Сергей Александрович Есенин (1895-1925)

До свиданья, друг мой, до свиданья.

До свиданья, друг мой, до свиданья.

Милый мой, ты у меня в груди.

Предназначенное расставанье

Обещает встречу впереди.

До свиданья, друг мой, без руки, без слова,

Не грусти и не печаль бровей,

-В этой жизни умирать не ново,

Но и жить, конечно, не новей.

Sergei Alexandrovich Yesenin (1895-1925)

‘Goodbye, my friend, goodbye.’

Goodbye, my friend, goodbye.

My love, you are in my heart.

It was preordained we should part

And be reunited by and by.

Goodbye, my friend, no handshake to endure,

Let’s have no sadness and no furrowed brow

-There’s nothing new in dying now,

But to live, of course, is no newer.

After being discharged from a mental hospital on December 21, after nearly a two month stay, he again began to drink and moved to Leningrad by the 24th. His comrades reported that he was in high spirits while he was staying at the Hotel d’Angletre. On December 27th, he wrote “Goodbye, my friend, goodbye” in his own blood. He gave the poem to Elizaveta Ustinova that morning, but following Esenin’s request, she did not read it until it was too late.

…

Leonid Leonov said of all of Esenin’s last poems “He foretold his end in everytheme, cried out about it in every line: One merely needed ears to hear him.” Shershenevich wrote “Everywhere in his verse the single theme began to appear: the theme of death—We thought it was only a literary theme. We thought it was only a poetic device, and yet it turned out to be the terrible truth’” However, Olga Hasty wrote “Although his suicide was shocking and theatrical, critics and commentators found in his verse no dearth of material for retrospective proof of its inevitability.” A fear of losing his poetic abilities was a widely accepted explanation for his suicide and the images of death in his latter poetry. (Hasty, 837)

Аноним спросил: Do you know if Russian surnames still agree with the gender of the person? I know that 100 years ago they did, but I met a Russian woman the other day whose last name was Osipov...

EDIT: Yes!

(Taken from The Guardian)

Pussy Riot sentenced to two years in prison colony over anti-Putin protest

Russian leader accused of orchestrating case against trio found guilty of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred

Three members of the Russian feminist punk band Pussy Riot are facing two years in a prison colony after they were found guilty of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred, in a case seen as the first salvo in Vladimir Putin’s crackdown on opposition to his rule.

Maria Alyokhina, 24, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 22, and Yekaterina Samutsevich, 30, were calmly defiant as a judge handed down the sentence, to cries of “Shame!” inside and outside court. Judge Marina Syrova said she rejected their arguments that they had not intended to offend religious believers but were protesting against the Orthodox church’s support for Putin.

The case has galvanised Russia’s anti-Putin protest movement and raised the international profile of their cause, with dozens of protests held worldwide.

British and American officials were quick to condemn what they described as a “disproportionate” sentence. The Foreign Office minister, Alistair Burt, said: “I am deeply concerned by the sentencing of three members of the band Pussy Riot, which can only be considered a disproportionate response to an expression of political belief.”

A spokeswoman for the US state department said: “We urge Russian authorities to review this case and ensure that the right to freedom of expression is upheld.”

Catherine Ashton, the EU’s high representative, said she was disappointed by the verdict. “It puts a serious question mark over Russia’s respect for international obligations of fair, transparent, and independent legal process,” she said.

Putin has alleged that foreign powers are behind the protest movement against his rule, launched shortly after he announced last autumn that he was returning to the presidency.

Pussy Riot’s supporters and opposition activists accused Putin of personally orchestrating the case against them. “They are in jail because it is Putin’s personal revenge,” said Alexey Navalny, the opposition’s de facto leader. “The verdict was written by Vladimir Putin.”

The three women were arrested in March after performing an anti-Putin “punk prayer” inside Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. The case against them is seen as serving two functions: a warning to other dissidents, and an appeal to Putin’s conservative base. Russia’s growing campaign against gay rights is seen as a part of that effort, and on Friday Moscow’s main court upheld a 100-year ban on gay pride rallies.

On Friday night, the Russian Orthodox church repeated its criticism of the band’s “blasphemous” protest, which it said displayed “crude hostility towards millions of people” but called on state authorities “to show mercy to the people convicted within the framework of the law, in the hope that they will refrain from repeating blasphemous actions”.

Dozens of protesters were arrested outside court, including chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov and leftist opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov. Hundreds more remained long after the court session had ended, shouting: “Russia without Putin!”

More than a dozen people have been arrested for taking part in a protest on 6 May against Putin, and could be jailed or fined under a new law against unauthorised demonstrations.

Navalny faces up to 10 years in prison after he was charged in a fraud case widely seen as an excuse to crack down on his activism. The country’s rubber-stamp parliament has recently passed a law forcing nongovernmental organisations that receive international grants to declare themselves “foreign agents”, and another that could prompt widespread censorship of the internet.

Protests in support of Pussy Riot were held around the world in New York, Vienna and dozens of other cities. The Royal Court theatre in London staged verbatim readings of the women’s closing statement to the court to coincide with the verdict. Sir Paul McCartney, Madonna, and Björk are among the dozens of stars who have issued messages of support. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch called the sentence a bitter blow to freedom of expression inside Russia.

