The War and Peace Reading Support Group week 1: We are in Petersburg and Napoleon’s army is coming.
My sister and I have a hair appointment at my other “suking” salon, the evocatively-named Be Beautiful For Him. (Cracks us up!) I have Chus’s permission since it is a non-styling treatment, and I shall commence reading Tolstoy while my hair is fussed over.
By the way Chus has this message for Neil Etheridge of the Azkals: “Neil my darling, if you need a haircut look for me at Jing Monis Salon (the former Propaganda) in Greenbelt 1.” Join us for the liveblog of the Philippines v Mongolia match at Panaad in Bacolod on Wednesday.
Apart from the excellent service BBFH has a variety of amazing chichirya, including the chicharon of pure evil, which probably explains why my Jedi master Ted goes there too. Although he has to go easy on the cholesterol since he’s had a heart bypass. We can confirm that Ted looks fabulous, having lost a lot of weight through Pilates and swimming; send him your love letters.
The War and Peace Reading Support Group is now in session: post your early impressions in Comments.
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This is more fun than I’d expected. I think the reason W+P is so long is because each character is accorded. . .a character (qualities distinctive to an individual). So many people are introduced in the early chapters and they’re not just extras in the party scene: they’re allowed to be human beings with their own quirks and expressions.
Tolstoy is not usually regarded as a laugh riot, but his descriptions of people had me laughing because they’re so accurate.
The viscount was a nice-looking young man, with soft features and manners, obviously regarded himself as a celebrity, but, from good breeding, modestly allowed himself to be made use of by the company in which he found himself. Anna Pavlovna was obviously treating her guests to him. As a good maitre d’hotel presents, as something supernaturally excellent, a piece of beef one would not want to eat if one saw it in the dirty kitchen, so that evening Anna Pavlovna served up to her guests first the viscount, then the abbe, as something supernaturally refined. . .
How about this?
The Italian’s face suddenly changed and acquired an insultingly false sweetness of expression, which was probably habitual with him in conversations with women.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
February 7th, 2011 at 03:06
I’ve DL-ed the book but haven’t started yet. In the words of one of my streetkids, “I’M NERBYOS, MA’AM!” but will do it and hope for the best and expect prescription drugs at the end of the book ahaha. Or plenty of coffee, whatever comes first.
Speaking of Neil, it’s his birthday today, so Happy birthday Neil “The Bus” Etheridge :) Oh my, live blog?! YESSSSS!!!
February 7th, 2011 at 03:10
It’s Neil’s birthday?! Happy Birthday Neil Etheridge!
Oy, don’t call him The Bus. Malas ang bus sa panahon ni Noynoy. Nahuhulog sa bangin, hino-hostage, sumasabog. . .
February 7th, 2011 at 03:16
Ay sorry sorry! I take it back! He’s not the Bus. He’s the, uh, The Wall :)
February 7th, 2011 at 09:04
Project Tolstoy I
5 Things That Crossed My Mind While Reading Book One
1. There is something Spurlock-ian about the challenge: 60-day diet of Tolstoy’s “super sized” prose.
2. 21st century tennis fans won’t struggle with the long Russian names.
3. These days, only HBO would be ambitious enough to produce a miniseries based on the novel.
4. Meryl Streep would (of course) play one of the matriarchs (Dubretskaya?)
5. WARNING: Six straight hours of reading Tolstoy on PDF can induce a migaine.
February 7th, 2011 at 11:03
First Impression
This is going to be my first Russian novel. I have the Vintage Classics paperback copy but I also downloaded a PDF so that I have the option of reading it on my notebook when on the go. Several pages into the book I ditched the ebook copy. The French passages (which Pevear/Volokhonsky left as is) are proving to be too much of a distraction because you’d have to scroll down to the bottom of the page for the translation (I don’t trust my French) and then scroll back up to read the rest of the paragraph.
At least with the hard copy you only have to glance down the page.
