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24Сравнительный анализ двух вариантов английских переводов стихотворения «Одиноко пью под луной»
Сюй Ян,
доцент кафедры английского языка института иностранных языков Шэньянского политехнического университета, КНР E-mail: 1846708098@qq.com
Китайская классическая литература является одним из самых ценных культурных достояний Китая, среди которых поэзия известна как яркая жемчужина китайской нации и художественный памятник. Достоверный перевод стихов помогает показать художественную ценность и очарование произведений китайской классической литературы. Ли Бай был одним из великих поэтов-романтиков династии Тан, и потомки прославляли его как гения-поэзии. Его стихи переведены на многие языки мира. В данной статье сравниваются английские переводы У. Дж.Б. Флетчера и Сюй Чжунцзе стихотворения Ли Бая «Одиноко пью под луной», обсуждаются различия между этими двумя переводами и их причины, анализируются преимущества и недостатки двух переводов, а также обсуждаются навыки и особенности перевода поэтических произведений, что принесет большую пользу преподаванию перевода.
Ключевые слова: поэзия, форма, рифма, художественная концепция.
Introduction
Li Bai (701-762), known as Fairy Poet, was one of the great romantic poets of Tang Dynasty, and he was frank, generous, and liked to drink and make friends, so his poems were mostly written in his drunk state. Li Bai's poetry, in terms of its pioneering significance and artistic achievements, had a very high status in Chinese literature. And therefore, his representative Collection of Li Taibai was handed down from generation to generation. Li Zhimin, a professor at Peking University, commented that Li Bai's poems had breathed the universe.
Drinking Alone in the Moon
The Pinyin Version of the poem is as follows,
yue xia do zhuo
hua jian y! ho jiO, do zhuo wo xiang qln 0 jO bei yao ming yue, dui ylng cheng san ren о yue ji bo jie yln, ylng to sui wo shen о zan ban yue jiang ylng, xing le хй ji chQn о wo ge yue pai huai, wo wO ylng ling luan о xing shi tong jiao huan, zui hou ge fen san о yong jie wo qing you, xiang q! miao yon han о
Drinking Alone in the Moon was one of Li Bai's representative works. Emotionally, the poet concealed his disappointment and depression behind a lively and cheerful scene. The magic imagination of inviting the moon to drink with him exactly revealed his loneliness and frustration caused by the disapprove of his talents and the failure of his political ambitions for his time. Structurally, the poem was a regular pentasyllabic verse with fourteen lines. Its neat rhythm had 3 rhymes: in in 'qln'and 'yln', the ending words of the second and fifth lines; en in 'ren'and 'shen', the ending words of the fourth and sixth lines; an in 'luan', 'huan', 'san' and 'han', the ending words of the tenth, eleventh, twelfth and fourteenth lines. It was the ingeniously and delicately wrought conception and form that aroused many translators' attention.
W. J.B. Fletcher (William John Bainbrigge Fletcher), an Englishman, specialized in English translations of Tang poetry. He put more than 200 poems in his two collections and firstly displayed Tang poetry before westerners' eyes. His translations were usually compared with those of later generations in order to gain more excellent translation skills of Chinese poetry. o Xu Zhongjie, a Chinese, was born in Hong Kong,
g and has studied English literature at the University of
Miami, Ohio in USA. So he had a good command of ~ both English and Chinese, and was good at translating
ancient Chinese poetry into English with beautiful
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words and rhymes. He has published 100 Chinese Ci Poems in English Verse, etc., and his translations were well received by readers.
Two English Translations by W. J.B. Fletcher and Xu Zhongjie
W. J. B. Fletcher Xu Zhongjie
Drinking alone in the moon Drinking alone in the moon
One pot of wine amid the In a bower among flowers is a goblet
flowers of wine.
Alone I pour, and none with I drink alone; about me-no kinsman
me. of mine.
The cup I lift; the Moon Cup raised, I call on the bright moon
invite; to join the spree.
Who with my shadow I-the moon- my shadow form a party
makes us three? of three.
