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August 22, 2014

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Globalized world eases way for translators

JEREMY Cai recently finished reading “One Hundred Years of Solitude” by late Colombian novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez, after he spent two months traveling through South American countries including Colombia. Cai first tried the book about 15 years ago, when he had only a vague geographic idea about the continent, but didn’t finish it.

Readers like Cai are much better exposed to places and cultures entirely different from their own, through travel, movies and exhibitions, among many other forms. It is especially so for Chinese, whose overseas travel has increased greatly in the past 10 years.

Another factor boosting world understanding for Chinese people is the increasing number of books being translated into Chinese. More Chinese writers are getting translated and published in other countries as well, although their influence is still limited.

Translation was a hot topic at the recent annual Shanghai Book Fair, which concluded its 7-day run on Tuesday with more than 700 cultural events. Shanghai Daily talked to Chinese and foreign translators and writers to learn about new trends and how translation is influenced by globalization.

“Language is not the most important. Culture, of course, general culture and diversity culture are very important,” says French translator and linguist Pascale Delpech.

He has translated works of former Yugoslavian novelist Ivo Andric, whose books dealing with the history, folklore and culture of his native Bosnia won him the Nobel Prize in 1961.

“The translator must know perfectly the language from which he is translating but it is more important that he is able to write very well in his own language, and this is the most difficult,” Delpech says. “You have material problems, whether they would understand all the connotations associated with the original material in its own context.”

Many writers and translators say a more globalized world has made literature translations easier. With the problem of accessibility largely solved via technology, more translators are moving closer to faithfulness. They strive beyond language and work hard to get the subtle meanings and cultural contexts better translated.

“The nature of translation is to swing between different cultures. All efforts are made for communications of ‘difference’,” Yu Zhongxian, a veteran translator from French to Chinese and current editor-in-chief of World Literature, tells Shanghai Daily.

The bimonthly magazine, more than 200 pages for each issue, has long been a major source of contemporary world literature for many Chinese readers since it was founded in 1953.

“The genre of translated literature has been changing the reading habit of Chinese readers and writing style of Chinese writers. Early translators mainly considered how to cope, while today’s translators often pull you toward the ‘originality’ of the works,” Yu adds.

Others find that globalization could actually be a threat to literature.

“Globalization makes translating much easier, but it is also sad that English is becoming the common language, which eliminates cultural diversity,” says BTR, a young translator who started his career by translating contemporary American writer, scriptwriter and film director Paul Auster.

He adds that it was a shock when he heard Hungarian writer Esterhazy Peter reading from his book at the book fair.

“It was utterly different from what I thought when I read his works in a different language. The text sounds like flowing water running to me one after another, while each sentence complements the other,” he says. “That’s an example of how globalization changes it completely. Many European writers are also writing in an English way.”

Many contemporary non-English writers have been criticized for catering to the English taste, notably Haruki Murakami, one of the best-known Japanese writers in the West. In recent years, he has often been criticized for writing in a way that is too translatable, which would arguably diminish the originality of his own culture.

“Literature is different from music or painting, which are both international language,” says Ma Zhencheng, a veteran translator who is still working at 80 years old. “Literature is quite the opposite. It is a very local language.”

Ma has introduced to Chinese readers many French works that are considered difficult to translate, such as the complete works of French writer and philosopher Michel Montaigne. Ma’s latest work, published in July, is the Chinese version of Milan Kundera’s most recent novel, “Celebrating Insignificance.”

The title itself was the first puzzle for Ma, who has become familiar with Kundera’s style and language as he translated “Slow” before.

The literal translation for the French title would be “festival of insignificance,” using festival as a noun rather than celebrating as a verb as in Chinese.

“I changed it after I read the whole book,” Ma says. “This insignificance refers to our whole life, our whole world. Everything that has happened and is happening are insignificant. This insignificance is the nature of life. But we learn to admire such insignificance.”

Kundera and Marquez, among many foreign writers, have often been cited by contemporary Chinese writers and artists to have greatly influenced their own works.

“The last few generations of Chinese writers, since the time of my grandfather or even his grandfather, have drawn great influence from foreign literature,” says Ye Zhaoyan, a well-established writer whose grandfather Ye Shengtao was one of the most influential contemporary Chinese writers.

“Lu Xun once admitted that all his novels, every one of them, are influenced by foreign literature. To us, foreign literature, everything that is translated, is in one genre. Nearly 90 percent of my reading is foreign literature, since I was around 15 or 16. The influence is not from any single writer, but foreign novels as a whole,” Ye adds.

Earlier Chinese translators of foreign literature are often themselves great writers, such as Lu, who introduced many Russian novels as well as works from other countries, translating from their Japanese translations. In his time during the 1920s and 1930s, the emphasis was on introducing a lot and focusing on accessibility, as readers were only just starting to see a world outside of China.

Many works were translated from English or Japanese translations, rather than from the original version. Some were even first translated literally to a Chinese writer who didn’t speak the foreign language, who then rewrote it in refined Chinese. And even translators who knew the language very well were accustomed to polishing the foreign works with a sophisticated Chinese writing style.

One classic example of such style is Fu Lei’s translation of French writer Romain Rolland, famously known for the graceful language that is very different from the more straightforward original works.

“Fu Lei’s Chinese is so great that he may be qualified to ‘write over’ the original French style with his own,” says Yu, who has translated many French writers including Paul Claudel and Claude Simon. “But today, many translators are not working in the same way. In Fu’s translations, there is little difference in the styles of Romain Rolland, Honore de Balzac or Voltaire. It is difficult to see their original styles.”

He explains by citing his own experience translating “The Satine Slipper” by Claudel.

“It was my first published translation,” he says. “Following the editor’s suggestion, I changed the original style to an essay style. But 15 years later I went back and redid the translation, changing it back to the poetry style. I definitely vote for faithfulness in terms of translation.”

He adds, “A good translation has to be faithful to the original, well transformed, and has little lost in translation. That’s more easily said than done.”

Another challenge facing today’s translators is the low payment. Literature translation is among the most difficult, but also often the lowest paying, at about 55 yuan (US$9) to 70 yuan per 1,000 words, according to BTR.

“Often times, I see different styles in one book and it makes me wonder whether the translator whose name is on the book has actually finished the entire book, or whether he has assigned some chapters to his students without crediting them.”

 




 

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