Page "Vasily Zhukovsky" Paragraph 12

Zhukovsky translated from a staggeringly wide range of sources, often without attribution, given that modern ideas of intellectual property did not exist in his day.

In his choice of original, however, he was consistently motivated by formal principles, above all generic.

Following his initial success with the " Elegy ," he was especially admired for his first-rate melodious translations of German and English ballads.

Among these, the ballad " Ludmila " ( 1808 ) and its companion piece " Svetlana " ( 1813 ) are considered landmarks in the Russian poetic tradition.

Both are free translations of Gottfried August Burger's well-known German ballad " Lenore ," although each renders the original in a completely different way.

Characteristically, Zhukovsky later translated " Lenore " yet a third time as part of his lifelong effort to develop a natural-sounding Russian dactylic hexameter.

His many translations of Schiller -- including both Classical and Romantic ballads, lyrics, and the verse drama Jungfrau von Orléans ( about Joan of Arc ) -- became classic works in Russian that many consider to be of equal if not higher quality than their originals.

They were remarkable for their psychological depth, strongly influencing the younger generation of Russian realists, among them Dostoevsky, who famously called them " nash Schiller " (" our Schiller ").