The moon then drinks While the moon doesn't care for
without a pause. alcoholic drinks.
The shadow does what To me, in all my movements, my
I begin. shadow links.
Tile shadow, Moon and Both of them can keep one company
I in fere a short time.
Rejoice until the spring Hence, one should enjoy life in one's
comes in. youth-in one's prime.
I sing: and wavers time the As I sing, the moon lingers on,
moon. listening agape.
I dance: the shadow antics As I dance, my shadow ever change
too. its monstrous shape.
Our joys we share while While I'm sober, we make one
sobers still. another gay.
When drunk, we part and After I become drunk, each goes his
bid adieu own way.
Of loveless outing this the Thus, we three form a bond,
pact, sentiment-free.
Which we all swear to keep We are to appear where there is
for aye. a spree.
Tile next time that we meet Appointments among us are made
shall be only someday-
Beside you distant milky Far up in the clouds or else in the
way. Milky Way.
Li Bai's Drinking Alone in the Moon was translated into multiple versions, among which we found quantities of excellent translations, each having its own characteristics and merits, and meanwhile some questionable expressions as well. "The comprehension of the context was unique every time and an unrepeatable reading action; the receivers were different, then their reactions to the context were different" (Hatim, Basil & Mason, 4). This paper made a comparison of Fletcher's and Xu Zhongjie's English translations, aiming to explore the translation skills of Chinese poetry.
Comparison
I. Form and Rhythm
Form and rhythm are two important structural components in poetry creation, which are helpful in both expression of meanings and reflection of feelings, and therefore, should be maximally presented in the translation. Since the spirit of poetry exists in a regular form, losing the definite form is bound to lose its spirit.
In English poems, according to the combination of unstressed and stressed syllables, there are seven metrical foots - iambus, trochee, dactyl, anapaest, amphibrach, spondee and pyrrhie (Zhou, 2003, 163). In above-mentioned two versions, both of the translators adopted rhythmic forms to keep loyal to the original poem in form, and actually the rules of the poetry composition were common and regular.
Fletcher's version was basically the same as the original work in form. Except for the ninth, there were eight syllables in each line, which perfectly reflected the brevity of the original poem. Fletcher's translation applied pentatonic iambus, with the thyme mode abcb, defe, ghih, jkbk, which made the whole poem sound smooth and cadent.
While in Xu's translation, the whole poem was divided into four parts and each part had four lines. The four lines in the fourth part actually just corresponded to the last line of the original poem. In his version, each line had approximately twelve syllables, which was also suitable to the original context. The rhythm of Xu's translation was a combination of pentatonic pyrrhie, iambus and trochee, with the rhyme mode aabb, ccdd, eeff, bbff, and the rhymes of the first and second lines in the fourth part echoed the ones of the third and fourth, which made the tone of the entire poem high and fluent.
II. Meaning and Artistic Conception
Fletcher and Xu applied different translating skills in their respective translations. Fletcher's version seemed to be more solemn and elegant with the usage of archaism(fere), poetic vocabulary(aye, yon) and literary language(amid, adieu), which were all helpful to the presentation of the value and charm of this classic poem. While in Xu's version, the matching of sound and sense from the ninth to twelfth lines made the English translation neat, accurate and presented the artistic conception of the original sentences. The corresponding translation of "wo ge yue pai huai", "As I sing, the moon lingers on, listening agape", vividly described the scene that the poet after drinking was suddenly in high spirits to sing a song, and the moon was so entranced that it would not like to go away. The sound combination of [m], [n], [l], [s] and [z] effectively built up a romantic atmosphere that the moon was intoxicated by the song, and lingered around for a long time, unwilling to leave. In comparison, Fletcher's " I sing: and wavers time the moon. I dance: the shadow antics too" was inferior in artistic conception, which was similar to the original in words, form and structure, but failed to convey the classical beauty and charm of the poetry.
