Many of us from childhood have heard the phrase "Language will bring to Kiev." The significance of the metaphor is not always obvious. It is for those who are still not clear how the language and Kiev are connected, our article is intended.
It was once upon a time, even before the era of Google
Previously, when not everyone had maps, and people somehow did without the Internet, there was no other way to figure out the way, as soon as ask passers-by. And so a person could even get to Kiev. Now, however, everything you want (and you don’t even want) can be found at Google or Yandex, and if you are planning to travel around our little globe, it’s best to know at least your native language and English. In other words, the proverb "language will bring to Kiev" is relevant now. But it’s not enough just to clarify the meaning of the saying, you also need to understand what kind of life it can expect in modern reality. To complete the task, we turn to the cinema and literature.
Francis Ford Coppoll and his Oscars
Before talking about Vito Corleone, we ’ll tell you a little story about Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece. She was told in a radio interview by Vasily Gorchakov (a translator from English films in the 90s). He personally knows the master.
So, the cult American director hates his great creation with all the fibers of the soul , because it obscures with a huge shadow all his other paintings. And once, in a fit of anger, Coppola even broke all the Oscars that he received for The Godfather, and told his mother to immediately throw out all this garbage! Francis’s mother did it her own way: she went to the film academy and said that misfortune had happened, and could officials replace the broken Oscars? Those said, “No problem.” When the storm in the house of Coppola abated, the figurines took their former place.
Don Corleone and his version of the Russian proverb
For the viewer, of course, all the same, “The Godfather” remains an unsurpassed masterpiece. And now back to the saying "the language will bring to Kiev." Its significance (and the aphorism itself) was hardly known to Don Corleone, but he could have used it.
Fans of the film and those who just heard about it, know some formula adopted by don Vito in dealing with people. If the Godfather has the mood and desire, then he can render the service to the applicant, but in return he agrees to repay the debt if necessary: “One day, maybe this day will never come, I will ask you to provide me one service ... ". This day usually comes.
The subtlety of such relationships is that they are purely gentlemanly (oral) in nature. Therefore, in the case of Don Carleone, the phraseologism “language will bring to Kiev” is fair. The head of the Italian mafia clan relies entirely on “language”. The entire system of relations in a criminal syndicate is based on conditional agreements.
Zhvanetsky and Russian proverb
Michal Mikhalych has a wonderful phrase: "How many friends are needed under socialism, so much money is needed under capitalism." And it is true that if the proverb “language could bring to Kiev” could have acquired a value other than the primordial, it was only in Soviet times. Then, when things were not bought, but exclusively "got". At that time, “language” (dating) meant a lot, but today we need money equivalent to the number of friends. After all, it was not for nothing that the saying “do not have one hundred rubles, but have one hundred friends” was widely used precisely in the Soviet period of Russian history.
Nowadays, best friends are money. They open all doors, solve almost any problems, except, perhaps, the fourth stage of cancer. In this case, no financial injections help, as a rule. Thus nature delicately hints to a person: "Are you rich or poor, but still obey biological laws, so don’t especially lift your nose."
But for those who still have little money, the proverb “language will bring to Kiev” (its meaning) also remains relevant, because it is a rich person who can call for help, and the poor can only stay together.