Pavel Antokolsky

Not from a legend, not from sky lands,
He’s just a youth from those times – 
Though he’s played by the hundred hundreds
Good actors, questioning his rights.

I’d play him in another manner,
Just more disparate and gay:
He laughs, as in revenge, whenever
His fate set crashes on his way.

He saw his funs in many crowds, 
But youth is very short to stroll 
Into a man in the applause 
Of pits, of galleries and stalls.

Tho’ dead men were upset and dreary,  
Tho’ beauties were in tears, else, –  
All made up roughly, searched and varied  
All doesn’t count – hasn’t a sense….

And putting fault on his character,
His childishness and slow trends,
He promptly perishes – the actor,
Not played his role to the end.  

Not from a legend, not from sky lands,
He’s understood in every way,
Such as that Hamlet – hundred hundreds,
Such Hamlet I intend to play.


Translated by Yevgeny Bonver, December, 2000