At my age there is a strong urge to leave well enough alone: do not mend it if it is not broken. On the other hand, what does not move dies.
The problem as I see it is that you cannot have it both ways. The way I do it, to be able to sit down and write something one has to keep up a certain buzz emitter in the brain. And the buzz could only be in one language, either/or - English and Russian are very different. As long as you insert pieces of one into the other it is safe, but once you go whole hog you can only follow the direction you have chosen. Somebody like Brodsky does not count: he never really crossed over, his output in English is patently ignorable.
There is another consideration which I also have to take into account: through the years my Russian audience has been very kind and grateful to me. Should I break a happy marriage for the sake of a stormy romance? Could I come back if the new affair goes sour? Is this a moral problem or simply a practical one?
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Date: 2005-05-11 11:01 am (UTC)The problem as I see it is that you cannot have it both ways. The way I do it, to be able to sit down and write something one has to keep up a certain buzz emitter in the brain. And the buzz could only be in one language, either/or - English and Russian are very different. As long as you insert pieces of one into the other it is safe, but once you go whole hog you can only follow the direction you have chosen. Somebody like Brodsky does not count: he never really crossed over, his output in English is patently ignorable.
There is another consideration which I also have to take into account: through the years my Russian audience has been very kind and grateful to me. Should I break a happy marriage for the sake of a stormy romance? Could I come back if the new affair goes sour? Is this a moral problem or simply a practical one?
Most likely, it will happen the way it will.