Russia Blog Roundup – 13 May

I’d like to offer you a few thoughts by way of feedback on your latest “Blog Roundup,” a noble effort undertaken by few other bloggers but which I feel could be vastly improved with a bit more attention to detail.

(1) It’s really a shame that not a single post you mention is a translation from Russian into English. My blog, just for instance, has published two such items in the “fortnight” you cover, and I think it’s beyond dispute that such efforts are the most important and valuable thing that English-language bloggers can do. Adding insult to injury, you find space for a German translation! Here’s the link to my recent content (nearly two hundred others follow):

http://larussophobe.wordpress.com/category/translations/

(2) Your toilet-like effort to imply that La Russophobe, the only Russia blog ever to have been cited by the New York Review of Books and listed by you yourself as one of the “top five” Russia blogs in existence, is a toilet ought to be beneath you. It’s hypocritical, childish, offensive and pathetic. In light of my first point, it’s truly shameful and even more than that, bizarre.

(3) Your suggestion that it’s the Duma that is seeking to regulate Internet speech is laughable, and harmful in the sense that it distracts attention from the real offender. Everyone knows the Duma is just a rubber stamp, with no genuine opposition, and therefore that this is the Kremlin’s measure. The buck stops with Mr. Medvedev, so-called “liberal.”

(4) Don’t know if you actually looked at the Russian Life piece or not, but they themselves back away from the “novel” designation and refer to “works of fiction.” Eugene Onegin is hardly a novel, other entries are dubious under that moniker. What’s more it’s not a true top ten list, since the entries are not ranked and since it only pertains to “lesser known” items, not the fully body of Russian work. Given the latter, they must be referring to translations (Onegin isn’t “lesser known” in Russian), and that’s just silly. Onegin is a pale shadow in English, not great.

(5) Excellent links to the Other Russia and Mat Rodina and Amsterdam pieces. I can only hope some actual Russians read your blog and will take note of these important and devastating comments on Russian society. You might consider doing a bit more to cover such issues outside the context of a roundup.

(6) Disappointing that you don’t mention Russia’s barbaric parading of nuclear weapons and goose-stepping soldiers through Red Square or Medvedev’s scary, crazy “holy-Russian-empire” rhetoric aimed at Georgia. Were you really unable to find any bloggers discussing this terrifying topic? If so you probably didn’t look hard enough.

(7) Really, really disappointing that you couldn’t find space to mention Paul Goble’s new blog over at the Moscow Times. One post from Paul is worth all the others on your list combined.

On the matter of translation, refer to the third item in 1343:

http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@1018.WYaefjpm0bM@.7760b692/1468

Several follow-up inquiries to multi-lingual observers of such matter resulted in no taking issue with the apparent discrepancy concerning what Chernomyrdin said relative to what was translated.

Does The Moscow Times have a blog offering a slant diferent from Paul Goble?

Michael Averko´s last blog post..CONNECTICUT GOVERNOR PROCLAIMS MAY 2009 AS ELECTROMAGNETIC SENSITIVITY (EMS) AWARENESS MONTH

Exactly, James.
It is frequently mentioned that Russia invests far too little in physical infrastructure, and I agree that this was a valid argument, at least until recently when it’s been stepped up.
But the point is that although much of it is dilapidated, unlike practically all developing nations Russia actually has an infrastructure inherited from Soviet times (as do all east-central European nations). As such the need to renew it is not anywhere near as urgent as the need to build it in Third World nations.

Sublime Oblivion´s last blog post..Victory Day Special: The Poisonous Myths of the Eastern Front

That was far too easy… 🙂