Ar-kaa-dee (with the accent on kaa). And with a rolling r.
Yes, buy “o” can be pronounced “a” if it is not in an accented syllable. Like in the “pochemu” pronounced “pahchemoo”. Or “posuda” (“pahsooda”). Depending on the regional accent of course.
In Russian, it is accented on the second syllable, but no Russian vowels are pronounces exactly the same as any English ones, so when speaking English and using the name, just make sure it is accented on the second syllable. To the English tongue, the closest would be something like /ar-caddy/.
This I doubt. English has about 40-50 different vowel sounds (and Henry Higgins would say many more). Some of them must be like the few in Russian.
I wonder how the story turned out.
TEN YEARS AGO.
LOL. I swear, the board software should put a big red banner up top that says “Zombie Thread” if there is a gap of more than a year between two recent posts in the thread.
That plethora of English vowel sounds occurs because English vowels are colored by the adjacent consonants, like the A in cake, cane and care. In Russian, a vowel might be identical to one of your English vowels, but not as an adjacency to the same consonant, so you would be unable to say it in a way that would seem native to a Russian speaker.
Go to Google Translate, enter Arkady in English, and ask for a translation into Russian. Then hit the audio icon on the Russian side and listen to it. See if you can make exactly the same vowel sounds.
You may be right, but it doesn’t, so once a zombie is resuscitated, you cannot blame people who continue to treat it like a new thread.
By the way, if a topic has been discussed in the past, what is the correct procedure:
- Bring it back as a zombie, and have every other post reminding you of that
- Start it anew, and have somebody remind you (with a link) that it was discussed before
- Consider it to be topic that is verboten to ever again be discussed in this forum.
I had marked half a dozen other replies with which I was going to agree until I encountered the one from Q.E.D. at which point I knew I had stepped on a zombie’s dick. So I’ll make this short and sweet.
The FX Network’s The Americans has a Russian character with that name and they pronounce it ar-Kah-dy.
That’s all I know.
Well, unlike most zombie cases, the OP is still active. Maybe we’ll get an update. 
Well, crap. I knew the answer to this one.
Ar-KAH-dee.
Oh, I very much hope we do. And if the OP comes back and says I realized that if the pronunciation of my character’s name is giving me trouble, it’s going to be no less confusing to my readers, so I decided to call him Boris, I’m gonna just laugh, and laugh. . .
Indeed! And there’s always Anatoly. What’s up with that?
Very bad assumption. Most immigrants I know give up correcting people’s pronunciation because (1) it gets boring, (2) there’s other stuff to move on to, (3) 90 percent of the people are never going to get it right anyway, so it’s futile, and (4) other things.
I’m the child of immigrants, and I give someone about two chances when I first meet him or her to do the “no, I want to learn how to pronounce it correctly” bit. After that—if I detect no special ability to learn pronunciation—no matter what they say, I say “Yes, that’s perfect.”
It’s particularly irritating when I have to play that game with someone I’m trying engage in a simple transaction with or customer service. I’m hoping I never have to speak to you again, so I really don’t care if you pronounce my name correctly. Stop asking me to pronounce my name for you and let’s get on with it.
Oh crap. I answered this question twice. Ten years apart.
Good to know that my essence never changes.
The Russian guy who gave me some of his furniture (nice stuff too) when he moved told me his name was “ar Kay dee”. I had to get an interpreter ( a friend who spoke fluent Yiddish) to learn more because He didn’t speak much English and I know just a handful of Russian words.
But, according to the experts in this thread (and I defer to them), it’s pronounced “ar kah dee”. Is it a regional variation? Had he given up on Americans pronouncing his name properly?
I am confused (more than usual).
He had given up on Americans pronouncing his name properly.
The name is: Аркадий - see that second “a”? In Russian it would never be pronounced “ay”. Not in any regional dialect.
I have known Russians whose first name was Arkady change their name in US to “Alex” - easier.
That makes sense. Here in Philly, the pronunciation of Dauphin street has shifted from “Dough fan” to “Doff in” and the various things named after Von Neumann have shifted from “Noy mun” to “New min”
Very likely.
Also, Americans have an oddly insistent attitude towards “proper pronunciation of my name” that doesn’t necessarily exist in quite same way in other societies. There’s a lot more flexibility of the “pronounce it however it works for you” attitude, especially when it comes to people who are outside your immediate family or social group.