This chapter explores how literary texts from the Napoleonic era translated the concept of French 'patrie' into Russian. By selecting between 'otechestvo', 'otchizna', and 'rodina', Russian writers gave different nuances to the formulation of their relationships to home, relationships elaborated against the backdrop of linguistic and cultural ties with France. As the texts of Aleksandr Radishchev, Nikolai Karamzin, Vasilii Zhukovskii and Fedor Glinka demonstrate, the selection of an effective equivalent for 'patrie' was not a purely Russian problem, but involved slippage and ambiguity relating to the term 'patrie' and its changing sociolinguistic connotations in French cultural discourse. In France as in Russia, elite terms for the homeland were closely tied to the nobility’s preoccupations with its social position and changing role vis-à-vis the peasantry, and the Russian alternatives for 'patrie' evolved hand-in-hand with semantic change in the French term. Russian texts begin by equating 'patrie' with 'otechestvo', then explore other options as they muse both on their public relationship to the state and their personal relationship to the specific rural territories within it.

Otechestvo, Otchizna, Rodina: Russian 'Translations' of Patrie in the Napoleonic Period

DICKINSON, SARA
2015-01-01

Abstract

This chapter explores how literary texts from the Napoleonic era translated the concept of French 'patrie' into Russian. By selecting between 'otechestvo', 'otchizna', and 'rodina', Russian writers gave different nuances to the formulation of their relationships to home, relationships elaborated against the backdrop of linguistic and cultural ties with France. As the texts of Aleksandr Radishchev, Nikolai Karamzin, Vasilii Zhukovskii and Fedor Glinka demonstrate, the selection of an effective equivalent for 'patrie' was not a purely Russian problem, but involved slippage and ambiguity relating to the term 'patrie' and its changing sociolinguistic connotations in French cultural discourse. In France as in Russia, elite terms for the homeland were closely tied to the nobility’s preoccupations with its social position and changing role vis-à-vis the peasantry, and the Russian alternatives for 'patrie' evolved hand-in-hand with semantic change in the French term. Russian texts begin by equating 'patrie' with 'otechestvo', then explore other options as they muse both on their public relationship to the state and their personal relationship to the specific rural territories within it.
File in questo prodotto:
File Dimensione Formato  
Dickinson in Offord 2015-compressed.pdf

accesso chiuso

Descrizione: Articolo
Tipologia: Altro materiale allegato
Dimensione 4.18 MB
Formato Adobe PDF
4.18 MB Adobe PDF   Visualizza/Apri   Richiedi una copia

I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11567/826039
Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
  • Scopus ND
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.isi??? ND
social impact