Crime & Punishment censorship?

[x1a4]

Hi,

I'm currently reading this edition of Crime & Punishment (ISBN 0-553-21175-7) and noticed something strange someone may be able to shed some light on. It seems that street names and landmarks such as bridge names have been censored. Whenever a street name or landmark is mentioned only the first letter is shown followed by a long line, for example:

Raskolnikov walked straight to X----- Bridge, stood in the middle, and leaning both elbows on the rail stared into the distance.

Is this Soviet-era censorship? Perhaps the street names and bridges have been named after royals and the commies didn't want them mentioned, or is it something else?

I also noticed strange spelling. "he waked" instead of "he awoke", or "to-day" instead of "today". Is this old English or just translator's/editor's mistake?

[andymorton]

Hi,

I'm currently reading this edition of Crime & Punishment (ISBN 0-553-21175-7) and noticed something strange someone may be able to shed some light on. It seems that street names and landmarks such as bridge names have been censored. Whenever a street name or landmark is mentioned only the first letter is shown followed by a long line, for example:


Is this Soviet-era censorship? Perhaps the street names and bridges have been named after royals and the commies didn't want them mentioned, or is it something else?

I also noticed strange spelling. "he waked" instead of "he awoke", or "to-day" instead of "today". Is this old English or just translator's/editor's mistake?

I read the Oxford World Classics edition a few years ago and the same thing happens in there. I'm not sure why this is but the translator of the one I have has a Western name (Jessie Coulson) so I don't think it would be politically motivated, since Dostoyevsky's original text would have been available in the West and it was probably translated from that rather than any version the Soviet government put out.
One of my favourite novels, by the way!!

andy

[DZ*]

These were "coded" by Dostoevsky himself.

In Russian:
http://dostoevsk.narod.ru/crime.html

Google translation:
http://translate.google.com/translat...%26prmd%3Divns

[x1a4]

These were "coded" by Dostoevsky himself.

Thanks. Boy was I off.