Talk “Korney Chukovsky, the writer & translator. Then and Now”

On Septemer 23, there will be a two-part talk Korney Chukovsky, the writer & translator. Then and Now. Korney Chukovsky created a canon of Soviet children’s literature in the 1920s, but he was also the most popular children’s writer in post-Soviet Russia as late as 2016 with over 2.35 million copies of his works sold in that year alone. This first part of the anniversary talk with Dr. Megan Swift looks at how Chukovsky has been republished and re-illustrated for his new child (and parent) readers, and how he provides a vital link between two generations divided by the fall of Communism.

Olga Bukhina will talk about Chukovsky’s ideas of a “high art” of translation; about whether his understanding of the translator’s work is outmoded or not. Chukovsky was particularly concerned with the question of accuracy vs. artistry in translation; in his book, he uses multiple examples of what, from his point of view, are good and mediocre translations. Olga will also talk about Chukovsky’s own translations from English into Russian for children and adults as well as about translations of Chukovsky’s narrative poems for children into English: contemporary translators also need to manoeuvre between the Scylla of accuracy and the Charybdis of artistry.

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