I would be remiss if I did not bring to your attention Ander Louis’s Bogan version of War and Peace:
Book 1 of 16 (Complete and unabridged) The greatest epic of all time, now translated into Bogan Australian. Early 1800s Russia wouldn’t be all that bad a place to live, if it weren’t for all the social protocol and that bloody Napoleon bastard, trying to invade the place. In this new translation, Ander Louis has faithfully reconstructed Tolstoy’s epic masterpiece, line for line, in a style the modern reader can understand. Finally, after 150 years, War & Peace is available in Bogan Australian. Book 1 contains the first 28 chapters of War & Peace (approx. 50,000 words)
However, at MetaFilter, where I got the link, the natives are restless:
It’s wrong from the very first word. No bogan is ever going to say “Bloody hell” when “Fuck” would do. […] Vasíli would instantly become Vaz. Prince is his title, not his name, and no bogan would ever use it. This isn’t snark, I’m genuinely cringing. Bogan isn’t a language, it’s a culture, and if this translator took this project at all seriously he’d be doing far more with the source material than plaster cliche export-grade Australianisms all over it. What he’s made here is a literary analogue of blackface. It’s just fundamentally disrespectful to Tolstoy and bogans.
posted by flabdabletI’m with flabdablet. If your whole project is about putting a famous work in another voice, you’ve gotta get that voice right. “Fucken oath, Vaz, Genoa and Luca are Nappie’s fucken holiday homes now… I’m tellin’ ya, if you still reckon he’s orright – if you don’t reckon he wants a fight – if you still rate that mad bastard, when he’s a total cunt… Well, you can fuck off – we’re done. But yeah, nah – come in, I’m just messing with ya. Siddown, mate. Anyway… how are ya?”
posted by rory
It all makes me want to see War and Peace made over into every variety of English around. (Not Brothers K, though — I don’t want a Bogan Father Zosima, however accurate the dialect.)
Surely the first words should in any case be in French? Perhaps Queneau might provide a model …
Bienvenu, you fuckin’ chevaliay.
I think the problem is the use of the word “Bogan”. What the first pages suggest to me is vernacular, matey Australian, which doesn’t actually need to be chock-full of expletives. Bogan denotes not only mateyness — not only ignorance and lack of culture — but also a certain attitude. Bogans aren’t just matey, they revel in their aggressive “don’t come that bullshit with me” attitude. I suspect it owes a lot to certain lower-class British attitudes, e.g., the football lout crowd.
You mean this galah has translated the *whole* of war and peace into bogan? Like it’s not just a two page spoof?
Well stone the crows!
For reference, the Metafilter link has this sample of the translation:
‘Bloody hell, Prince Vasíli, Genoa and Luca are pretty much just Napoleon’s holiday homes now… I’m warning you, if you still reckon Napoleon is an alright bloke – if you still don’t reckon this mean he wants a fight – if you try to defend that mad bastard, who I reckon is pretty much the devil… Well, then you can bugger off, we’re not mates any more. But, oi, come in, come in, I’m just messing with ya mate. Sit down. How are ya, anyway?”
The original is:
Eh bien, mon prince. Gênes et Lucques ne sont plus que des apanages, des поместья, de la famille Buonaparte. Non, je vous préviens que si vous ne me dites pas que nous avons la guerre, si vous vous permettez encore de pallier toutes les infamies, toutes les atrocités de cet Antichrist (ma parole, j’y crois) — je ne vous connais plus, vous n’êtes plus mon ami, vous n’êtes plus мой верный раб, comme vous dites. Ну, здравствуйте, здравствуйте. Je vois que je vous fais peur, садитесь и рассказывайте.
And Constance Garnett translates it as:
‘Well, prince. Genoa and Lucca are now no more than private estates of the Bonaparte family. No, I warn you, that if you do not tell me we are at war, if you again allow yourself to palliate all the infamies and atrocities of this Antichrist (upon my word, I believe he is), I don’t know you in future, you are no longer my friend, no longer my faithful slave, as you say. There, how do youdo, how do you do? I see I’m scaring you, sit down and talk to me.’
Setting aside the question of whether the bogan translation should keep the French to reflect the speaker’s social pretensions (spoiler: no. Bogans don’t speak French), I still have some doubt about whether it appropriately translates the overall *tone* of the occasion.
But maybe I’m unfair. Next time I’m at a bogan pissup in a function room of the Rooty Hill RSL club [1], I’ll eavesdrop closely on the conversations of any middle-aged maids of honour and titled princes who happen to be present [2], and I’ll report back on whether they sound like the sample above.[3]
[1] see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooty_Hill,_New_South_Wales
[2] who I will recognise by their embroidered court uniforms, stockings and slippers
[3] with proviso that this may have to be in an alternative universe (I’m not a regular attender at the Rooty Hill RSL in this one), and I’m not sure whether I’ll be able to get back to this blog from there.
It would take a rare talent to map the various sociolects of Russian into distinct varieties of Bogan, to say nothing of Russian-French and French-French. One workaround would be to use Bogan only for the narrator’s voice. Or Napoleon’s.
@Mollymooly
Bloody oath mate. Like, Napoleon: “Christ but it’s cold here! Freeze the balls off a brass monkey!”
[to avoid doubt: “Bloody oath!” can have a approving tone, similar to “Fuck yeah!”]
Who is this translation for?
People who enjoy wacky translations.
Do female bogans tend to speak any differently from male bogans? I tried to translate this passage into Northern New Mexico Hispanic Vernacular English, and one problem was whether to try to imitate a woman (more appropriate) or a man (more fucks, and potentially funnier). (There were more important problems, and I don’t think I can do it.)
Are there any bogan-like characters in W&P? Do the French or Russian common soldiers get any dialogue? Other than Platon, who I feel sure doesn’t speak Bogan.
“Fundamentally disrespectful to Tolstoy and bogans” is a fine example of bathos, by the way.
It would take a rare talent to map the various sociolects of Russian into distinct varieties of Bogan, to say nothing of Russian-French and French-French. One workaround would be to use Bogan only for the narrator’s voice. Or Napoleon’s.
Yes, it would have been funny, if a lot more work, to do a mirror translation. Standard Russian as Bogan, with Natasha speaking notably more vulgarly than Pierre, put all the French into Mandarin, translate “peasant speech” as Queen’s English, etc.