Author: Kai

Rubbish Boy

by Yevgeny Zamyatin Another Zamyatin “fairytale” for you, translated yesterday and this morning by me. Why has it taken so long to get these out (no one is wondering)? Well, essentially, because I don’t think very much of them compared to the second volume as a whole, or Pyotr Petrovich and God in this one. But […]

Cherubim

by Yevgeny Zamyatin Translated yesterday and this morning by me. It’s been a while since we had one of these, so here you go! * * * Everyone knows what cherubim are: head and wings, that’s the whole of their being. So it is written in all churches.  And grandmother had a dream: cherubim were […]

Windex

Spontaneous creation! A poem. Made in a Word document while wiping down my keyboard to clean off the oil and grime. — “          q=[][-   Zghjuhg nj876rdsxdcfuiijb]=6t567\]“ ; m,.lkmn m,kbnv cvhygxfrewa        Q232Q u7y6tra          QW2 BVCCU87TR7890-\ z?

Pyotr Petrovich

Another Zamyatin “fairytale”, from the collection Fairytales 1914-1917. Like “God”, from yesterday, this is — I believe — the first version in English. Translated just now, tonight, by me. * * * “Pyotr Petrovich” by Yevgeny Zamyatin There is no one in the whole world smarter than Pyotr Petrovich: he thinks it all, he thinks […]

God

“God” by Yevgeny Zamyatin, from his first collection of fairytalesTranslated last night by me The kingdom was rich and ancient, famous for its female fertility and male valor. And the kingdom was placed in the gap between the oven and the wall at the house of the postman Mizyumin. There was a particular cockroach named […]

Fairytales

PICTURES by Yevgeny ZamyatinTranslated this morning by me I came to visit a friend—to ask for a loan. He wasn’t at home, nor his wife: a boy came out to meet me in the hall. He was squeaky clean. “Wait a little. Mom and Dad are coming back.” And so that I wouldn’t be bored, […]