Saturday, January 11, 2003

Romain Rolland: Colas Breugnon - Dobrý èlovek ešte žije

I can't find any english texts about the novel "Colas Breugnon", the masterpiece of Romain Rolland so I am quoting in Czech and Polish

"Colas Breugnon: umelec - rezbár, meš�an burgundského mesta Clamecy, poctivý, dobrého srdca so zdravou galskou veselos�ou, vierou v život a láskou k nemu. Pomocou týchto vlastností prekonáva všetky �ažkosti a vždy a radostne, smelo pozerá v ústrety k novým dòom, i keï vopred vie, že zase budú �ažké a trpké. Vie sa vždy zmieri� aj s najhorším neš�astím, nestráca nikdy humor, ktorý je zdrojom jeho životnej múdrosti, životného optimizmu."

Some tidbits: "Colas Breugnon" was a challenge for Valdimir Nabokov to translate into Russian and he did a fine job
Amazon.com has a book but you have to special order it and there is no English review. Amazon France has a review in French which I translated using google translatador contraption: "At fifty years, Breugnon Colas, robust country Burgundian of the XVII century, believes to have gained drinks it to blow a little. A pot the wine on its line, a book and a encrier in front of him, it undertakes to tell it. To tell what? All, tales of formerly and life as it is, the lived anecdote and good stories, at the rate/rhythm of the festivals and village work. The priest Short, the as faithful one to the Bottle as with the gate vault. The shepherd, the wolf and the lamb, lucid fable on the small ones of this world, always victims, even of those which claim to protect them... All that gives flesh to a rustic wisdom, rabelaisienne and lucid. "

Lovely book. Great reading. I have a copy in Polish published in 1987 and it's time to read the book again.
Did I mention Rolland got a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1915

Swety Marcin pije wino
Wode pozostawia mlynom
(french proverb in polish)

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