Volume 02 Issue 08-2022
15
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
(ISSN
–
2771-2834)
VOLUME
02
I
SSUE
08
Pages:
15-19
SJIF
I
MPACT
FACTOR
(2021:
5.
705
)
(2022:
5.
705
)
OCLC
–
1121105677
METADATA
IF
–
5.914
Publisher:
Oscar Publishing Services
Servi
ABSTRACT
This article is dedicated to the work of William Shakespeare, the most famous representative of world literature, and
it is of great importance to study his work. William Shakespeare's Uzbekized sonnets have been translated by Maqsud
Shaykhzoda, Yusuf Shomansur, Jamal Kamal in a unique tone and style. This article provides solutions to the
translation problems we face and compares sonnets translated by translators and discusses similarities and
differences.
KEYWORDS
Sonnet, ghazal, rubai, tertset, William Shakespeare, Yusuf Shomansur, Maqsud Shaykhzoda, Jamal Kamal.
INTRODUCTION
William
Shakespeare
is
the
most
famous
representative of world literature. His name has been
staying next to such the great thinkers as Homer,
Firdawsi, Dante, Nizami, Hafiz She’razi, Sa’di, A. Nawai,
F. Dostoevsky, L. Tolstoy and R. Tagore because in
such his plays as Hamlet, Othello, King Lear
complexities
of
human
beings’
psychology,
interpersonal relations are depicted without bias. The
truth embodied in these plays still engrosses the
minds of people and makes them feel empathy. For this
reason the works by W. Shakespeare have been
arousing interest as usual all over the world. Theatres
Research Article
VARIETY OF SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS
Submission Date:
August 11, 2022,
Accepted Date:
August 21, 2022,
Published Date:
August 27, 2022
Crossref doi:
https://doi.org/10.37547/ijll/Volume02Issue08-04
Rakhmonova Sayyora Rajabovna
PhD in philology, Uzbek national institute of musical art named after Yunus Rajabi, Lecturer at Department of
“Uzbek literature, languages and humanities”, Uzbekistan
Journal
Website:
https://theusajournals.
com/index.php/ijll
Copyright:
Original
content from this work
may be used under the
terms of the creative
commons
attributes
4.0 licence.
Volume 02 Issue 08-2022
16
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
(ISSN
–
2771-2834)
VOLUME
02
I
SSUE
08
Pages:
15-19
SJIF
I
MPACT
FACTOR
(2021:
5.
705
)
(2022:
5.
705
)
OCLC
–
1121105677
METADATA
IF
–
5.914
Publisher:
Oscar Publishing Services
Servi
begin their seasons with his plays and producers
consider it an honor to stage such plays as Othello and
Hamlet. Actors dream of playing title roles in these
plays.
The truth about the nature of human beings is depicted
in the plays by W. Shakespeare. Everyone perceives
them and falls under their impression in his own way
and it is one of the main reasons why translators tackle
his works. An interest to the works of the English
playwright arouse in Uzbekistan at the beginning of
the 20th century. Great Uzbek poet and novelist
Abdulhamid Cholpon was among the first who started
translating the works by W. Shakespeare. The
generation of the Uzbek writers which Gafur Gulom
and Maqsud Shayhzoda belonged to translated a
number of his plays and sonnets into Uzbek.
W. Shakespeare wrote all his plays and in particular
Othello, Hamlet and King Lear in verse and feelings and
rushes of the characters are depicted in an impressive
way. In the extremely impressive monologues and
dialogues the author opens his heart.
W. Shakespeare is famous not only with his plays but
with sonnets as well and they are also full of wise
sayings about a human being’s heart filled with
contradictions and his hard lot.
The genre of sonnet has a high position in Western
literature as ghazal and rubai have in Islamic one.
Sonnet has a strict form like ghazal and rubai. It is a
fourteen-line verse and its first two strophes consist of
four-line ones and other two – three-line ones. Its four-
line strophes are called quatrains and three-line ones –
tercets. Sonnet has a peculiar rhyming scheme and its
four-line strophes have two sonorous rhymes and
three-line ones – two or three. The rhymes in tercets
are different from those ones in quatrains. In sonnet
each strophe has to be a complete verse. The first
quatrain is considered as an exposition i.e. a prologue.
