Eneida Енеїда

It is the original, not an adaptation: Ivan Kotliarevsky’s complete burlesque poem in all six parts. Parts I-III were first printed in 1798 in St Petersburg, without the author’s consent; Part IV came in 1809, and all six parts appeared together in 1842, after his death. The text comes from Wikisource, which reproduces volume I of Твори Котляревського (Berlin, Українське слово, 1922, edited by Bohdan Lepky), and keeps that edition’s spelling: no apostrophe (пяний), и for і in a few words (инший), particles written together (такіїж). Lepky’s foreword, notes and glossary are not included. We corrected a few slips of the digital transcription (such as the digit 3 read for the letter З in Зевес), rejoined lines split by page breaks and removed doubled part headings. Two features of the 1922 printing are kept as printed: in Part I the number 22 is used twice and 23 is skipped, and stanza 23 of Part III and stanza 107 of Part IV have nine lines instead of ten, because a line is missing in that edition. The poem uses some period words for Jews and other peoples that are offensive today.

There is no audiobook: Eneida is read on screen, and a tap on a word shows its translation. You will tap often, for burlesque words like гольтіпаки (“ragamuffins, down-and-outs”) and for the dishes and drinks of every feast, like варенуха (hot vodka boiled with dried fruit, honey and spices). Old spellings may not always be found, so expect to guess some words from the modern form.

Yes, with the Reader plan. It helps most where the rhyme bends the word order, as in the famous Любов к отчизні де героїть, Там сила вража не устоїть (“Where love of the fatherland fights like a hero, no enemy force will stand”). Without the plan, single words are translated up to the daily limit.

About 6-9 hours, at the pace of someone reading with translation of new words, slower than a native speaker. The parts grow longer as the poem goes on: I. Частина перша has about 3,100 words, II. Частина друга about 3,400, III. Частина третя about 6,500, IV. Частина четверта about 6,000, V. Частина п’ята about 6,600 and VI. Частина шоста about 7,900. Each numbered stanza is ten lines, so you can stop at any number.

The difficulty is even. Every part has 25-30 words per sentence (Part II 25, Part III 30, the others 26-27) and 7.9-8.4% long words, except Part I with 6.8%. Part I, the shortest and the most quoted, is the gentlest way in; Part III, with its long lists of sinners in hell, has the longest sentences. If the verse is too hard at first, the catalogue’s B1 retelling, Eneida, tells the same story in modern prose.

Yes. Once you sign in, the reader keeps your last place and the words you opened, so you can come back where you left off. Every part also opens from the contents on this page, for example III. Частина третя, where Aeneas lands at Cumae and the Sibyl leads him down to hell.