Brodsky on cats and people
Please note that the bit we are analysing is between 1:10 and 2:45.
Below is a word-by-word transcript. Click on any paragraph to see literal and proper translations along with commentary; click again to collapse. Joseph Brodsky was a prominent Russian and American poet and essayist.
Интервьюер (interviewer):
Literal: So, it is known, that you are a cat person. Why? Why is the cat — your one of favourite animals?
Proper: You are known to be a cat person. Why? Why are cats among your favourite animals?
Commentary:
Вот is simply a filler word. It actually means ‘here, look’, ‘here you go’, etc.
Кошатник — cat person (masculine). A woman would be called a кошатница. Note that English adopted the Slavic suffix ‘nik’ in words like ‘beatnik’.
Ваше одно из — awkward and incorrect word order. It should be одно из ваших любимых (one of your favourite).
Бродский (Brodsky):
Literal: One… that is, I have one simple answer. Such, simple answer.
Proper: I have a simple answer. A simple one.
Commentary: то есть means ‘i.e.’ or ‘that is’, which also happens to be its literal translation.
Literal: Onсe I, I remember I, when I, um, had a heart attack once, and I was lying in the apartment of my acquaintance in New York, and moving I was not allowed to, so, I was lying after the heart attack and so on and so on. And she had a cat, and naturally I had to observe it, it must be said, with a higher degree of concentration than this happens usually.
Proper: I remember once, when I had a heart attack, I was at my friend’s apartment in New York and I wasn’t allowed to move. So, I was resting after the heart attack. My friend had a cat, and I naturally ended up observing it more closely than usually.
Commentary:
Значит is a filler word that could be put virtually anywhere. It’s similar to how ‘like’ would be used in English. Значит literally means ‘means’.
Двигаться мне нельзя было. The beauty of Russian is that it allows for virtually any word order. A more orthodox word order here would be мне нельзя было двигаться. Different word order makes a sentence sound a bit different. While not as commonly as in Russian, this happens in English too. Compare: I’m not sure about this vs. This, I’m not sure about.
Literal: I am looking at this cat — black it was such — and it came to my head that whatever the cat pose would adopt, whatever it did — even when, let’s say, when it does doo-doo, yea? — it is still graceful. That is, there is no position, in which the cat would be not gracious.
Proper: I’m looking at the cat — a black cat it was — and it struck me that whatever pose the cat would be in, whatever it did — even when, say, she makes doo-doo — it is still elegant. In other words, there is no position, in which a cat would not be elegant.
Commentary:
Черная она была такая — an unorthodox word order again, completely natural though. A more straight forward way would be ‘она была черная’. Also, такая, at the end adds a conversational feel to the statement. Somewhat like if in English you say ‘I saw this black cat’ vs. ‘I saw a black cat’.
Делать кака — deliberate childspeak on Brodsky’s part. Кака has the same root as какать (to poop) and is commonly used with children.
Literal: I thought that, let’s say, if we take of the most amazing beauty being of female sex, for example, just that same Marilyn Monroe, and so on and so on.
Proper: I thought that if we look at, say, the most beautiful female human being, take Marilyn Monroe for instance.
Commentary:
И так далее и так далее has already appeared before. It acts like a filler word, but people don’t usually say it as such. This seems to be a Brodsky thing.
Интервьюер (interviewer):
Literal: In her too there is a lot of catlike things.
Proper: There is something catlike about her, isn’t there.
Commentary:
Кошачьего — an adjective without a noun. English has to use ‘something’ here for a noun to not leave the adjective ‘catlike’ alone. But lone adjectives do occur in English too, e.g., ‘the rich’.
Такого, similar to one of the sentences above and, like above, it adds a conversational style to the sentence. To incorporate it, the phrase could be alternatively translated as ‘There is this catlike aura about her, isn’t there’.
Бродский (Brodsky):
Literal: Yes, yes. Then still in some position she will turn out to be a little bit awkward, yes? That is, if from some sort of angle, well, let’s say if she is tying her boot, and so on and so on.
Proper: Yes, exactly. There would be some positions in which she would still appear awkward, right? From a certain angle, say, she’s tying her boot, etc.
Commentary:
Ботиночек — Russian can make virtually anything diminutive. This is one of the examples. A non-diminutive version would be ботинок, which Brodsky did not opt for here, likely because it would’ve sounded a bit too harsh in the context of elegancy.
Literal: And it came to my head, from where… And I thought, from where are our aesthetic standards, the standards of beauty, if a cat satisfies them one hundred percent and a human being seventy percent, yes?
Proper: And I realised… I thought, where do our aesthetics and beauty standards come from if a cat meets them one hundred percent, while human beings only get up to seventy.
Commentary:
Же is an intensifier with no meaning of its own.