The main idea of sonnet is set forth in this quatrain and
in the second one a substance aimed at uncovering the
idea of the verse is developed. In the following tercets
proper conclusions are made on the bases of the
thoughts in quatrains. The conclusion starts in the first
tercet and ends in the second one. As we mentioned
above rhymes must be sonorous in sonnet. These
characteristics of sonnet show how it a complicated
poetical form is. It means the translation of sonnets
into other languages is more difficult rather than other
poetical forms. No matter how these great works are
difficult where feelings of human being and the truth
about his life are depicted masterly an interest in them
will never stop. Translators try to translate into their
own languages such works and share these
masterpieces of creative thinking with their fellow
citizens.
Sonnets by W. Shakespeare have been translated into
Uzbek by famous Uzbek poets Maqsud Shayhzoda and
Yuysuf Shomansur. He wrote 154 sonnets. 1n 1965-1966
Maqsud Shayhzoda translated a few of them into
Uzbek but it was Yuysuf Shomansur who translated all
sonnets and it was published as a separate book in
1978. They translated sonnets through Russian.
After 30 years a new book of translation of sonnets by
the great poet has come out. The translation was
made the People Poet of Uzbekistan Jamol Kamol who
translated them directly from English into Uzbek. One
can compare his translation with old ones and see a
serious difference between them. They are evident
almost in all lines and in their meanings too. I think one
should think of a big problem of adequacy while
reading or researching translations of works by non-
Volume 02 Issue 08-2022
17
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
(ISSN
–
2771-2834)
VOLUME
02
I
SSUE
08
Pages:
15-19
SJIF
I
MPACT
FACTOR
(2021:
5.
705
)
(2022:
5.
705
)
OCLC
–
1121105677
METADATA
IF
–
5.914
Publisher:
Oscar Publishing Services
Servi
Russian authors made through Russian into Uzbek.
Most works of authors of English, German, French,
Spanish, Japanese literature etc. have been translated
into Uzbek through Russian.
The translation of sonnets by W. Shakespeare made
directly from English into Uzbek shows how a
translation from the original sounds better than a
translation from the second language when its initial
allure is lost in a certain sense.
The translation of sonnets by W. Shakespeare shows
their translators’ ability and talent. It is fair to say that
both Maqsud Shayhzoda and Yuysuf Shomansur
translated sonnets with a proper intonation and style.
If to compare the two poets’ and J.Kamol’s
translations one can see how M. Shayhzoda and Y.
Shomansur were constrained to feel free because of
not speaking English and they totally depend on their
Russian translation. Both M. Shayhzoda and Y.
Shomansur reached some positive results in conveying
the idea of sonnets and they did their best to keep in
the process of translation both the form and content
of sonnets’ text in Russian. While reading the
translations made by J. Kamol one can make sure that
the previous translators lost sight of some facets of
meanings of Shakespeare ‘s sonnets.
When we compare translations by Y. Shomansur and J.
Kamol we witness that both of them tried to make
their translations adequate to the original and to avoid
adding unnecessary lines. At the same time it is evident
a serious difference between them. In order to make
sure here we put side-by-side the Sonnet 1 in original
and its word-for-word re-translations into English of
those translations into Uzbek.
From fairest creatures we desire increase,
That thereby beauty's rose might never die,
But as the riper should by time decease,
His tender heir might bear his memory:
But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes,
Feed'st thy light'st flame with self-substantial fuel,
Making a famine where abundance lies,
Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.
Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament
And only herald to the gaudy spring,
Within thine own bud buriest thy content
And, tender churl, makest waste in niggarding.
Pity the world, or else this glutton be,
To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee.
Word-for-word re-translations:
J. Kamol’s translation
Y.Shomansur’s translation
We want the beauties to get more beautiful,
While awaiting the sprouts to yield fruits
Let the rose flourish and never die.
We want the beauty to get flourished.
In case the rose fades and loses its leaves
It is alright with the aged flower to lose the leaves,
Volume 02 Issue 08-2022
18
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
(ISSN
–
2771-2834)
VOLUME
02
I
SSUE
08
Pages:
15-19
SJIF
I
MPACT
FACTOR
(2021:
5.
705
)
(2022:
5.
705
)
OCLC
–
1121105677
METADATA
IF
–
5.914
Publisher:
Oscar Publishing Services
Servi
May its delicate rosebuds flower.
Because its buds will follow it and flourish.
And you, the beautiful woman, dedicate
You are enraptured with your own beauty
The heat of your heart and your youthfulness
And sacrificing your unique virtue.
To your beauty. Your are making a famine Your abundance makes you poor,
where abundance lies
And you are a merciless foe to yourself.
but it is a foe and enemy to you.
