MY OFF-LIST EMAILS TO YOUR SKYLARK05 RU ADDRESS HAVE
BOUNCED. SEND ME AN ALTERNATIVE.
Stan Kelly-Bootle
On 15/02/2009 14:00, "Alexey Sklyarenko" <skylark05@MAIL.RU> wrote:
> Stan K.-B.: could ³left² here also have an echo of the Latin ³sinister?² This
> meaning persists in derog. Brit. Slang: ³left-hander² (and ³left-footer²)
> applied (rather irrationally?) to both Roman Catholics AND Homosexuals.
>
> In the last paragraph of my recently published (in Zembla) article on Chose
> (the name of Van's University in ADA) I quote the Russian saying dva sapoga
> para ("they make a pair"; sapog is Russian for "boot"), about two people who,
> having something in common, match well. Reading Skitalets's story Ogarki ("The
> Scum", 1906), I belatedly discovered that this saying can be continued as
> follows: dva sapoga para i oba na levuyu nogu (literally: "the two boots that
> make a pair and both are for the left foot"). Because I speak in my article of
> Ilf and Petrov, the two Soviet writers (and patriots with leftist views) who
> make a wonderful pair, the full version of the saying would be even more
> appropriate.
>
> Re homosexuality: Gomoseksualizm ("homosexuality") is one of some one hundred
> and eighty words that make up Fima Sobak's vocabulary. Fima Sobak is a
> character in Ilf & Petrov's "The Twelve Chairs". Compared to her friend
> Lyudoedka Ellochka ("Nellie the Cannibal"), who manages with only thirty
> words, Fima is certainly a cultured girl. It is interesting to compare the
> names Sobak, Tobak (in ADA, the name of Cordula de Prey's first husband; Van
> suspects Cordula of being a lesbian: 1.27) and... Koba (Stalin's nick-name,
> after the hero of Kazbegi's novel "The Parricide"). Sobak (accented, like the
> word in its singular form, on the second syllable; the family name Sobak is
> stressed on the first syllable), is gen. pl. of sobaka, Russian for "dog".
>
> Mayakovsky (who, like Stalin, comes from Georgia) is the author of Levyi marsh
> ("Left March", 1918).
>
> The phrase seksual'nyi levsha ("a sexually left-handed person", in the sense
> "a homosexual") occurs in Nabokov's Soglyadatay ("The Eye", 1930). A character
> refers thus of the narrator, a Russian emigre named Smurov. Vanya Smurov is
> the hero in Kuzmin's tale Kryl'ya ("The Wings", 1908). Kuzmin was a notorious
> gay author. In Nabokov's story, Vanya (a diminutive form of Ivan) is the
> affectionate name of the girl with whom Smurov is in love.
>
> Sorry to be so laconic. "Brevity is a sister of talent" (Chekhov).
>
> Alexey Sklyarenko
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Fascinated by VN¹s use of the phrase seksual'nyi levsha ("a sexually
left-handed person"), matching the Brit. Idiom ³left-hander² for
"homosexual.² BUT, note the incongruity: the Brit idiom would NEVER use the
predication ³sexually.² It¹s a redundant qualification in slang usage which
rather spoils the SLUR! The whole point is the in-group ³knowing² wink that
the ³left-hander² IS a queer. Outside dictionaries, you say ³left-hander²
and ³queer² leaving the ³sexual² implications UNsaid.
Even when ³left-hander² is used as a religious slur (for Catholics by
Proddies*), it¹s the context that disambiguates. We don¹t hear ³You bleedin¹
religious left-hander.² In fact, my friend Frank Shaw (co-author of our
³Lern Yerself Scouse²) wrote ³The Memoirs of a Left-Handed Customs Official²
without the need to spell out that this referred to his SJ (Jesuitical)
apprenticeship. And to be frank and honest, neither of the ³left-hand²
slurs, sexual or doctrinal, are really widely bandied about these days.
Verbal insults are extremely volatile over space and time, witness the
current debate in the UK over ³golliwog² which displaced the usual
economic-doom headlines.
