This |
edition |
is a complete |
scholarly |
translation into Russian |
|
of The |
Book of |
Lamentations, |
by a celebrated mediaeval |
[10th |
|
century] Armenian poet Grigor Narekatsi. |
|
|
|||
The |
poem has survived in |
more than |
200 manuscript |
copies |
|
and sustained almost 60 editions. It brought into existence mediaeval interpretations and imitations. It has been translated in full into modern Eastern and Western Armenian literary languages, French, Turkish and Arabic. Its individual chapters and fragments are published in English, Italian, German, Rumanian and other languages.
A Russian poetic translation, by Naum Grebnev, appeared first
in fragments, then in a larger variant |
[Yerevan, 1970]. Not |
long |
|
ago [Yerevan, 1985] The Book of |
Lamentation |
translated |
by |
L. Mill was published. |
|
|
|
The poetry of Grigor Narekatsi, a contemporary |
of the Bagra- |
||
tide era — the epilogue of the "golden age" of Armenia—points both to the originality of Old Armenian culture and to the uniqueness of his own poetic genius. His poetic world should be regarded as part of the whole which is referred to as mediaeval Christian literature.
Narekatsi's work is among the Old Armenian literary texts whose comprehension gives the greatest difficulty, having been created ten centuries ago, when the dominant ideology was Christianity, and exhibiting the extreme complexity of syntax and imagery as well as intense stylistic individuality, in particular, an abundance of synonymical series.
In expressing his own thoughts Narekatsi, naturally, cloaked many of them in the form of images and expressions borrowed from the Bible. But whereas biblical legends and tales are based on the historical reality of the ancient world Narekatsi's images and expressions were symbols of Christian conceptions of good and evil. By using such symbols, many of them similes, Narekatsi adorned his poetic text imparting to it a quality of rhetoricalness which responded to the tastes of his time. The present complete translation of The Book of Lamentations embodies efforts to convey all these specific features of the Armenian poets's language, syntax and imagery.
The text follows a brief foreword by the translators and a preface "The Brilliance of Design and the Depth of Feeling: the Poetry of Grigor Narekatsi" by S. S. Averintsev.
The translation |
is furnished |
with a commentary, which embra- |
||
ces all fragments |
and individual |
words |
[in Old Armenian with |
|
a parallel literal |
translation] |
that |
can |
be differently interpreted |
by other translators, references to, or, where necessary, citations from, the Bible (book, chapter: verse), indexes of proper, geographical and ethnic names [chapter: paragraph], a glossary, a list of biblical abbreviations and a list of references.
Григор Нарекаци
КНИГА СКОРБНЫХ ПЕСНОПЕНИЙ
Утверждено к печати
Институтом древних рукописей им. Маштоца Матенадаран
Редактор Т. М. Швецова
Младший редактор Н. О. Хотинская
Художник fi. Д. Бритвенко
Художественный редактор Э. Л. Эрман Технический редактор 3. С. ТепЛякова
Корректор К. Н. Драгу нова
ИБ № 15433
Сдано внабор 26.04.85. Подписанокпечати 6.10.87. Формат 60X90 '/|б. Бумага офсетная. Гарнитура «Тайме». Печать офсетная. Усл. п. л. 25,5. Усл. кр.-отт. 26. Уч.-изд. л. 26,06. Тираж 30 000 экз. Изд. № 5650. Зак.№ 3305. Цена 3 р. 60 к.
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Типография цветной печати Госкомитета по делам издательств, полиграфии и книжной торговли АрмССР. Ереван-82, пр. Адмирала Исакова, 48.