Activists said the case has only strengthened the growing movement against Putin’s rule. “Russia must stop being a laughing stock in the eyes of the world,” said one woman protesting outside the court, who declined to give her name. “We must join civilised society. I really want to hope that our government will find common sense and stop showing itself in such a monstrous way.”

Boris Akunin, one of Russia’s most popular authors, said that the verdict had doomed Putin to “another year and a half of international shame and humiliation.”

Other supporters were less optimistic. Tolokonnikova’s husband Pyotr Verzilov said blame for the verdict rested with one man alone: “Whatever Putin wants, Putin gets.”

In public statements made earlier this month, Putin had called for the women to be judged “not too severely”. Prosecutors had asked for a three-year sentence.

The women remained defiant throughout the trial, issuing powerful closing statements that quickly entered the canon of Russia’s dissident speeches. “We have won,” Samutsevich said in her closing statement. “The whole world now sees that the criminal case against us has been fabricated. The system cannot conceal the repressive nature of this trial. Once again, the world sees Russia differently than the way Putin tries to present it.” The women intend to appeal against the sentence.

Парад Победы на Красной площади 9 мая 2012.

Moscow Victory Parade in Red Square.

Всех с днём победы!

(From Wikipedia:)

Victory Day or 9 May marks the capitulation of Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union in the Second World War (also known as the Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union and most post-Soviet states). It was first inaugurated in the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union, following the signing of the surrender document late in the evening on 8 May 1945 (after midnight, thus on 9 May, by Moscow Time). The Soviet government announced the victory early on 9 May after the signing ceremony in Berlin. Though the official inauguration happened in 1945 (which means it has been celebrated since 1946), the holiday became a non-labour day only in 1965 and only in some of the countries.

If you click through to the link, you’ll find Russian news clips with transcripts (click on the letter T near the bottom right corner).

It’s great for listening practice, so enjoy!

Happy Easter/С праздником Пасхи!

Apologies, this post comes a day late, but Happy Easter/С праздником Пасхи!

Easter is an important occasion in Russia, celebrated by the Russian Orthodox Church according to the Orthodox calendar. The celebrations happen in April or May.

Russians celebrate Easter with decorated eggs, festive food and customs.

The origin of the Russian Easter egg goes back to pre-Christian times, when eggs were seen as symbols of fertility. When Orthodoxy was adopted, eggs were given a Christian association: for example, red eggs (крашенки), as shown in the picture above, symbolise the blood of Christ.

(Пасхальный) кулич is a sort of bread typically eaten in Easter:

As is пасха, a dish made from cheese and other ingredients, formed into a pyramidal shape.

The letters ‘XB’ stand for ‘Христос воскрес’ (Christ is risen).

Russian Easter service is held Saturday evening (Великая Суббота, Holy Saturday); at midnight, the bells are rung and the priest says, ‘Христос воскрес!’ (‘Christ is risen!’), to which the congregation replies, ‘Воистину воскрес!’ (‘He is truly risen!’).

Sources:

http://www.transparent.com/russian/

http://goeasteurope.about.com/od/russia/a/easterinrussia.htm

Images:

http://www.transparent.com/russian/

http://chrislinda.forum2x2.ru/t1161-topic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paskha_(meal)

A BBC documentary: Putin, Russia and the West.

Thought this might be of interest since the Russian presidential elections will be taking place exactly next week, on Sunday 4th March.

This is a really excellent four-part documentary that I’d really recommend watching if you’re interested in what’s been going on in Russia. In terms of learning Russian, there’s a lot of spoken Russian in it as well, so you’ll probably learn some vocabulary here and there - and don’t worry, there are English subtitles! It’s all up on Youtube - links below:

1. Taking Control (embedded above)

2001: Putin gives a prophetic warning about Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Taliban.

2. Democracy Threatens

Leonid Kuchma talks about the election of his successor in 2004 and Putin’s involvement.

3. War

Political figures discuss the conflict between Russia and Georgia in August 2008.

4. New Start

The inside story of Barack Obama’s relationship with the Kremlin.

Go and follow properrussian and check out the original blog here. It is most excellent.

Why do people anticipate Winter holidays? Because this is the time to switch off an alarm clock and sleep longer. This is a time for lazy morning coffee and the quiet satisfaction of taking your time. Christmas is a good time for relaxation. Some countries limit winter vacations to a few days, right between Christmas and the New Year, and return to working routine on January 2ndat the latest. In Russia, the New Year holidays officially last from January 1st to January 10th, however, unofficially, many offices go on vacations during the last week of December. Russians are quite serious about holidays.

There are at least five different words in the Russian language for non-working days. The word “праздники” (plural form of “праздник”) is for holidays, for days when people celebrate something significant. The New Year holidays in Russian are “новогодние праздники”. There is another set of holidays called “майские праздники” (May holidays) that starts on May 1st (a Labour Day, a tradition inherited from the Soviet Union) and lasts until Victory Day (the end of World War II).

