Thread: Роковые Яйца

Hey all
I'm back, and thinking of getting an audiobook! I found an audiobook for a book entitled Роковые яйца, and now I'm wondering if the book uses archaic language. It was written in the 1920's, so I'm not sure. I'd hate to read the book and find out I now have a vocabulary full of words you never hear anymore.

An online version of the text is here
Thanks

In your link it's modern language.

Do you think > if book written a long time ago > it's must be on archaic language? 8)

Originally Posted by Dimitri

In your link it's modern language.

Do you think > if a book was written a long time ago > it's must be in archaic language?

Originally Posted by Dimitri

In your link it's modern language.

Do you think > if book written a long time ago > it's must be on archaic language?

I don't think it was an unreasonable question at all. Even the language of a few hundred years ago can be challenging to a native speaker, much less someone who's trying to learn a language.

To answer your question, I really don't know. I don't know if it applies in this case, but one of the things you may have a bit of a hang-up on is some of the abbreviations and acronyms. Words like Обком, Обсовет, etc. may look really weird -- use something like sokr.ru for those...

Do you think > if book written a long time ago > it's must be on archaic language?

Well, it wouldn't exactly be archaic, but it still might not be how people speak these days. Unless your planning on hanging with babushkas or something.

basurero, ti uchish' kitayskiy eshe?

1920? Modern language then. Maybe one two words will be archaic, but no more.

Read it without fear.

Originally Posted by Dimitri

basurero, ti uchish' kitayskiy eshe?

Het, tbI owibaewbc4. 3to 4ponskij 4zbik, a nye kitaiskij,

Ty 4to, kla8iatupa ne rabotaet?

Originally Posted by Darobat

...a book entitled Роковые яйца, and now I'm wondering if the book uses archaic language. It was written in the 1920's, so I'm not sure.[/url]

Since 1920's Russian has not been chaneged too much. IMHO, even Russian of 1820's is not considered as "archaic".

Originally Posted by basurero

Originally Posted by Dimitri

basurero, ti uchish' kitayskiy eshe?

Het, tbI owibaewbc4. 3to 4ponskij 4zbik, a nye kitaiskij,

у тебя 4to, kla8iatupa ne rabotaet?

Originally Posted by basurero

Originally Posted by Dimitri

In your link it's modern language.

Do you think > if a book was written a long time ago > it's must be in archaic language?

why do you miss the article "a" before "modern language" here??? I didnt get it... (language is a countable noun..)

Yes, but Dimitri was referring to Russian specifically, ie it's modern Russian. If he said "it's a modern language", it would mean that it could be any modern language, not only Russian. I can't explain it any better though, I'm no linguist.....

Originally Posted by basurero

Het, tbI owibaewbc4. 3to 4ponskij 4zbik, a ne kitaiskij,

kla8iatypa ne pabotaet?

argh, it seems I'm lacking in consistency with my transliteration...

I've read this book and it seems to me that the language of this book is not outdated at all. Besides story is pretty funny.

So, with that out of the way, where did you find the audiobook file Darobat -- I might give this a shot too...

1920 is hardly archaic. Perhaps you mean "old fashiond". I doubt you are good enough at Russian to understand the book anyway.

Also in Russian you only capitalise the first word of titles:

Роковые яйца.

Originally Posted by Бармалей

Originally Posted by Dimitri

In your link it's modern language.

Do you think > if book written a long time ago > it's must be on archaic language?

I don't think it was an unreasonable question at all. Even the language of a few hundred years ago can be challenging to a native speaker, much less someone who's trying to learn a language.

To answer your question, I really don't know. I don't know if it applies in this case, but one of the things you may have a bit of a hang-up on is some of the abbreviations and acronyms. Words like Обком, Обсовет, etc. may look really weird -- use something like sokr.ru for those...

It is unreasonable. Firstly suggesting 1920 is archaic means he doens't know what the word means. Also languages generaly evolve at similar rates, so you can just compare it to English. Would you think an Enlgish book written in the 1920s would be archaic?

Originally Posted by TATY

1920 is hardly archaic. Perhaps you mean "old fashiond". I doubt you are good enough at Russian to understand the book anyway.

Also in Russian you only capitalise the first word of titles:

Роковые яйца.

Yeah, it is rather difficult. With a dictionary I'm fine for the most part, but there's a little too much dictionary involved when reading it for it to be useful. I'll keep it in mind for the future, but try to find an easier audiobook for now.

And perhaps this question was rather silly, but I'd still hate to read a book that uses outdated language (not archaic ) while I'm still only learning.

Originally Posted by TATY

Would you think an Enlgish book written in the 1920s would be archaic?

Yes, I would think it would be archaic -- after all, if they spelled "English" as "Enlgish" back then, could you imagine what a word like "philanthropy" or "melancholy" would look like? Phliantrhoyp or Mellinclhyo, anyone?