Masculine Fantasies and Feminine Representations in the English Translations of Premodern Chinese Poetry in Journals

2015 ◽  
pp. 165-178
Author(s):  
Kar Yue Chan
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
English Translations

On English Translations of Classical Chinese Poetry

Babel ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 227-243
Author(s):  
Fu Hao
Keyword(s):  
18Th Century ◽  
Original Form ◽  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
Grammatical Function ◽  
Monosyllabic Word ◽  
Classical Chinese ◽  
Classical Chinese Poetry ◽  
English Translations ◽  
The Right ◽  
Verse Forms

Abstract There have been numerous classical Chinese poems translated into English since the 18th century, and many of them enjoy more than one version. This article discusses some prominent aspects of English translation of classical Chinese poetry, such as choice of words, syntax, metre and form, and allusion, based on comparative analysis of different versions. In the language of classical Chinese poetry, the prevailing monosyllabic word often tends to be polysemous and the grammatical function of a word more flexible. There are also many grammatical ellipses in its syntax. How does a translator choose the right word and decipher the sentence? In addition, classical Chinese poetry enjoys strict verse forms and rhyme schemes, and has a tradition to employ literary allusions. How can an English version achieve an equivalent effect? To solve such problems, translators in different times and places have made various experiments. But the swing of the pendulum seems not to go beyond the two extremes, rigidly imitating the original form or freely rewriting in another language. Under proper modulation, both methods may score some points. Résumé Il y a eu de nombreux poèmes classiques en langue chinoise traduits vers la langue anglaise depuis le 18ème siècle, et plusieurs d'entre eux ont plus d'une version. Cet article discute de certains aspects particuliers de la traduction anglaise de la poésie classique chinoise tels que le choix des mots, la syntaxe, la versification et la forme ainsi que les allusions, basées sur l'analyse comparative des différentes versions. Dans le langage de la poésie classique chinoise, le mot monosyllabique qui prévaut tend à avoir plusieurs significations et la fonction grammaticale du mot à être plus souple. Il existe aussi beaucoup d'ellipses grammaticales dans sa syntaxe. Comment un traducteur choisit-il le mot exact et décompose-t-il la phrase? En outre. la poésie classique chinoise nous offre une structure en vers et un agencement de rimes très strictes et possède une tradition de l'emploi d'allusions littéraires. Comment une version anglaise peut-elle atteindre un effet équivalent? Pour résoudre ce type de problèmes, les traducteurs à différentes époques et lieux ont effectué des expériences différentes. Mais le pendule ne balance pas en dehors des deux extrêmes, l'imitation rigide de la forme originale ou sa réécriture libre dans une autre langue. Selon la modulation appropriée, chacune des deux méthodes pourrait présenter certains avantages.

scholarly journals Linguocultural Specificity of Chinese Poetry and Ways to Compensate them in Translation

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Language ◽  
Proper Names ◽  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Language And Culture ◽  
English Translations ◽  
Lexical Polysemy ◽  
Linguistic Units ◽  
Language Influence ◽  
Intensive Development

The problem of language and culture correlation has long been the focus of considerable attention in Linguistics. It has recently acquired particular urgency due to the intensive development of linguistic culturology. The article deals with one of the aspects of the “language and culture” issue, namely the language influence on culture based on the linguo-cultural peculiarities of ancient Chinese poetry. The language-specific nature of this poetry is presupposed by the polytonic and isolating system of Chinese language, which results in impoverishing the rhyme and creating the certain monotony of rhythm. All this is also stipulated by hieroglyphic script which stimulates lexical polysemy and semantic integrity of linguistic units. Cultural peculiarity of Chinese poetry, in its turn, is caused by the presence of characteristic poetic genres unique to China, by the presence of cultural and relevant proper names and cultural realia as well as by the presence of special figurative (semiotic) codes in Chinese poetry. All these factors result in considerable difficulties while translating into other languages, especially into European ones. The article considers some ways of neutralizing these difficulties in Russian and English translations. It has been established, in particularly, that translators most often resort to the methods of substantiation, loan translation, and analogue translation. Most often, the external shape of poetry (rhythm, rhyme) has to be sacrifice (omission transformation).

scholarly journals A Comparative Study on the Tang Poetry Translation in the Perspective of ‘Harmony-Guided Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria’—A Case Study of Li Bai's Invitation to Wine

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 128
Author(s):  
Li Wenxuan ◽  
Wang Feng
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
Tang Poetry ◽  
Artistic Conception ◽  
Poetry Translation ◽  
English Translations ◽  
Micro Level

There are many English versions of poems on the market with different styles, but the quality of the translated poems is quite different. This paper mainly makes a comparative analysis of English translations of Li Bai's "Invitation to Wine" by using Dr Wang Feng's "Harmony-Guided Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria" and concludes that when translating poems into English, we should not only achieve harmony at the macro level, and the similar style and artistic conception at the meso-level, but pay attention to the representation of various beauties at the micro-level. Through the analysis, the authors hope to verify the guiding role of "Harmony-Guided Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria" in poetry translation and promote the English translation of Chinese poetry.