The word “выходные” (plural form of “выходной”) just means non-working days with no specific reason indicated. This word may be used for holidays as well as for a weekend (Saturdays and Sundays are normally non-working days in Russia).

The word “каникулы” (vacations) was initially used for academic vacations only. However, for last ten years, the usage of this word extended to non-academic areas as well, thus, you may find news headlines like this “ Во что обойдутся казне Рождественские каникулы” (How much Christmas vacations will cost to the state budget). Outside academic life, the word “каникулы” means quite a long period of non-working days.

Besides official holidays and weekends, every employee has a right for a vacation, a period of time that one is to be away from his/her primary job, while maintaining employment. In Russian, the word for (paid or unpaid) time off is “отпуск”. Summer time is often called “время отпусков” (vacation time), because many clerks prefer to schedule their vacations for July and August.

Finally, the last word that also means non-working day is “отгул”. Sometimes, an employee may be rewarded with a day-off for working additional hours. In this case, the employee may take a day-off on any day of the working week. Or, one may need an extra day-off for some personal reasons and, in order to get this day-off, he or she works more hours or perform some additional tasks.

Do I have any followers from the UK? Check out these papers, which you can find pretty much anywhere in England:

Англия (Free)

Пульс UK (Free)

Лондон Инфо (50p - This one of course, can only be found in London.) 

I found these papers in ‘Berezka’, on Finchley Road, but you can probably find them in Russian shops dotted around England. (OK, well, mainly in London. There’s also one in Birmingham and another in Oxford, apparently.)

Here’s a site I just found, which lists Russian shops in the UK (so you can try out some Russian delicacies without having to go to Russia!):

www.russians-in-london.co.uk/russian-shops.html

shapka-ushanka:

why-russian:

I found it really helpful!

I also agree - it is important to learn the literal translations of constructs. It is what I have done from the start, simply because I felt it more appropriate to translate that way. My teacher always gave me hell for it, assuming I didn’t know how to translate into proper English.

All Russian nouns have a gender; there are three genders: masculine, feminine and neuter.

There is no direct article (the) or indirect article (a), so we have to look at the ending of each word to determine its gender.

The observant among you will have noticed that the only ending ‘shared’ by more than one gender is the soft sign (ь). About three-quarters of nouns ending in the soft sign (ь) are feminine; the rest are masculine, often they are ‘naturally’ masculine or feminine – e.g. царь (tsar) is masculine and дочь (daughter) is feminine, which makes the gender easy to distinguish.

Spelling rules

Yes, the Russian grammar has a particular set of rules regarding spelling, so pay attention!

1)     ы is replaced by и,я by а and ю by у after ж, ч, ш, щ and г, к, х:

нога, ‘leg’, gen. sing. ноги

молчать, ‘to be silent’, first-person sing. молчу, third-person pl. молчат

Note:

Exceptions are found in some non-Russian words and names: брошюра ‘brochure’, Кызызлкум ‘Kyzylkum Desert’, Кяхта ‘Kyakhta’

2)     о is replaced by е in unstressed position after ж, ч, ш, щ, ц:

немец ‘German’, instr. sing. немцем, gen. pl. немцев

3)     Initial и is replaced by ы following a prefix ending in a consonant:

impf. играть/pf. сыграть ‘to play’

интересный ‘interesting’, небезынтересный ‘not uninteresting’

4)     The prefixes без-/бес-; вз-, воз-/вс-, вос-; из-/ис-; раз-/рас- are spelt with з before voiced consonants, voiced sonants or vowels and with с before unvoiced consonants:

беззубный ‘toothless’ but бесконечный ‘infinite’

взлетать ‘to take off’ but всходить ‘to rise’

избить ‘to beat up’ but испить ‘to sup’

разобрать ‘to dismantle’ but расцепить ‘to uncouple’

5)     Prefixes ending in a consonant (e.g. под-, от-, раз-, с-) are spelt подо-, ото-, разо-, со-:

i) In compounds of -йти (подоийти ‘to approach’, подошёл ‘I approached etc.)

ii) Before consonants + ь (сошью ‘I shall sew’)

iii) Before certain consonant clusters (разогнать ‘to disperse’)

The Russian Cyrillic alphabet consists of 33 letters, including 20 consonants, 10 vowels, a semi-consonant/semi-vowel (й), a hard sign (ъ) and a soft sign (ь).

• NB: Printed and cursive Cyrillic look quite different. Have a look at this site to learn how to write in Cyrillic:

http://www.brown.edu/Departments/LRC/RU_writing/index.htm

• To hear what the alphabet sounds like, check out this site:

http://www.languagehelpers.com/Russian/TheRussianAlphabet.html

• To get a Russian keyboard, there are three options:

1. You can use this website for a free online Russian keyboard (there are several different types of keyboard there, including phonetic ones): http://www.winrus.com/screen_e.htm
2. Go to Control Panel - Clock, Language, and Region - Change keyboards or other input methods (under Region and Language) - then add ‘Russian’. To switch between languages, Left Alt + Shift
3. Buy a keyboard!

Hello all!

This shall be a most fantastic blog dedicated to the intricacies of Russian grammar.

I myself am still a learner, so please feel free to correct me if I’m wrong!