Last week, I offered some general tips on improving your pronunciation in Russian. One suggestion I overlooked: Reciting скороговорки (“tongue twisters”) can give you practice at distinguishing similar-but-different sounds, such as the hard and soft variants of consonants.

For instance, the shortest Russian tongue-twister I know of is Пароль — «орёл» (“The password is eagle“). Despite having only two words, it’s VERY tricky to say, because you’ve got a hard [р] and a soft [л] followed by a soft [р] and a hard [л]. (“Red leather, yellow leather” would be a comparable English example.)

But in this post, I wanted to introduce another скороговорка that some of you may already know:

Generations of Russian kids have learned this one to practice the difference between the soft [р] (as in река) and the hard [р] (as in рука):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Byn9GMf46Tw

So famous is this tongue-twister that a few years ago it inspired the writer Олег Новиков to pen a considerably longer parody in verse — which has become famous in its own right, though not as well-known as the original. If you’re a fan of Alice in Wonderland, you’ll recall that Lewis Carroll turned a four-line nursery rhyme (“The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts…”) into an entire chapter about an absurdist trial. Novikov does essentially the same thing: in his version, Greka is suing the crayfish for damages; the crayfish is countersuing; and Greka’s horse is called in as a witness.

The results are utterly hilarious — especially the crayfish, who is obviously exaggerating his testimony to get as much sympathy (and money) as possible, and does everything but claim “whiplash”! (Though, in fairness, Greka’s lawsuit also seems a bit frivolous, and he exaggerates too.)

The poem is a bit too long to cover in a blog post, but you can find it online here, and I’ll take you through some selected lines to explain some of the key plot elements and jokes. And of course, if you decide to read the whole thing by yourself and have any difficulties or questions, please ask in the comments section below!

The poem begins with the testimony of Greka, the пострадавший (here: “injured party” or “plaintiff”), and it’s established that “Greka” is actually a грек (“Greek man”). As Greka and his кобыла (“mare”) were crossing the bridge over a river, he suddenly saw an огромнейший рак (“an extremely enormous crayfish”) с бандитскою рожей (“with the ugly mug of a bandit”).

Grabbing the horse’s уздечка (“bridle”), the crayfish basically tells the Greek to “get the hell out of here, lowlife!” — in fact, Greka assures the court that practically every word out of the crayfish’s mouth was мат, though he doesn’t repeat the obscenities. On the contrary, he paints himself as the very model of a gentleman:

But Greka’s courtesy fails to placate his assailant:

As a result, the horse’s сбруя (“harness”) is damaged beyond repair, along with a pair of “heirloom shorts” that Greka inherited from his grandfather!

Next we hear the показание (“evidence”) of the crayfish, who explains that he had been peacefully napping in the shade of the bridge, when suddenly…

Greka immediately begins harassing the innocent crayfish, who of course responds by turning the other cheek (or whatever crustaceans have):

And lead to blood it does, because the man physically assaults the crayfish, who has no choice but to act in self-defense:

The outcome of all this, claims the crayfish, is that the Greek
сломал мне мой дом и беседку при нём (“wrecked my house and the attached gazebo”), and furthermore, (он) пачкал мой ил (“he got my nice mud all dirty”)!

Finally, Greka’s mare is called briefly to the stand as a свидетель (“witness”). She assures the court that the Greek and the crayfish are basically nice guys who used to hang out together before the hand-pinching incident:

But, she concludes, regardless of who pinched whose hand, or who ruined whose whatever, the poor horse shouldn’t be dragged into the dispute!

The poem ends with an epilogue с точки зрения рака (“from the point-of-view of the crayfish”). Apparently, not only did he lose the lawsuit, but he’s become publicly notorious as a pincher-of-hands (and also, possibly, an anti-Greek racist), so nobody sticks their hands into the crayfish’s river anymore.

In fact, the lonely and depressed crayfish hasn’t had a nice fleshy hand to pinch for months, and he fantasizes that if only someone would dip his hand in the water…

As to the allegations of racial prejudice, the crayfish insists «мне искренне пофиг» (“I sincerely don’t give a darn [about race]“) — and, furthermore:

Will рак и Грека eventually settle their differences? Will they ever have a three-way in the reeds with the horse? Novikov ends the parody on an ambiguous but optimistic note as the crayfish wistfully dreams that he can hear Greka approaching the river…