Divine Music in the Dark

Divine Music in the Dark

Divine Music in the Dark

A guide to an extraordinary life of Tatyana Zyulikova, a blind girl from Yekaterinburg

An artist, a literary translator, a dramaturg, a theater actress and a Church Guru disciple: she is dancing to the beat of her own drum and her dark world is full of sunshine. I Don`t Know How She Does It, let`s find out together. 

An interview by Maria Gulyaeva

Tanya, as a person who has health limitations, how did you manage to achieve your great career at Vladimir Bakanov`s School of Literary Translation, being blind when at the same time it`s hard enough even for people without health limitations to get a job at a publishing house and to boost a career in this sphere? You on the other hand had been working at Vladimir Bakanov`s School for 5 or 6 years and managed to translate about 10 novels, you have also become a freelance translator. How did you manage to do it and what character qualities you think are an absolute must for a person who wants to achieve one`s goals and to make something out of one`s life?

Yes, I had been working for Vladimir Bakanov`s School for 5 years, since 2012 till the end of 2017. I came to Bakanov`s School via a contest of literary translation, which they hold 3 times a year. I won the contest of literary translation at Bakanov`s School. I did not do it at once, it was not my first attempt. I was in love with literary translation since college because of Alexander Vernikov, who has turned my perception of translation and life views upside down. I had never met before such a free spirit, a person possessing an enormous amount of internal freedom. He has influenced me a great deal. And after my college graduation I started searching literary translation contests. The first contents I had found at that time were the contests of Wodehouse and Bakanov.

The contest of Wodhouse was for amateur translators. However, I was a professional. I had an honours degree, an all As diploma and I was thinking “Now I`ll outdo everybody as simple as that”.

At that time the contest judge was Dobrokhotova-Maikova, I did not know then who she was. So, she had quoted the first phrase of my translation and said “It`s better to stop reading from this very spot”. I was crushed and depressed. It was a death of my good self-esteem.

1 month of depression and I started all over. Once again, I had tried to win the contest and took part in it. The feedback comment was, that my translation was “dull and somewhat average”. And again, my self-esteem was ruined.

I started working as a freelance translator. There were large gaps between the orders and I had a lot of doubts in my own competence and was undergoing a great turmoil. Like “Nobody needs my translation, am I good enough, are my translations good enough?”

Several years had passed. My interest in literary translation was renewed. And once again I took part at the literary translation contest of Wodehouse. At that time there were 2 rounds in this contest. The first round was for bad works, it was a prime filter, and the 2-nd round was for better works. That time I did not succeed in getting to the 2-nd round, however, the judge of the 2nd round did not trample on my work, which gave me hope.

The next months the judge criticized my translation text, however, she praised my dialogues.

I continued taking part in this contest and later started winning it. Still later they changed the terms of the contest and the winners of previous competitions got an opportunity to judge the participants. And I had been writing the feedbacks. It also helped me to translate better, as when you are writing a feedback and are criticizing someone`s work you need to clarify why it`s bad and what`s wrong with it. For example, one of the works was mostly ok. All the words and phrases were translated just ok and correctly, however it was boring to read it. And I noticed that all the phrases in this translation were calques from English – subject, predicate, subordinate parts of the sentence, subject, predicate, subordinate parts of the sentence, subject, predicate, subordinate parts of the sentence. And it conveyed a particularly boring rhythm.

Later in this contest they even had a prize “Wise Owl”, and I even got it.

Tanya, this returns me to the second part of my question. You have achieved a lot in your life. What are a must have qualities for a successful person?

I don`t like the concept “successful” much. Because the general view is that a successful person is a person with a big salary, a house and a car and a family.

No, Tanya, this is not what I mean by success. For me success is an ability to be happy in spite of everything, even if and when your life gets hard. In spite of all the obstacles and the cards life has dealt you. My point of view is as follows – if life gives you limes, go and buy salt and tequila and throw a party. This is what I mean by success. An ability to live in harmony with yourself. 

Well, I`ve read a definition of success, which I like. According to this definition success is when you are doing exactly what you want and what makes you happy. What is a success for you is not a success for the other person. For example, you are an artist living at the attic. You pant pictures and you don`t have enough money to buy food. But if this makes you happy and if this is what you want, then you are successful.

So, firs of all the trait of character you must poses is insistency. And ability to develop oneself and to learn new things. I know that school has ruined this quality in many people, but I was lucky enough, I`m not one of them.