Translation History || "Shakespeare Love History" of Two Generations of Chinese Translators

Source of this article: Oriental Morning Post

Reporter: Xu Xiao

Zhu Shenghao died after the first two scenes of the translation of Henry V at the age of 32.

The Complete Works of Shakespeare, translated and published by Fang Ping in 2014, is the first translation of a complete collection of poems.

In 1921, Tian Han's translation of "Hamerlet" was published in the magazine "Young China", which is the earliest Chinese translation of Shakespeare's plays, and today, Shakespeare's Chinese translation has been 95 years. In the past hundred years, the well-known Shakespeare translators are Zhu Shenghao, Liang Shiqiu, Sun Dayu and Fang Pingping.

Among them, Zhu Shenghao, Liang Shiqiu, and Fang Ping's Shakespeare translations have all appeared in the complete works (Zhu Shenghao's last 6 historical dramas were not translated due to illness; Fang Ping's translation was Fang Ping's chief translator-in-chief, and many people translated it; Liang Shiqiu completed the translation of the complete collection alone), while Sun Dayu's translations totaled 8. In terms of style, Zhu Shenghao and Liang Shiqiu are prose styles, Sun Dayu is the first to use poetry to translate, and the Complete Works of Shakespeare, translated and published by Fang Ping in 2014, is the first translation of the complete works of poetry. In addition, Shakespeare or poems translated by Bian Zhilin, Liang Zongdai and Cao Yu are also widely familiar to Chinese readers.

This year coincides with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death, and the opening event of the "2016 Shanghai Changning District Reading Festival Reading Carnival" has prepared two Shakespeare lecture series for readers. On the afternoon of April 16, zhu Shanggang, the only son of Zhu Shenghao, and Zhang Chong, professor of the English Department of Fudan University and one of the translators of the poetry "The Complete Works of Shakespeare", told readers about the "Love History of Shakespeare" of two generations of translators at the Changning District Library in Shanghai.

Without Shakespeare's Chinese translation, the Japanese say that China has no culture

In 1942, Birmingham, England, held an exhibition of foreign translations of Shakespeare's works, and on the booth in Japan, a set of Japanese translations of The Complete Works of Shakespeare were displayed, and dozens of hardcover gilded volumes were displayed. Next to this complete collection, there is a thin copy of Romeo and Juliet published in China, translated by Tian Han.

This kind of cultural pain, Zhu Shenghao has already experienced it long ago.

In 1929, at the age of 17, Zhu Shenghao graduated from Xiuzhou Middle School in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, and was sent to the provincial capital of Hangzhou, a well-known institution of higher learning, Zhijiang University (now the Zhijiang Campus of Zhejiang University) to study, majoring in Chinese and taking English. The four years of Zhijiang University have laid a good foundation in Chinese and English for Zhu Shenghao. Because of the school's rich collection of books, he was able to read a large number of excellent chinese and foreign literary works, of which the most profound and influential to him were the works of many British poets such as Shelley, Keats, Wordsworth and so on.

"In addition, he also developed a strong interest in the works of the great British dramatist Shakespeare, and was deeply attracted by the deep humanistic connotations in Shakespeare, and read it several times from beginning to end during his college years." Zhu Shanggang said.

Zhang Chong believes that the sensitivity to poetic language and the good traditional Chinese culture, classical literature accumulation, and patriotism are the three important reasons why Zhu Shenghao was able to complete the landmark Shakespeare complete works. The patriotism mentioned here, Zhu Shanggang explains, refers to the motivation of Zhu Shenghao's entry into Shakespeare translation.

It was the spring of 1935, the major publishing houses in Shanghai were translating world famous works, Zhu Shenghao after graduation to work for the World Bookstore naturally not to be left behind, intending to translate the complete works of Shakespeare, Zhan Wenhu, who was the director of the English Department at the time, suggested that Zhu Shenghao come to translate, zhu Shenghao agreed. According to Zhu Shenghao's wife, Song Qingru, the contract was paid piece by piece, two silver dollars per thousand words (1 silver dollar is about thirty or forty yuan today). At that time, Zhu Shenghao had to bear the life of the whole family, the economy was tight, and although the translation remuneration was not much, it was not without small supplements.