Is there any beauty as yours?
As a perishable herald to the spring
You are the only herald to the spring.
You are an ornament to the current day.
You are wasting while being greedy
Before you are in leaf you are doomed
And burying the bud in your heart.
to falling,
Both waste and greediness are embodied in you.
Pity the world and leave your offspring here
Do not wither yourself and pity the world and be a glatton,
And do not take him into the grave.
Do not allow the harvest to perish!
It should be noted that in poetry a translator cannot
follow the author all the time. In particular it is uneasy
to overcome all obstacles arising in the process of
translation when original and target languages belong
to remote families of languages. The process turns
more difficult because the translator must convey in
the target language not only the idea and spirit of
sonnets but their poetics as measures, syllables,
refrains and rhymes too.
In this regard one should recognize that both
translators Y.Shomansur and J.Kamol had worked
hard. The only difference is that if J. Kamol translated
the sonnets directly from English and Y. Shomansur did
them through Russian. It is evident in their word-for-
word re-translation into English.
As an example, we can compare the translations of the
first two lines of the first quatrain. First we give here
the original:
From fairest creatures we desire increase,
That thereby beauty's rose might never die...
The J. Kamol’s translation is more appropriate:
Истаймиз, гўзаллар бўлсин зиёда,
Гўзаллик бар
қ
уриб, яшнасин абад.
(We want the beauties to get more beautiful,
Let the rose flourish and never die).
But the Y. Shomansur’s translation diverges from the
original:
Гўзаллик бар
қ
урсин, сўлмасин, дея,
Аъло новдалардан кутамиз
ҳ
осил.
(While awaiting the sprouts to yield fruits
Volume 02 Issue 08-2022
19
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
(ISSN
–
2771-2834)
VOLUME
02
I
SSUE
08
Pages:
15-19
SJIF
I
MPACT
FACTOR
(2021:
5.
705
)
(2022:
5.
705
)
OCLC
–
1121105677
METADATA
IF
–
5.914
Publisher:
Oscar Publishing Services
Servi
We want the beauty to get flourished).
One needs to say that this carelessness has caused
another problem and introduced a little change into
the conclusion:
Етилажак
ҳ
осил бўлмасин хазон!
(Do not allow the harvest to perish!)
To tell the truth not all lines of the translation by J.
Kamol are adequate but they sound similar as the
original does and convey their meanings in a correct
way.
There is a few phrases like “beauty's rose” in the
orginal which were not translated by an adequate
phrase into Uzbek and “gaudy spring” has been
translated merely “bahor” without any epithets
whereas Uzbek is rich of such ones.
But J. Kamol has managed to translate these following
lines in an adequate way:
Within thine own bud buriest thy content
And, tender churl, makest waste in niggarding...
Хасислик айлабон этасан исроф,
Куртакни ма
ҳ
в айлаб ботининг аро...
(You are wasting while being greedy
And burying the bud in your heart...)
There is the same meaning in the translation by Y.
Shomansur too but it is difficult to say they are
adequate. Comparing to the original one can see that
they had been translated into Uzbek another
language.
Барг ёзмай жувонмарг сенга исти
қ
бол,
Исроф ва зи
қ
налик сенда ялакат...
(Before you are in leaf you are doomed to falling,
Both waste and greediness are embodied in you...)
There are a few inconsistencies between the original
and the translation. The same could be said about the
rhymes in the translations. Though W. Shakespeare
had not been consistent with the classic forms of
sonnet the rhymes in the original are very sonorous:
increase, decease, eyes, lies etc. which cannot be said
about the rhymes in the both translations.
Nevertheless they are important as primary attempts.
Eventually the works in particular the sonnets by W.
Shakespeare get more and more attractive for Uzbek
poets and translators with their topicality and artistic
sophistication. No doubt that fresh and more adequate
translations will appear in future.
REFERENCES
1.
Western European sonnet XII-XVII centuries. -
Leningrad: LGU, 1988. -405 p.
2.
Foreign
literature.
Renaissance.
Comp.
B.Pureskiev. - Moscow: Education, 1976. -385 p.
3.
Sonnets. William Shakespeare. Jamal Kamal.
Tashkent: Vector press, 2009.
4.
Mizrabova J.I. "Macbeth" translated by Jamal
Kamal // Philology issues I. -Tashkent, 2016.
5.
Mizrabova J.I. Uzbek translations of "Hamlet" //
Uzbek problems of textual studies and source
studies in philology. - Namangan, 2016.