I wonder if VN¹s seksual'nyi levsha was translated as "sexually
left-handed", leaving the reader to deduce "homosexual?" Usually, idioms are
a major challenge for the poor translator, but here we have levsha that
might well be rendered literally as left-handed As others have noted, the
³left as sinister² seems common to many cultures, so levsha might also ³go²
literally in many other languages.
Can¹t leave the fertile lev-left roots without noting:
Bstat¹ c levoi nogi ³getting out of bed on the WRONG foot²
Levak = LEFTIST: praise for some, but a political SLUR in VN¹s book! And all
because of a quirk in how the French Revolutionary parties were seated in
1789. Also colloq. Levak = Black marketeer (Brit. SPIV). Linguistic
confusion with ³Left² acquiring both good (³Progressive,² ³Liberal²) and bad
(³sinister,² ³false,² ³gauche = awkward²) connotations.
Compare ³The Left was Never Right,² ³The Looney Left² and ³The Left Behind²
(a sarcastic hint that Marxism might in some respects have been er er
discredited.) Not to be confused with those ³left behind² by the Rapture in
the Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins apocalyptic novels. Nor with Bush¹s
brave NCLB (No Child Left Behind) educational project.
IMPORTANT: ALEXYEY, MY OFF-LIST EMAILS TO YOUR SKYLARK05 RU ADDRESS HAVE
BOUNCED. SEND ME AN ALTERNATIVE.
Stan Kelly-Bootle
On 15/02/2009 14:00, "Alexey Sklyarenko" <skylark05@MAIL.RU> wrote:
> Stan K.-B.: could ³left² here also have an echo of the Latin ³sinister?² This
> meaning persists in derog. Brit. Slang: ³left-hander² (and ³left-footer²)
> applied (rather irrationally?) to both Roman Catholics AND Homosexuals.
>
> In the last paragraph of my recently published (in Zembla) article on Chose
> (the name of Van's University in ADA) I quote the Russian saying dva sapoga
> para ("they make a pair"; sapog is Russian for "boot"), about two people who,
> having something in common, match well. Reading Skitalets's story Ogarki ("The
> Scum", 1906), I belatedly discovered that this saying can be continued as
> follows: dva sapoga para i oba na levuyu nogu (literally: "the two boots that
> make a pair and both are for the left foot"). Because I speak in my article of
> Ilf and Petrov, the two Soviet writers (and patriots with leftist views) who
> make a wonderful pair, the full version of the saying would be even more
> appropriate.
>
> Re homosexuality: Gomoseksualizm ("homosexuality") is one of some one hundred
> and eighty words that make up Fima Sobak's vocabulary. Fima Sobak is a
> character in Ilf & Petrov's "The Twelve Chairs". Compared to her friend
> Lyudoedka Ellochka ("Nellie the Cannibal"), who manages with only thirty
> words, Fima is certainly a cultured girl. It is interesting to compare the
> names Sobak, Tobak (in ADA, the name of Cordula de Prey's first husband; Van
> suspects Cordula of being a lesbian: 1.27) and... Koba (Stalin's nick-name,
> after the hero of Kazbegi's novel "The Parricide"). Sobak (accented, like the
> word in its singular form, on the second syllable; the family name Sobak is
> stressed on the first syllable), is gen. pl. of sobaka, Russian for "dog".
>
> Mayakovsky (who, like Stalin, comes from Georgia) is the author of Levyi marsh
> ("Left March", 1918).
>
> The phrase seksual'nyi levsha ("a sexually left-handed person", in the sense
> "a homosexual") occurs in Nabokov's Soglyadatay ("The Eye", 1930). A character
> refers thus of the narrator, a Russian emigre named Smurov. Vanya Smurov is
> the hero in Kuzmin's tale Kryl'ya ("The Wings", 1908). Kuzmin was a notorious
> gay author. In Nabokov's story, Vanya (a diminutive form of Ivan) is the
> affectionate name of the girl with whom Smurov is in love.
>
> Sorry to be so laconic. "Brevity is a sister of talent" (Chekhov).
>
> Alexey Sklyarenko
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/