The public life of contemporary Chinese poetry in English translation

Target ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 253-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cosima Bruno
Keyword(s):  
English Translation ◽  
Publishing Industry ◽  
Public Life ◽  
Public Intellectual ◽  
Chinese Poetry ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
English Translations ◽  
Social And Cultural Factors ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

This essay is an exploration of some of the social and cultural factors that have played a role in the production, publication and reception of English translations of contemporary Chinese poetry, from the beginning of the 1980s to today. The aim is to link translations to the broader context, highlighting modalities and expectations of reception that have evolved within the social structures through which the translation of contemporary Chinese poetry has been circulating: the publishing industry, universities, the periodical press, public intellectual debates, and the market. The article does not try to establish if this or that expectation are either real or perceived features of the source texts. Nor does it deal with translators’ individual interpretations, their private readings. Instead, adopting a wider sociocultural approach, the analysis proposes to shed light on the industrial and commercial dimension—the public life—of contemporary Chinese poetry in English translation.

Beyond Intelligence Testing

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 320-325 ◽  
Author(s):  
Serge Nicolas ◽  
Zachary Levine
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Experimental Psychology ◽  
Intelligence Testing ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
Mental Life ◽  
Applied Psychology ◽  
Important Research ◽  
Memory Research ◽  
English Translations ◽  
The Many

Though Alfred Binet was a prolific writer, many of his 1893–1903 works are not well known. This is partly due to a lack of English translations of the many important papers and books that he and his collaborators created during this period. Binet’s insights into intelligence testing are widely celebrated, but the centennial of his death provides an occasion to reexamine his other psychological examinations. His studies included many diverse aspects of mental life, including memory research and the science of testimony. Indeed, Binet was a pioneer of psychology and produced important research on cognitive and experimental psychology, developmental psychology, social psychology, and applied psychology. This paper seeks to elucidate these aspects of his work.

Lesse Greeke? Homer in Jonson and Shakespeare

2016 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert S. Miola
Keyword(s):  
William Shakespeare ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Ben Jonson ◽  
Dark Side ◽  
Julius Caesar ◽  
Troilus And Cressida ◽  
English Translations ◽  
Love's Labor's Lost ◽  
And Function

Throughout their careers both Jonson and Shakespeare often encountered Homer, who left a deep impress on their works. Jonson read Homer directly in Greek but Shakespeare did not, or if he did, he left no evidence of that reading in extant works. Both Jonson and Shakespeare encountered Homer indirectly in Latin recollections by Vergil, Horace, Ovid and others, in English translations, in handbooks and mythographies, in derivative poems and plays, in descendant traditions, and in plentiful allusions. Though their appropriations differ significantly, Jonson and Shakespeare both present comedic impersonations of Homeric scenes and figures – the parodic replay of the council of the gods (Iliad 1) in Poetaster (1601) 4.5 and the appearance of “sweet warman” Hector (5.2.659) in the Masque of the Nine Worthies (Love's Labor's Lost, 1588–97). Homer's Vulcan and Venus furnish positive depictions of love and marriage in The Haddington Masque (1608) as do his Hector and Andromache in Julius Caesar (1599), which features other significant recollections. Both Jonson and Shakespeare recall Homer to explore the dark side of honor and fame: Circe and Ate supply the anti-masque in the Masque of Queens (1609), and scenes from Chapman's Iliad supply the comical or tragical satire, Troilus and Cressida (c. 1601). Both poets put Homer to abstract and philosophical uses: Zeus's chain and Venus's ceston (girdle), allegorized, appears throughout Jonson's work and function as central symbols in Hymenaei (1606); Homer's depiction of the tension between fate and free will, between the omnipotent gods and willing humans, though mediated, inflects the language and action of Coriolanus (c. 1608). Ben Jonson and William Shakespeare practice a kind of inventive imitatio which, according to classical and neo-classical precept, re-reads classical texts in order to make them into something new.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document