Беспокойное бессмертие: 450 лет со дня рождения Уильяма Шекспира - [53]

Язык Шекспира сильно отличается от современного английского языка, и потому он достаточно труден для англоязычных читателей и зрителей сегодняшнего дня, хотя англичане и читают шекспировские пьесы в школе. Величанский, в отличие от большинства наших знаменитых переводчиков XX века, например, Пастернака, старался сохранить этот ускользающий «исторический» аромат подлинника, вводя в свой текст архаизмы и литературные конструкции, не характерные для разговорного языка. В этом, быть может, одна из важнейших, сразу бросающихся в глаза сторон его «личного искажения подлинника». Но такова была его поэтическая воля.

Будем надеяться, что знакомство с этим новым, пусть и незаконченным, переводом «Ричарда III» поможет нашим читателям открыть новые сокровенные тайны неисчерпаемого таланта Шекспира.

Act I

Scene 1

^{Enter Richard Duke of Glouster, solus.}

Richard

Now is the winter of our discontent

Made glorious summer by this son of York,

And all the clouds that loured upon our house

In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.

Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths,

Our bruisèd arms hung up for monuments,

Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,

Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.

Grim-visaged war hath smooth’d his wrinkled front,

And now, instead of mounting barbèd steeds

To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,

He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber

To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

But I that am not shaped for sportive tricks

Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass,

I that am rudely stamped and want love’s majesty

To strut before a wanton ambling nymph,

I that am curtailed of this fair proportion,

Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,

Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time

Into this breathing world scarce half made up,

And that so lamely and unfashionable

That dogs bark at me as I halt by them,

Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,

Have no delight to pass away the time,

Unless to spy my shadow in the sun

And descant on mine own deformity.

And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover

To entertain these fair well-spoken days,

I am determinèd to prove a villain

And hate the idle pleasures of these days.

Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,

By drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams

To set my brother Clarence and the king

In deadly hate the one against the other.

And if King Edward be as true and just

As I am subtle, false, and treacherous,

This day should Clarence closely be mewed up

About a prophecy which says that ʼG’

Of Edward’s heirs the murderer shall be.

Dive, thoughts, down to my soul, here Clarence comes.

^{Enter Clarence and Brakenbury, guarded.}

Brother, good day. What means this armèd guard

That waits upon your grace?

Clarence

                                                     His majesty,

Tend’ring my person’s safety, hath appointed

This conduct to convey me to the Tower.

Richard

Upon what cause?

Clarence

                     Because my name is George.

Richard

Alack, my lord, that fault is none of yours.

He should for that commit your godfathers.

Oh, belike his majesty hath some intent

That you shall be new christened in the Tower.

But what’s the matter, Clarence? May I know?

Clarence

Yea, Richard, when I know, but I protest

As yet I do not. But as I can learn,

He hearkens after prophecies and dreams,

And from the cross-row plucks the letter ʼG’.

And says a wizard told him that by ʼG’

His issue disinherited should be.

And for my name of George begins with ʼG’,

It follows in his thought that I am he.

These, as I learn, and such like toys as these

Hath moved his highness to commit me now.

Richard

Why, this it is when men are ruled by women.

ʼTis not the king that sends you to the Tower.

My lady Grey, his wife, Clarence, ʼtis she

That tempts him to this harsh extremity.

Was it not she and that good man of worship,

Anthony Woodville, her brother there,

That made him send Lord Hastings to the Tower,

From whence this present day he is delivered?

We are not safe, Clarence, we are not safe.

Clarence

By heaven, I think there is no man secure

But the queen’s kindred and night-walking heralds

That trudge betwixt the king and Mistress Shore.

Heard you not what an humble suppliant

Lord Hastings was for her delivery?

Richard

Humbly complaining to her deity

Got my Lord Chamberlain his liberty.

I’ll tell you what, I think it is our way,

If we will keep in favour with the king,

To be her men and wear her livery.

The jealous, o’er-worn widow and herself,

Since that our brother dubbed them gentlewomen,

Are mighty gossips in our monarchy.

Brakenbury

I beseech your graces both to pardon me;

His majesty hath straitly given in charge

That no man shall have private conference,

Of what degree soever, with your brother.

Richard

Even so. And please your worship, Brakenbury,

You may partake of any thing we say.

We speak no treason, man. We say the king

Is wise and virtuous, and his noble queen

Well struck in years, fair, and not jealous.

We say that Shore’s wife hath a pretty foot,

A cherry lip, a bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue,

And that the queen’s kindred are made gentlefolks.

How say you, sir? Can you deny all this?