News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy th... by frandroid on Tuesday March 14, 2017 @05:28PM (#13871632)
Apparently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Pevear_and_Larissa_Vol... have made translations of Dostoyevsky which are eminently more readable than the rest. I've started reading their translation of The Master and Margarita and I'm enjoying it a lot.
Re:Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy th... by defen on Tuesday March 14, 2017 @06:26PM (#13872054)
> I've started reading their translation of The Master and Margarita and I'm enjoying it a lot.

I'll have to check that out - I enjoyed their War & Peace. I found Ginsburg's translation of The Master and Margarita to be unreadably bad. There was just no joy in it whatsoever, to the point where I was wondering why it was such a famous book. It's been a while, but I recall the adjective use being terribly wooden. So many sentences with the basic structure "X walked down the long broad beautiful street. He spoke with the tall bespectacled bearded man" etc. It was quite tiresome.

Re:Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy th... by frandroid on Wednesday March 15, 2017 @01:51PM (#13878203)
It has a ton of footnotes explaining the background and in-jokes on the specific names and characters invoked. They really enrich the novel in ways that a non-religiously educated person like me would miss. The preface is really excellent too.