When Vladimir Nabokov's translation of Pushkin’s masterpiece Eugene Onegin was first published in 1964, it ignited a storm of controversy that famously resulted in the demise of Nabokov’s friendship with critic Edmund Wilson. While Wilson derided it as a disappointment in the New York Review of Books, other critics hailed the translation and accompanying commentary as Nabokov’s highest achievement. Nabokov himself strove to render a literal translation that captured "the exact contextual meaning of the original," arguing that, "only this is true translation." Nabokov’s Eugene Onegin remains the most famous and frequently cited English-language version of the most celebrated poem in Russian literature, a translation that reflects a lifelong admiration of Pushkin on the part of one of the twentieth century’s most brilliant writers. Now with a new foreword by Nabokov biographer Brian Boyd, this edition brings a classic work of enduring literary interest to a new generation of readers.

When Onegin, a dashing but jaded aristocrat from St. Petersburg, inherits his uncle’s estate in the country, his arrival sets hearts afire and stirs the embers of jealousy. Even the reclusive young Tatyana falls hopelessly under the spell of the aloof Onegin and professes her love for him. Will playing with lonely Russian hearts reap heartbreak or romance?

Eugene Onegin, a "novel in verse," as announced by its subtitle, and Russia's best-loved classic, was written by Alexander Pushkin, that country's unsurpassed literary idol. Yet the American reading public generally attributes its authorship to Tchaikovsky, who composed the score and co-authored the libretto of its operatic adaptation. Henry Hoyt, translator for this bilingual edition, suggests that this misunderstanding may stem from other translations' having been cast in a mold ill-fitted to capture both the spirit and meaning of the original. Most of the translations follow the complicated rhyme and meter scheme of the original, where the invention of new rhymes for the translated version forces the translator to abandon verbal fidelity to the original. The other translations are in prose, lacking the rhythm and hence much of the spirit of the original. Mr. Hoyt's translation is unrhymed, but retains the meter of Pushkin's verses, a procedure under which he believes verbal fidelity is attainable along with rhythm, affording the English-speaking reader an experience as close as possible to that of a Russian-speaking reader of the original. This publication includes an appendix describing the Cyrillic alphabet for readers unfamiliar with it but interested in examining the original text.

This edition includes a line by line English translation together with the native Russian (written in Cyrillic) for the opera goer.

Vladimir Nabokov's famous and brilliant commentary on Pushkin's Eugene Onegin When Vladimir Nabokov first published his controversial translation of Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin in 1964, the great majority of the edition was taken up by Nabokov’s witty and exhaustive commentary. Presented here in its own volume, the commentary is a unique scholarly masterwork by one of the twentieth century’s greatest writers—a work that Nabokov biographer Brian Boyd calls “the most detailed commentary ever made on” Onegin and “indispensable to all serious students of Pushkin’s masterpiece.” In his commentary, Nabokov seeks to illuminate every possible nuance of this nineteenth-century classic. He explains obscurities, traces literary influences, relates Onegin to Pushkin’s other work, and in a characteristically entertaining manner dwells on a host of interesting details relevant to the poem and the Russia it depicts. Nabokov also provides translations of lines and stanzas deleted by the censor or by Pushkin himself, variants from Pushkin’s notebooks, fragments of a continuation called “Onegin’s Journey,” the unfinished and unpublished “Chapter Ten,” other continuations, and an index. A work of astonishing erudition and passion, Nabokov’s commentary is a landmark in the history of literary scholarship and in the understanding and appreciation of the greatest work of Russia’s national poet.

Read Pushkin's most famous poems without the need for a dictionary with this insightful edition. Passages in Russian and English word-by-word translation are displayed side by side on separate pages, the stressed syllables labeled in bold for each Russian word, thereby eliminating the need for a dictionary. Study Pushkin's most moving passages with ease. This edition is a must for Russian language learners and Russian literature lovers wanting to study Pushkin.