egorius

Arthur Conan Doyle, «The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes»

Захотелось внезапно почитать про Холмса на английском. Книжка — сборник всех рассказов, некоторые мне даже не попадались раньшее. Но до конца не осилил, надоело. Какие-то повторы пошли, да и в целом все довольно однотипно. В детстве так не казалось, конечно.

В оригинале помимо регулярных «сцен табакокурения» Холмс еще и балуется кокаином. Посмотрел книжку, которую читал в детстве — все так, все на месте, никого это не смущало. Интересно, как обстоят дела с современными российскими изданиями, не повыкорчевали еще? А то ведь хватает любителей переписать историю.

Забавно, что параллель между братом Вильгельмом и Холмсом прописана у Эко предельно четко, но я просто не опознал эту почти дословную цитату:

Nothing could exceed his energy when the working fit was upon him; but now and again a reaction would seize him, and for days on end he would lie upon the sofa in the sitting-room, hardly uttering a word or moving a muscle from morning to night.

La sua energia pareva inesauribile, quando lo coglieva un eccesso di attività. Ma di tanto in tanto, quasi il suo spirito vitale partecipasse del gambero, recedeva in momenti di inerzia e lo vidi per ora stare sul suo giaciglio in cella, pronunciando a malapena qualche monosillabo, senza contrarre un solo muscolo del viso.

Еще мне было очень интересно, как же звучит в оригинале наше невыговариваемое «Мне следовало бы дать такого тумака, чтобы я полетел отсюда до Черинг-кросса». Оказалось, хорошо звучит:

I deserve to be kicked from here to Charing Cross.

И незабвенный боргес на шпонах:

There is as much difference to my eyes between the leaded bourgeois type of a Times article and the slovenly print of an evening half-penny paper.

Ну и еще разных цитат на память до кучи.

In the every-day affairs of life it is more useful to reason forwards, and so the other comes to be neglected. There are fifty who can reason synthetically for one who can reason analytically.

An exception disproves the rule.

Individuals very, but percentages remain constant.

You see, but you do not observe.

Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent.

Not invisible but unnoticed, Watson.

To carry the art, however, to its highest pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to utilise all the facts which have come to his knowledge; and this in itself implies ... a possession of all knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and encyclopaedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment.

“Is is possible.”
“More than that. It is probable.”

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Nothing clears up a case so much as stating it to another person.

I hereby commend you, and I counsel you by way of caution to forbear from crossing the moor in those dark hours when the powers of evil are exalted.

Intense mental concentration has a curious way of blotting out what has passed.

Every problem becomes very childish when once it is explained to you.

Football does not come within my horizon.

It’s all been done before, and will be again.

Breadth of view, my dear Mr. Mac, is one of the essentials of our profession.

Education never ends, Watson.