“Well, the rabbit is not like that”: B. Potter’s literary fairy-tales translated by P.S. Solovyova (“Rabbit’s adventures”, “The doll-house”)

This article will focus on translations (or, more precisely, verse transcriptions) of the tales of the English writer Beatrix Potter - “The Tale of Peter Rabbit” (1902), “The Tale of Benjamin Bunny” (1904) and “The Tale of the Two Bad Mice” (1904) - into Russian, made by P.S. Solovyova (Allegro) and published by her publishing house “Path”. In our study, we will consider in detail the specifics of the transcription of these works, translation and “adaptation” strategies chosen by the Russian poetess. We will pay attention to how in the translation, despite the replacement of poetry with prose, the adaptation of texts for the Russian reader, the introduction of new storylines, the features of Potter’s original poetics were carefully preserved (especially its relation to sound writing and the auditory structure of the text). Along the way, we will look at how the original concepts were rethought, and above all - the concept of “naughty child”, which is extremely important for late Victorian and Edwardian children’s literature. We will also pay attention to the didactic-spiritual substrate, reinforced in the Russian version. Finally, together with the translations of Solovieva, we will consider the first translations of B. Potter’s tales, made by A.N. Rozhdestvenskaya and appeared in the journal “Heartfelt Word” - the main competitor of Solovyova’s “Path”: this analysis will allow us to more fully and more clearly highlight those features that were especially successful for P.S. Solovyova in her unique translations.