Mikhail Piotrovsky. Revering authenticity

Recently it was the 20th anniversary of the death of Anatoly Sobchak. The city recalled its first mayor. There are many recollections and from them a sense of an evaluation of an ere arises. There are different viewpoints and it seems to me that state of affairs can be compared to the problem of translation. As a philologist and historian, I am able to judge what a translation of a real-life text into different languages is.

For some, the reality of the 1990s is horror, hunger and catastrophe. For others, those same years mean romance, a great exploit, overcoming difficulties. It was a time when for millions of people opportunities opened up that had never existed before. For hundreds of thousands, opportunities that had existed came to an end. The account of the historical reality depends on who is “translating the text”. That’s something we often encounter.

The problem of things getting “lost in translation” does exist – there’s a film with that title. Let me cite two clear examples. The TV series Baghdad Central tells about real-life events – the occupation of Baghdad in 2003. There is a scene in it where the Americans are listening in on a conversation that an Iraqi interpreter is translating for them. The conversation is a complicated one, revealing people’s mentality and exposing secrets. But the translation is imprecise, a standard thing for a non-professional, reflecting the viewpoint of a local inhabitant.

Professional translators know both worlds and won’t omit something important.

Another example is the latest season of the American series Homeland. The CIA intercepts a conversation between members of the Taliban that gets machine-translation in real time. There is a fairy tale that technology can translate anything tolerably well. The film shows the incorrectness of that. An American agent listens to the exchange in a language that he doesn’t know, but he understands that only a father and son can chat in that way and not Taliban commanders between themselves. The human being is the most important element: he perceives the situation on an emotional level.

An adequate translation is an extremely difficult thing. Today, when we have machine translation, the impression arises that it’s simple: press a button and out it comes. Sometimes you don’t even have to ask: a text appears on the computer straightaway with its translation. So far, we are still able to tell them apart. Mechanical translation resembles the digital economy – primitive translations that aren’t based on an understanding of the text. That’s a dangerous path to go down.

In the near future we shall be discussing in the Hermitage Vincent Lépinay’s book Art of Memories. The celebrated French professor, a specialist in the study of science and technology, wrote a book, as we see it, about the sociology and ethnography of the Hermitage. There has never been anything like it before. It’s roughly like this: a researcher descends on the natives, not knowing the language, not being familiar with the local customs, and studies what goes on among them.

The book is constructed on interviews with members of the Hermitage staff. Each of them has their own view of the museum. The resulting picture is a mixed, inconsistent one. Like the account of an elephant given by people who can’t see it as a whole, but feel its trunk, a leg or the tail.

The problem of the actual text and the translation immediately arises. The author of the book devotes much attention to the Hermitage as a special museum in Soviet conditions. The general idea is that the Hermitage existed for a long time in isolation. For Lépinay the cause of that isolation was the USSR. In actual fact, it is the typology of a museum like the Hermitage. It lives a life of its own. People come here to work their whole lives. That is a difference between the Hermitage and many other museums, worldwide and in this country. That is the way things developed and neither tsarist nor Soviet rule is responsible. The book discusses the positive and negative consequences of isolation. It creates an image of the museum as some sort of gold casket that those working here ought to defend.

The Hermitage mentality is to restrict information so as to keep outsiders from getting in. People would take up residence here once and for all. Art historians become real experts thanks to the works that they study. Their qualifications are founded upon constant communing with the objects and with colleagues and not upon what they have been taught. There are academic institutions and there are museums. Museum scholarship is at the tips of people’s fingers. In the Hermitage there are major specialists, curators, who do not have higher degrees. They know their material tremendously well, being constantly in touch with the genuine articles. It is like people who are involved in practical politics as opposed to opinion journalism.

The Hermitage system of restoration is founded upon a sense of authenticity. One might say that we employ the classic techniques of restoration because due to our isolation we did not have access to the latest technologies. Hermitage restoration is conservative, though. It always adheres to traditional methods and principles of reverence for authenticity. We restore everything ourselves, entrusting nothing to other people’s hands, although that is customary practice around the world.

All museums are unique. The Hermitage is special because the majority of stereotypes do not fit it. Just as stereotypes do not fit Russia either. On the one hand, it is a country like all the rest; on the other, it is unique. There needs to be the correct balance between stereotypes and special features peculiar to the country.

Lépinay’s book is an experiment when it comes to translating the Hermitage reality into other languages. Let’s apply the same method to the country.

Going back to the start of the discussion, it’s possible to say that the period of the 1990s has not been described yet. At that time everything collapsed. It was a heroic era.

Sobchak created a Petersburg style in politics. For the first time, people with highbrow approaches went into politics. In our city a distinctive style of resolving problems was established, not economic, but with an emphasis on culture, on the idea that all doors should be open. Long live the monarchy, long live the Russian world abroad, welcome… That was what Sobchak’s position was founded on.

A sign of the times was that people with a diversity of features went into politics, Sobchak stood out for a heroic approach that would work at some moments. He managed to establish the Petersburg influence that people today are feverishly trying to get rid of. It’s important that it survives.

Sergei Belov, Dean of the Law Faculty of our university, wrote an article on the 1993 Constitution. He showed why it turned out fairly Soviet in spirit, contrary to the draft written by Anatoly Sobchak and Sergei Alexyeyev. For them, the foundation of the constitution ought to be the priority of the interests of the person and not the public good. In the 1993 Constitution a socialist approach triumphed. The liberal and social options are opposed to one another. Some of Sobchak’s ideas did get realized, others didn’t, although they may yet become relevant.

In any case, only the direct participants in events speak in the authentic language. One has to understand that a translation always differs from the original.