In order to successfully convey the content and emotion hidden in the original work, the translators need to seek both functional and textual equivalence. Compared to composing a poetry, translating, with smaller freedom, definitely has more difficulty. Mao Dun, modern Chinese writer and literary critic, said that the minimum requirement of translation was to faithfully convey the content of the original work in clear and fluent words. Loyalty, as the core of translation, takes priority in the translating process.
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In view of the poet's romantic writing style, "hua jian" in the first line should be comprehended as an opening garden or flower shrubs. In Xu's version, he translated the words into "in a bower among flowers", which to some extent seemed a little far-fetched. In addition, "goblet" was not quite appropriate for the word "hu", for goblet was not pot at all. In comparison, Fletcher's version: "One pot of wine amid the flowers. Alone I pour, none with me" was more brief and smooth to convey the original meaning of the poem.
Xu translated "wu xiang qln" in second line into "no kinsman of mine", which was divergent from the poet's meaning. In this sentence, Li Bai would like to tell the fact that there were no close people or friends of his to drink together, which had nothing to do with gender, so "kinsman" referring to male relatives more often was not quite exact here. While "none with me" in Fletcher's version had no confusion in meaning.
To "bu ji e yln" in the fifth line, both of the translations were not quite loyal to the original meaning "did not understand" or "could not figure out". Xu translated the words into "doesn't care for alcoholic drinks", which expressed the negative attitude towards drink instead of ability, while Fletcher went even farther away by using "The moon then drinks without a pause. The shadow does what I begin", which actually implied that the moon and the shadow were excessively fond of drinking and therefore became winebibbers.
Li Bai invited the moon to drink together with him, intending to make the best use of the spring night to have fun time, and therefore to eliminate his loneliness. The word "chGn" in the eighth line echoed the word "hua" in the first sentence of the poem, which referred to the nice time of spring or the moment when the time of spring came and flowers bloomed, but not to "enjoy life in one's youth-in one's prime", as in Xu's translation, which had a long distance from the original words "xG ji chGn". However, Fletcher's translation was even opposite to the original words by "The shadow, Moon and I in fere. Rejoice until the spring comes in", which in other words, could be understood as when the spring came, the shadow, Moon and I would stop to rejoice.
In "while sobers still" and "when drunk", Fletcher obviously misunderstood "we" for the subject of the "xing shi" and "zui hou", which actually should be the poet himself. Comparatively Xu's translations of "While I'm sober" and "after I become drunk" were more accurate and faithful to the original meaning.
Conclusion
Poetry is a highly organic combination of sound, form and meaning, so the translators should use concise
language and abundant imagination with great care and precision to exactly present the scenes and emotions reflected in them. This paper chose W.J.B. Fletcher's and Xu Zhongjie's English translations of Li Bai's Drinking Alone in the Moon as examples, and compared them in forms, rhythms, meanings and artistic conceptions. Instead of ranking the two, the purpose of comparison was to discuss the expressions of the poem's spirit, mood and style in the two versions, which revealed some translation skills. Those differences between the two probably resulted from the following two reasons. One was that the translators overgeneralized some parts of the context and therefore the whole translation was affected by them; the other was that the translators comprehended the context from different viewpoints according to their individual times, social backgrounds, cultures, and interests, which determined the tones of their translations.
THE COMPARISON OF TWO ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF DRINKING ALONE IN THE MOON
Xu Yang
Shenyang Ligong University
Chinese classical literature is one of the most precious cultural heritages of China, in which poetry is known as a resplendent pearl and an art monument. To faithfully translate the poetry is helpful to present the artistic value and charm of those Chinese classical works. Li Bai, one of the great romantic poets of Tang Dynasty, was praised as Fairy Poet by later generations, and many of his poems have been translated into multiple languages. This paper contrasted W.J.B. Fletcher's and Xu Zhongjie's English translations of Li Bai's Drinking Alone in the Moon, discussing the differences between the two versions and their causes, analyzing their respective superiority and inferiority, and investigating the translation skills of Chinese poetry.
Keywords: poetry, form, rhyme, artistic conception. References
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