EDNOTE. DN is not only the English translator of
_Beheading_ (during VN lifetime) but the INTO Italian of _Transparent
Things_.
----- Original Message -----
From: Dmitri
Nabokov
Sent: Thursday, March 18, 2004 12:56 PM
Subject: FW: Query: Translation of Invitation to Beheading's "Mali e
trano t'amesti!"
Dear
Don,
For
Charles Byrd:
No,
the brother is only singing untranslatable mock-Italian. With some
adjustment, the phrase could be made to sound remotely like
"Strangely and badly I loved you!" I struggled a good bit with the thing
when I was translating Invitation. It is clearly not
French, and I doubt the Onegin reference. Barabtarlo's
conjecture is ingenious.
Greetings,
DN
Don:
I
continue to receive highly insulting mail from Livry. I see no action has been
taken with regard to my letter.
D.
From: D. Barton Johnson [mailto:chtodel@cox.net]
Sent: Wednesday,
March 17, 2004 3:33 PM
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Subject: Query:
Translation of Invitation to Beheading's "Mali e trano
t'amesti!"
----- Original Message -----
From: "Charles Byrd" byrdc@uga.edu
I remember that
Gennady Barabtarlo decoded the line, sung by one of Marthe's brothers in
"Invitation to a Beheading," "Mali e trano t'amesti!" (103) as an anagram
of the Russian "Smert' mila; eto taina!" but I can't seem to come up with a
literal English translation of the line as it originally appears. This is
Italian, isn't it?
It would be great if you or anyone on the
Nabokov list could translate the song lyric into English for
me.
Many thanks,
Charles Byrd
University of
Georgia