Alien places in late Soviet science fiction: the ‘unexpected encounters’ of Arkady and Boris Strugatsky as novels and films

Tarkovsky’s poems are weaved into the texture of his son’s films – namely, Mirror, Stalker and Nostalgia – and the way they interact with these films’ central leitmotifs. Particular attention is given to the image of the father, and the poignancy of his presence and absence in Mirror. In addition, Hunter Blair studies autobiographical references in Arsenii’s poetry, particularly his love poems. The translation of 150 poems is accomplished with fine attention to detail and sensitivity in rendering the subtleties of meaning and the preservation of images. The translator also provides helpful contextual (historical, cultural, biographical, literary, and intertextual) information about the poems, and notes on some of the challenges of translation. The arrangement of the poems does not follow a strict chronology, but the order has its rationale: the poems either appear in the order chosen by Arsenii Tarkovsky for his last collection or else they are grouped in clusters when they are dedicated to the same addressees. The last group are poems not published in the poet’s lifetime. With rare exceptions, translations render the meaning of the Russian texts accurately. Tarkovsky’s sharpness of focus, poetic intonations, and precision of vocabulary are nonetheless not easy to reproduce and maintain. Many of his poems contain folk-poetic, vernacular and outdated words and expressions, rich in mythological, folkloric, and Biblical allusions, often giving earthy physicality and texture to his images – for example, krinitsa (well or spring), has the same root as krinka (a milk jug made of clay); kulesh (a simple hearty soup made of millet and lard that resembles porridge); rubishche (rags or coarse clothes), studenyi (icy cold), belyi svet (the big wide world). Such connections with folkloric and archaic worlds are at times lost in translation. Greater attention should have been paid to the modality and register of the poet’s language as certain words are occasionally given more profane meanings, losing some of their spiritual connotations. That said, the translations demonstrate painstaking work with the original, and offer many finely tuned, subtle readings of Arsenii Tarkovsky’s poems and imagery, while the editor’s identification of thematic links in the works of both masters represents a significant contribution to our understanding of the artistic and spiritual kinship that existed between father and son, poet and poet-filmmaker.