Is this typical for Australia?

A 36-year old graduate student opened fire Monday on students at Monash University, in Australia. He killed two and wounded several other people before a lecturer and another student tackled the gunman to the ground, preventing further bloodshed. As they tried to restrain the gunman, the lecturer called for assistance from others, as he had been shot in the arm and the leg and blood was seeping from his wounds.

I compare that reaction to that of us in the U.S., who have been very carefully instructed over a long period of time to Let Someone In Authority Handle It. Don't get involved. Don't antagonize the perp. It's not your place to do anything, lest you "take the law into your own hands."

Please note: I am not disputing that the police play a necessary role in society, and that they ought to be called in such situations. And while I do not approve of vigilantism, I do distinguish between it and acting in one's own self-defense.

I do dispute the philosophy that, in effect, results in the upbringing of people who can do little other than cower in fear and do nothing, even while someone walks up to them and blows their brains out (as reportedly happened at Columbine High School). On a larger scale, the application of the same philosophy to hijackers ("Take 'em where they want to go... don't antagonize them") helped al Qaeda accomplish its 9/11 goals. (By the same token, once the people on the plane over Pennsylvania understood the score, and that it didn't matter whether they antagonized their captors or not, they did take action.)

One wonders how "far" this deranged individual would have gotten on a U.S. campus? I shudder to think of a suitable answer. One also wonders where this individual obtained his weapons, since handguns are banned in Australia? That answer is somewhat easier to visualize.

Cheers...

A brief respite... back in translationland!

Got a call at 6 pm from M in Houston. Can I do 5 pages for tomorrow, noon?

's done. About 2,000 words. About a half hour ago.

I work better when my mind is fresh, that's for sure.

Cheers...

On Pushkin...

The subject of my torment is a verse written by Pushkin in 1830. I am striving to understand it, and to translate it. It is a fairly well-known piece that's included in many anthologies, Стихи, сочиненные ночью во время бессонницы (Verses composed at night during insomnia).

One of the first things the non-Russian student of Alekander Pushkin learns, besides the fact that Pushkin is considered to be the ne plus ultra of Russian literature, is that the man devised a 14-line stanza for his Eugene Onegin, with what has been described as "a slippery rhyme scheme and treacherously foursquare meter" (William Davies). The formal name for the meter in Onegin is iambic tetrameter, and there I shall let the matter lie. What does matter is meter and rhyme scheme is something to contend with when dealing with poetry of Pushkin's era, and of Pushkin himself.

In "Стихи,..." the basic unit of construction is the trochaic foot, which means a stressed syllable, followed by an unstressed one. There are typically four such feet in a line, which would make it tetrameter, but the last syllable is missing in several lines. I seem to recall this is okay, as it tends to cut down on the number of so-called "feminine" rhymes, in which there are two rhyming syllables where the first is stressed and the second isn't. For some reason, poems that rely largely on such rhymes just don't have the same "oomph" as those where the rhymes rely on a single stressed syllable that ends the line (and yes, you guessed it, these are called "masculine" rhymes).

The rhyme scheme is (if I did this right) abbaccaaeeaff.

(Here, I am relying upon very old memories of lit classes in which I spent more time thinking of what to do after class than about the subject at hand... one of the hazards of being young, I guess.)

So, with all that being said, let me introduce the poem:

СТИХИ, СОЧИНЕННЫЕ НОЧЬЮ ВО ВРЕМЯ БЕССОННИЦЫ

Мне не спится, нет огня;
Всюду мрак и сон докучный.
Ход часов лишь однозвучный
Раздается близ меня,
Парки бабье лепетанье,
Спящей ночи трепетанье,
Жизни мышья беготня...
Что тревожишь ты меня?
Что ты значишь, скучный шепот?
Укоризна или ропот
Мной утраченного дня?
От меня чего ты хочешь?
Ты зовешь или пророчишь?
Я понять тебя хочу,
Смысла я в тебе ищу...
      - А.С. Пушкин (1830)

And my effort thus far...

I can't sleep, the fire's dead;
Vexsome dreams and gloom prevailing.
Steady ticking, e'er unfailing,
From the clock, assails my head.

The next lines puzzle me, sort of:

Парки бабье лепетанье,

The Парки, I finally figured out, are the Roman Parcae (goddesses of fate), also known as the Tria Fata. Most sources (e.g., Columbia Encyclopedia) send you to the definition of the Greek Fates if you look up Parcae. Under "Fates," the Columbia Encyclopedia says the following: in Greek religion and mythology, three goddesses who controlled human lives; also called the Moerae or Moirai. They were: Clotho, who spun the web of life; Lachesis, who measured its length; and Atropos, who cut it. The Roman Fates were the Parcae—Nona, Decuma, and Morta. In Norse mythology, the three Norns wove the web of life. Interestingly, the CE notes that the proper pronunciation of Parcae is par-see, not par-kee.

In any event, Pushkin is dealing, here, with their "female chatter."

Спящей ночи трепетанье,

And here, with the "babble" of a sleeping night. I am beginning to notice that sound is very central in this poem, which makes sense, since the author is sitting in darkness, unable to sleep.

Жизни мышья беготня...

I understand this to describe the running-around-like-crazy aspect of a mouse's life.

Что тревожишь ты меня?

This I understand. "Why do you trouble me?"

So, if we ignore meter and rhyme, I have four more lines as a "try" that say, basically:

Parcae prattling about nothing,
Babble of a night that's sleeping,
Frantic pace of mouse's tread...
Why do you disturb my bed?

(I lied about ignoring meter and rhyme. The meter and rhyme came to me as I was writing it. I paused before writing the last line, as the original doesn't actually ask why the author's "bed" is troubled. I shall hide, at least for now, behind poetic license.)

To be continued.

Cheers...