Here's an extract from a book I'm translating.
“Oh, I knew I was right to hire you! We shall be merry as grigs. So you will come tonight?”
If you Google this, you'll find the following definition:
merry (or lively) as a grig full of fun; extravagantly lively. The meaning and origin of the word grig are unknown. Samuel Johnson conjectured in his Dictionary that it referred to ‘anything below the natural size’. A sense that fits in with the lively version of this idiom is ‘a young or small eel in fresh water’. The phrases merry grig and merry Greek , meaning ‘a lively, playful person’, were both in use in the mid 16th century, but it is impossible to establish the precise relationship between them or to be certain which may be an alteration of the other.
My task is to find the closest expression in Russian. It's best to use an idiom with the same or similar meaning. Something that expresses the same metaphor would be perfect, but we don't have any idioms about playful fish. Fish are considered to be stupid. Ума как у рыбки (a mind like a fish's).
But we have the idiom "божья пташка" (literally: God's little bird), made famous in a poem by Pushkin:
Птичка божия не знает Ни заботы, ни труда; Хлопотливо не свивает Долговечного гнезда; В долгу ночь на ветке дремлет; Солнце красное взойдет: Птичка гласу бога внемлет, Встрепенется и поет. За весной, красой природы, Лето знойное пройдет — И туман и непогоды Осень поздняя несет: Людям скучно, людям горе; Птичка в дальные страны, В теплый край, за сине море Улетает до весны.
А.С. Пушкин
"Пташка" (a tiny bird) is something small enough to render the Russian phrase beautifully, and it's associated with a merry, carefree life.
So here's my translation:
– О, я знала, что поступила правильно, наняв вас! Мы будем беспечны, как пташки. Значит, вы идете со мной сегодня?
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I loved this post! I also translate, but in the opposite direction: from Russian into English. I recently translated a story, Гном (The Gnome), which in the second paragraph had an expression that was impossible to render into English with the same meaning (and wit) as the Russian. I had to think long and hard, but came up with something I really liked in the end:
Пятница. Февраль. Зашел в пивнушку после работы. Хотелось выпить одну маленькую бутылочку, и потом, конечно, сразу домой. Я был сонным, очень уставшим. Вообще плохо переношу нашу российскую зиму. Следовало родиться где-нибудь на Мальдивах. Что бы я ни делал, зимой мне все время кажется, что я просто сплю. Я во сне. В белом-белом-белом сне.
Я взял пиво и подошел к металлическому столику с серой столе́шницей. Стульев возле него не было, поэтому я решил пить стоя. Плевать, что в ногах правды нет. Правда вообще непонятно где. В пивнушке, помимо меня, находились только какой-то парень лет двадцати и странный старик. Очень странный старик. Я назвал его про себя Гномом. Потому что он был одет в дурацкий длинный красный колпа́к (хотя Новый год и даже старый Новый год уже давно прошли). Старик был корена́стым, низенького роста, у него сильно торчали уши. Ну натурально Гном.
It's a Friday in February. I pop into a local dive after work for a quick brewsky. The plan was to knock back one little beer and then head straight home, of course. I'm feeling drowsy and exhausted. These Russian winters are extremely hard on me — I don't do well with them at all. Sometimes I think I should've been born in the Maldives somewhere. No matter what I do, I feel like I sleep my way through every winter. Like I'm in a dream — a really, really, really white dream.
I grab my beer and head towards a metal table with a gray top. There are no chairs around it, so I decide to drink standing. In case I have to make a run for it, I think to myself and giggle. Won't be much of a race, I think, looking around. Besides me, there were only two other patrons — a guy in his twenties and this strange old man. A really strange old man. In my mind, I baptized him the Gnome because he was wearing this stupid long, red pointed hat (even though Christmas had long since passed). He was stocky, on the short side, and his ears jutted out from under the brim. In other words, a textbook gnome.
In English, when you're sitting and someone is standing, we say "Are you waiting to make a run for it?" as if they've done something wrong and are standing because they expect to have to run away if someone sees them. I like it in my translation because it segues beautifully into the next part of the paragraph where the author says there were only a few people in the bar. You'll see I added Won't be much of a race. Here's the entire story translated into English: https://vk.com/@222179097-the-gnome
Thank you! You're very helpful!
I liked the translation of the story and your choice if the phrase in that case, it's really good :)
I'm so glad you enjoyed it. Thank you for taking the time to read it! It's nice to meet a colleague)))
The pleasure is all mine :)