Translating literary Chinese into English is a daunting task

When I lament I only know English and yet I long for to learn French deep in my heart, Janice always reminds me I do know Chinese, not as much as I should though.

The strength of Chinese language lies in its aesthetic quality, thus its literary beauty is unmatched by English.  But one should never learn science, especially chemistry or math in Chinese, which is inherently a bad tool for this task.

While writing about the English translation of “A Dream of Red Chamber” (紅樓夢), I wrote, “No matter how good a translation, the beauty of the Chinese language was lost in translation.”  I am not the only one hold this view.  In his The Importance of Living, Lin Yutang wrote ,“One is often forced to write bad English in trying to express such Chinese aesthetic ideas or notions, . . .”

Chapter 5 of the Dream is important in foretelling, through Baoyu’s dream in fantasy, the unfortunate fate (薄命) of the Twelve Beauties of Chinling (金陵十二釵).

寶玉喜不自勝，抬頭看這司的匾上，乃是「薄命司」三字，兩邊寫著對聯道：「春恨秋悲皆自惹，花容月貌為誰妍？」
Baoyu (寶玉) was overjoyed.  He looked up and saw on the tablet the name Board of Ill-Fated.  This is flanked by the couplet:

They brought to themselves spring grief and autumn anguish;

Wasted, their beauty fair as flower and moon?

 

My comment:

“Overjoy” is a very appropriate translation for 喜不自勝.  There is nothing wrong to translate 薄命 (“thin fate”) as “ill-fated”, but Chinese readers know that it is conventionally used in describing the ill-fate in a marriage or a relationship of a woman, such as the idiom of 红颜薄命 (a great beauty suffers ill-fate).

 

春恨秋悲皆自惹,   They brought to themselves spring grief and autumn anguish;

花容月貌為誰妍？    Wasted, their beauty fair as flower and moon? ß translation in book

                                    [For whom the delicate beauty wasted?] ß my translation

My comment:
花容月貌 is “as beautiful as flower and moon”.  妍 is elegantly pretty of women.  妍 is an adjective, but it is used as a verb here.  It basically says “nobody is around to appreciate such a delicate beauty, thus wasted.”

早有一位仙姬在內，其鮮豔嫵媚，大似寶釵，嬝娜風流，又如黛玉.
More amazing still, he saw there a girl whose charm reminded him of Baochai (寶釵, with whom Baoyu eventually married), her grace of Daiyu (黛玉)  ß translation in book

My comment:
豔 is gorgeously beautiful, dazzlingly beautiful, passionate, voluptuous (like Mae West ß Lin Yutang’s example).  媚 is seductive, enticing, beauty of softness.  It is fitting to translate 鮮豔嫵媚 into “charm”, which is so plain that the “great charm and beauty” of Chinese language was lost.  The same is also true for 嬝娜風流 as “grace”. (I’ll devote a post just talking about 風流).

騷 is poetic, sentimental; we call poet 騷人.  We have a friend well versed in classic Chinese literature, 出囗成詩 真是騷人一個. Although one has to be careful using 騷. 風騷 is amorous, lustful, passionate, more of sensual love, or in a way, “hot”. 發勞騷 is complain, grumble, vent.

It is imperative to know that our 騷人 (the one we know) does not 發勞騷, nor 風騷.