February 7th, 2011 at 11:12
Good point about tennis fans. If you can remember Svetlana Kuznetsova and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the names in Tolstoy will not bother you.
There’s a seven-hour Russian film adaptation by Sergei Bondarchuk. I was overjoyed to find the DVD set in Quiapo, and then when I started watching I found it has no subtitles. Must be watched while reading the book.
February 7th, 2011 at 11:16
That’s one of the criticisms of the P/V translation: they insist on leaving in all the French passages because the Russian upper class spoke a very affected French. Which we wouldn’t get anyway with our fastfood French.
February 7th, 2011 at 13:04
The chapters are deceptively short. I’m in chapter 15, but (according to Adobe Digital Editions) I’ve barely gone 50 pages into this 1,300-page monster.
Nothing of much note is happening, which seems to mean that everything is happening elsewhere, i.e. France, for which Pevear/Volokhonsky is kind enough to give us little footnotes on. I’m reading the Gutenberg translation, only referring to P/V when the Buonaparte is mentioned.
I’m scribbling down the names of the characters, because there are just too many of them. IMO: The worst thing about Russian names is the diminutive. I’m still not sure if Natasha and Nataly are the same person. (That is, if Pevear and Volokhonsky rendered these names similarly.)
February 7th, 2011 at 17:49
The Kindle for PC app has this nifty feature that allows you to click on the French passages to jump to the translation page. When you return to the main text, the sentence you are on is brought right to the top of the page. Convenient.
I have had to backtrack to the Principal Characters page several times to get straightened out on the Bezukhovs, Bolkonskys, Rostovs, and Kuragins. Nikolai is also Nikolushka, Nikolenka, Nikolashka, Kolya, Nicolas, or Coco. And there are two (maybe more) Nikolais. Everyone is a prince or princess, count or countess. The most interesting characters thus far are Annette Scherer, the busybody hostess of an aristocratic salon; Prince Andrei who feels suffocated by his marriage to Lise; and Pierre who is characterized as opinionated, aimless, and fat. I like Pierre already.
February 7th, 2011 at 17:59
Prince Andrei: Marat Safin
February 7th, 2011 at 18:12
I’m looking forward to your liveblog coverage of the azkals game. Win or lose we should continue to support them… unlike the Philippine Olympic Committee president Jose Cojuangco Jr., who said “that Filipinos should not expect too much from the Azkals, despite their semifinal finish in the AFF Suzuki Cup last December.”
http://ph.news.yahoo.com/ann/20110205/tph-philippine-football-team-says-we-nee-fb8bb4f.html
Sorry, just needed to share this… it pains me that they’ve been working so hard to win only to have something like this shoved in their face by no less than the olympic committee president.
February 7th, 2011 at 18:41
“Her pretty upper lip with its barely visible black mustache was too short for her teeth, but the more sweetly did it open and still more sweetly did it sometimes stretch and close on the lower one. As happens with perfectly attractive women, her flaw–a short lip and half-opened mouth– seemed her special, personal beauty.”– Lise, the young princess Bolkonsky. Rachel McAdams in the film version.
February 7th, 2011 at 21:01
Unlike Anna Karenina, the first line of W&P isn’t memorable, but the characters are better written, more rounded, and even if Pierre pisses me off at the beginning, I learn to love him over time. Tolstoy develops pierre like no other character. He’s a buffoon turned hero. Ooops, that could be considered a spoiler. Edit if necessary.
I’m using google translate for all the harder french phrases, but this translation isn’t bad, quite energetic (unlike Garnett, my pov).
I remember the war scenes as being the best part of the book, but I’m taking time to read through his tracts about serfs and religion this time. SLOOOOW going.
February 7th, 2011 at 23:03
First Impressions of “War and Peace”:
The first dozen or so paragraphs are a struggle given the faithfulness to the French dialogue. I sometimes skip the French translations altogether as I try to imagine myself as a Russian servant overhearing but never quite understanding the language of Russian nobility.
