Peculiarities of the Russian Language

No need to apologize, that was just my way of recommending attention to how I began this topic. And now, coming on the heels of re-posting the Cyrillic alphabet, I will offer another instance of using that alphabet phonetically to approximate the sounds of a sentence in English.

Иф ю аппойнт иорселф да джадж ав иор оун кондукт, но уан уилл бий сурпрайзд уен ю гив иорселф хай маркс.

("If you appoint yourself the judge of your own conduct, no one will be surprised when you give yourself high marks.")
 
Another phonetic transliteration of English words with Russian letters:

Сом Уестерн мувийз ар террибли вайолент.

= Some Western movies are terribly violent.
 
Returning to illustrations of the SOUNDS of Russian letters, here is another ENGLISH sentence phonetically approximated with the Russian alphabet:


Джейн Остен хэд мач инсайт инту рийл хюман нейчур.

= Jane Austen had much insight into real human nature.
 
Again, Russian alphabet phonetically simulating ENGLISH words. Remember that there is no "TH" sound in Russian, so I substitute a D sound.

Дис тайм некст уийк Ай экспект ту бий ин Флорида.

= This time next week I expect to be in Florida.
 
Another phonetic line, to keep this thread alive. Remember, again, that Russian has no "TH" sound, so I substitute the letter D. Russian also has no "AW" sound, so I put in an O for it.

Рийсентли Ай дриймд дат Ай мет Дейхок, энд ший уаз толлер дэн Ай уаз.

= Recently I dreamed that I met Dayhawk, and she was taller than I was.
 
PHONETIC ONCE AGAIN:


Прей фор да пийпль ин Чиле энд Хейти.

= Pray for the people in Chile and Haiti.
 
English speakers will put verbs in _present_ tense for certain instances of discussing _future_ events. For example, suppose I am planning to fly to Singapore next week; I might say, "When I fly to Singapore, I'll meet a famous artist there." The first of the two verbs in this sentence is in present tense, even though _everything_ being talked about is in the future. It's just the way we do it. In Russian, as in many other languages, they _don't_ do it that way. Accordingly, if a Russian who had learned English wanted to make the exact same statement, the paradigms of his native language would probably affect his _English_ speech, causing him to say, "When I _will_ fly to Singapore, I'll meet a famous artist there."

(This does not mean that the English construction serves no logical purpose. It's a way to confirm that the arrival in Singapore has to happen _before_ the speaker can meet the artist.)
 
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I didn't see this question until much later, or I would have answered it much sooner. Here are some Russian placenames with different endings, in no particular order:

Kaliningrad, Rostov, Orenburg, Barnaul, Vladivostok, Saratov, Borodino, Murom, Polyarnyy, Samara, Volgograd, Chita (accent on second syllable, "Chi-TAH"), Perm, Vladimir, Kazan.
 
Copper, how many past tenses does Russian have? Is there, for example, an imperfect past tense, which denotes an ongoing action in the past rather than a single one-time event?
 
Yes, their verbs do have the perfect-vs-imperfect distinction in past tense AND future tense. When you have time to browse through this thread, you will find places where I discuss the verb forms.
 
The Russian word "Nadryv" is a word apparently without a good English translation, but the concept it conveys is somewhat central to the theme of Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamozov... Copper, how would you translate the meaning of the word into English? I've read several attemps at translation, including "torment" or "to injure oneself through exertion," but given the context in the story, I have the feeling that these translations are lacking something.
 
I don't have the novel before me in Russian, nor at the moment a dictionary; but I can tell you that "NADRYV" appears to be a compound word. The first half is a preposition, meaning "above," while the second half carries a sense of something breaking through, or being burst or broken. Their word for "explosion" has the same root. So maybe "NADRYV" means something like "breaking free and rising above things."
 
Hmmm... that is very interesting in the context of the story. The theme of suffering is tantamount, and many of the characters seem to purposely seek trials and adversity in life in order to atone or overcome past sins or mistakes, even those of another, as if it could be done by proxy. The image of "breaking through" or "exploding" is very interesting in that perhaps the novel is trying to show that a certain amount of suffering breaks a threshold of some kind, achieves a catharsis... there is some parallelism to Christ's suffering (by proxy) for us.

Thanks, Copper. I will surely have more questions from this book for you.
 
Such a breakthrough occurs with Rodion Raskolnikov, the anti-hero of Crime and Punishment. But it does not occur where people would think, that is, NOT at the point of his confessing his crime. He is not yet sorry for what he did at the time he confesses; he is only plea-bargaining to save himself from hanging. It is afterwards, at the prison camp in Siberia, that he has the epiphany which makes him face the truth of his inexcusable guilt; only then does he repent in his heart and find salvation.

This character's surname, by the way, bears a meaning: it approximately means a schismatic, a heretic, a rebel, an apostate, someone estranged. Suitable for a character who, like Nietzsche, had flattered himself that he was "above" good and evil.


You know how the winters arrive and depart;
Each one leaves a bit more old age in my heart.
But rise from your bed, and we'll dance all the same;
The tree of remembrance will tell me your name. ​
 
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