“In the fields under snow and rain” ( English O, wert thou in the cauld blast ) is one of the last poems of the poet Robert Burns , written in 1796. Translated into Russian by Samuel Marshak . The work attracted the attention of several composers who shifted it to music.
| In the fields under snow and rain | |
|---|---|
| O, wert thou in the cauld blast | |
| Genre | poem song |
| Author | Robert Burns |
| Original language | English |
| Date of writing | 1796 |
| Date of first publication | |
Content
- 1 History of creation
- 2 Translation Marshak
- 3 Musical arrangements
- 4 notes
- 5 Literature
Creation History
The creation of the poem was preceded by a long illness of Burns. The cold, caught in the fall of 1795, was aggravated by a rheumatic heart attack. A poet who did not get out of bed almost the whole winter sometimes lost consciousness; Robert Armor and eighteen-year-old Jesse Lewars took care of Robert - the younger sister of his friend John [1] . The girl nursed the Burns children, was involved in any housework, and was admirable to the head of the family. The poet called her "the only angel still remaining on the earth" [2] .
In early spring, Burns, who had not recovered from his illness and was in a melancholy mood, went to visit John Lewars. Jesse, sitting at the clavichord , was singing songs. Robert asked her to play his favorite tune to him. After listening to her several times, Burns returned home and composed poems in one evening: “O, wert thou in the cauld blast, On yonder lea, on yonder lea” [3] [4] :
| Poems consisted of a sad melody, of the damp wind outside the window, of loyal girlish eyes and an inescapable, unquenchable desire to protect, to cover with your breasts from storms and troubles everything weak, helpless, young ... |
Jesse, along with Gene, was with Burns until his last minutes. In July of the same 1796, it was she who brought his sons into the dying Robert’s bedroom to say goodbye to his father [5] . According to the writer and translator Rita Rait-Kovaleva , there was a legend among local residents that the grave of Jesse Lewars (Thompson was married), who was buried in the vicinity of the monument to the poet in 1855, did not get wet during rain: “Marble Burns was sheltered from the weather his faithful friend, as he once wanted to shelter alive ” [6] .
Marshak's Translation
In the fields, under the snow and rain,
My dear friend, my poor friend
I would have covered you with a cloak
From winter blizzards, from winter blizzards.
And if they would give me an inheritance
The whole globe of the earth, the whole globe of the earth
With whatever happiness I possess
You alone, you alone.
The collection "English ballads and songs" in the translation of Marshak was published in 1941 (publishing house " Soviet writer "). Korney Chukovsky , who was in Tashkent during the war, in a letter to Samuil Yakovlevich informed that Anna Akhmatova had given him the book. After recognizing that Marshak is “a master of not only steel verse, but also“ wet ”(in the terminology of Blok ), Korney Ivanovich separately singled out several poems [7] :
| “Jammy”, “In the fields under the snow”, “Gypsy”, etc. were unexpected for me. They contain so much genuine passion and lyrics - such features that only shone through in your children's poems. |
The editor of the collection of ballads and poems was the poet Alexander Twardowski . Later, speaking in his notes about Burns and Marshak, Alexander Trifonovich noted that the success of the published book was connected not only with the skill of the translator, but also with the exact selection of the poet’s best poems, which include “tender, clean and touching, touching love songs like “In the fields under snow and rain ...” or “You left me, Jamie” ” [8] .
O, wert thou in the cauld blast
On yonder lea, on yonder lea,
My plaidie to the angry airt,
I'd shelter thee, I'd shelter thee,
Or did Misfortune's bitter storms
Around thee blaw, around thee blaw,
Thy bield should be my bosom,
To share it a ', to share it a'.
Musical arrangements
Dmitry Shostakovich was one of the first composers to turn to Marshak’s poem “In the Fields Under Snow and Rain”. In 1943, having arrived from the evacuation to the capital, Dmitry Dmitrievich met with Samuel Yakovlevich and set about creating a cycle of musical works based on Burns' poems. He worked on them at the Moscow Hotel and wrote in one breath [9] :
| “In the fields, under snow and rain ...” - a gentle appeal to the beloved, touching, humble, without frantic passion. Song of fidelity. Watercolor. Everything flows calmly, toneably steady: Moderate tempo, tonality - Dorian D minor. A rare example of Shostakovich’s work is pure lyricism, a bright love feeling free from storms. |
Composer Tikhon Khrennikov, after meeting with ballads and poems, wrote the novel “In the Fields Under Snow and Rain”. As the musicologist I. Martynov noted, his interpretation is distinguished by “calm thoughtfulness and sadness” [10] . In 1944, the composer Georgy Sviridov also proposed his musical version of the poem, who composed a piece for voice and piano [11] .
Weller and I confess that the main love with our girls took place against the backdrop of the song “In the Fields Under Snow and Rain” ... - Dmitry Bykov [12] |
In the first half of the 1970s, the vocal suite of Alexander Gradsky “Reflections of the Jester” was published, which included the song “In the fields under snow and rain” written in Baroque-rock style [13] [14] , which, according to experts , “Gradsky's most famous composition from the Burns cycle” [15] . Answering a question from the correspondent of Novaya Gazeta Dmitry Bykov about how the song was created, the composer said that its appearance was accidental: in the studio, where another work was recorded on Burns poems, Alexander Borisovich randomly opened Marshak’s translation book, read the poem and here But he came up with a melody for him [12] .
Notes
- ↑ Wright, 1959 , p. 337.
- ↑ Wright, 1959 , p. 323.
- ↑ Mackay, James. Burns. A Biography of Robert Burns. - Darvel: Alloway Publishing, 2004 .-- P. 624. - ISBN 0907526-85-3 .
- ↑ Wright, 1959 , p. 339.
- ↑ Wright, 1959 , p. 353.
- ↑ Wright, 1959 , p. 340.
- ↑ Miron Petrovsky . Letters of K. Chukovsky to S. Marshak // Almanac "Egupets". - 2002. - Vol. 12 .
- ↑ Tvardovsky A.T. Articles and notes on literature. - M .: Soviet writer, 1961. - S. 68-82.
- ↑ S. Khentova. Shostakovich. Life and creativity . - L .: Soviet composer, 1986. - T. 2. - S. 125-135.
- ↑ I.I. Martynov. Tikhon Nikolaevich Khrennikov . - M .: Music, 1987.
- ↑ Sohor A.N. George Sviridov . - M .: Soviet composer, 1972. - S. 301.
- ↑ 1 2 Dmitry Bykov. Alexander Gradsky: “Music exists to express the main and inexplicable” // Novaya Gazeta . - 2013. - No. December 27 . Archived June 12, 2015.
- ↑ Sergey Tikhonov. "Reflections of the jester" . Site of Alexander Gradsky. Date of treatment June 14, 2015.
- ↑ A. Gradsky In the fields under snow and rain . YouTube Date of treatment June 14, 2015.
- ↑ Denis Bocharov. Scottish Yesenin // Culture . - 2014. - No. January 22 .
Literature
- R. Ya. Wright-Kovalev . Robert Burns - M .: Young Guard , 1959. - 360 p. - (The life of wonderful people ).