It’s difficult to keep track of all the names and characters but I make no effort to take a mental note of everyone. With a novel this epic, I’d probably get to know many of them intimately anyway.
February 7th, 2011 at 23:54
Cacs is right: Don’t get bogged down by the names. Just keep reading, and everything will click into place. Trust in the author and in your own intelligence.
February 8th, 2011 at 00:32
At the rate I’m reading this epic, I’ll be able to reach the ending by next year haha! I highly recommend the Epub format, which allows you to bookmark the last page you’ve read. If you’re using Firefox, you can download the free epub plugin. It’s really useful for checking the end-notes, and when you click the browser’s back button, it takes you back to the same spot where you left off.
February 8th, 2011 at 13:19
LT knows how to draw us in. Chapter 1: Introducing the Russian upper crust, still clueless of their imminent entry into the endangered species list.
The way Tolstoy describes them, almost all the characters pique my curiosity–they all sound so familiar, as if I knew people just like them. But it is Prince Andre I would probably gravitate to, if I were to be part of this little soiree. And perhaps grudgingly, to Pierre, who clearly aches for a confidante.
The drawing conversations in Russian and French reminds me of old Tagalog movies, where the unija hija’s mama (accent on the second syllable por favor) lords over the small talk. Sentences can start off in Tagalog, and segue seamlessly into English and Spanish.
Already one can’t help assigning a familiar face to some of the characters. I’ve a Sampaguita cast in a Merchant-Ivory production. I can’t figure out my director yet, but it’s not going to be King Vidor.
February 8th, 2011 at 17:50
My experience with W&P so far is a disaster. I was at page 36, then it jumped to page 53. Then at page 68, it jumped back to page 21. Then again: 21-36, 53-68. Then it resumed somewhere a little over page 100, near the end of part I. I went to NBS to have it replaced. They had trouble “borrowing” other copies from other branches, so they contacted The Warehouse and told me to wait until Friday. The person who assisted me was courteous, but when she started hinting that I could replace it with another book, I couldn’t help snapping at her.
I would have a lot of catching up to do once I get my new copy. (And I still don’t want an electronic version because I already work in front computers.)
About the book itself, I was surprised to find out that it wasn’t as taxing as I assumed it to be. I thought it was a really heavy reading muddled with lofty prose, but it was easy on the eyes. My favorite character so far is Pierre, but I might change my mind once I read the missing pages.
February 9th, 2011 at 05:02
on vacation currently but reading the ebook while waiting for my friends or in the train, etc etc.. quite nice though i think toothpick pa lang yung nababasa ko in the whole feast.. meanwhile i giddily discovered that there’s a borders store where i am so i let myself walk through it though my feet had been aching so much.. will read w&p now until i pass out..
February 9th, 2011 at 13:24
I just started and now merely two chapters into Book One. I also just acquired the 1965 Sergei Bondarchuk film. Jesus… 7 hours. Haven’t decided yet whether to watch the film parallel to my reading or finish the book before watching the film. In any case, this should be interesting.
February 9th, 2011 at 19:50
I’m back on track! NBS informed me that they found me a copy, and it is the Pevear-Volokhonsky translation. So I went there this afternoon and scanned the parts that I read. There, I found the French dialogue that weren’t present in Constance Garnett’s translation. Hmm.
February 9th, 2011 at 20:46
The worthy Ms Garnett is notorious for leaving out large chunks of text.
February 10th, 2011 at 21:50
Kaya ka pala ganyan kay Lise! Tsk tsk.
“Prince Andrei smiled involuntarily, looking at Captain Tushin. Silent and smiling, Tushin shifted from one bare foot to the other, and looked questioningly with his large, intelligent and kindly eyes first at Prince Andrei, then at the staff officer.
“Prince Andrei looked once more at the little figure of the artillerist. There was something special in it, totally unmilitary, slightly comical, but extremely attractive.”
*Recuerdo de Amor theme song*