But the deeper reason was that he wanted to use shakespeare translations to raise cultural resistance and counterattack against Japan. In the summer of 1936, he wrote in a letter to Song Qingru: "Do you worship national heroes? Shedd said I would be a national hero if Shakespeare was translated successfully. Because a certain Chinese once said that China is a country without culture, there is not even a translation of Lao Sha. In the letter, "Brother She" is Zhu Wenzhen, the younger brother of Zhu Shenghao, and "a certain countryman" refers to the Japanese.

"As a weak scholar with no chicken in his hands, my father used to feel depressed and confused because he had no way to serve the country, but at this time he found that his work could win glory for the nation and be linked to resisting the cultural aggression of Japanese imperialism, and his spiritual outlook suddenly perked up, so he was determined to do a good job in translating Shakespeare and win glory for the country." Zhu Shanggang said that since then, his father has changed his original "lonely, lonely, wandering" mentality and entered Shakespeare's world.

Two dictionaries, reprinted twice

After repeatedly studying all shakespeare and collecting as many different versions as possible, Zhu Shenghao began to translate in 1936.

Because the original text of Shakespeare is a verse in Middle English, if it is still translated according to the verse, Zhu Shenghao believes that it is not only difficult, but also greatly limited in the use of language, and it is difficult to achieve the requirements of popularity and fluency. After some deliberation, he decided to translate in prose style.

By the summer of 1937, Zhu had finished translating many of Shakespeare's plays, and it was expected that the first fascicle "Comedy" could be completed by the fall. But the "August 13" Songhu War of Resistance interrupted his translation plan.

"Father's place of residence bore the brunt. He had to leave in a hurry all night, too late to sort out anything, and only brought a rattan box containing an Oxford edition of Shakespeare' Complete Works, a small amount of manuscript paper, and a few pieces of clothing. The next day, Zhu Shenghao was ready to take the risk of retrieving the translations that had been handed over to the World Book Company, but the area was already in chaos and impassable, and the World Book Office headquarters was occupied by the Japanese army.

"All of my father's translations over the past year or so, as well as the various editions of Shakespeare, reference materials, and other books that I had painstakingly collected, were all lost." Zhu Shanggang said that although two translations of the script were later retrieved, Zhu Shenghao had already retranslated them by then.

Zhu Shenghao returned to his hometown of Jiaxing, and then traveled to many places, until 1938, when he ventured back to the "isolated island" of Shanghai, and later entered the Sino-American Daily. During this period, Zhu Shenghao's translation work did not stop, and he still began to translate from scratch from "The Tempest". However, this part of the translation was not preserved due to the outbreak of the Pacific War and the Japanese occupation of all of Shanghai. After fleeing Shanghai again, in May 1942, after holding a simple and simple wedding with Song Qingru, Zhu Shenghao went to Changshu Song Qingru's mother's house for half a year, and then returned to his hometown in Changshu.

At that time, his only reference books were two dictionaries, the Oxford Dictionary and the English-Chinese Dictionary, and there were no other books to refer to, nor to discuss the questioning of the teachers. The amount of energy he expended was indeed unimaginable. Zhu Shanggang said.

Due to the high mental expenditure, coupled with poverty and lack of necessary nutritional supplements, in June 1944, Zhu Shenghao had to put down his pen after translating the first two days of "Henry V", and died prematurely at the end of that year due to complications such as tuberculosis and intestinal tuberculosis, at the age of 32.

"To be precise, the five and a half historical dramas did not have time to translate and left. His biggest regret was that he 'knew that he was sick and couldn't afford it, and he desperately wanted to finish translating it'. Zhu Shanggang said with a sigh.

Absorb the fruits of international shakespeare and provide another kind of Shakespeare

Although Zhu Shenghao's translation is inevitably unsatisfactory due to the times, conditions and personal style, zhu yisha opera has become a classic translation loved by readers for more than half a century.

"Zhu Shenghao is such a monument here, how can we surpass him?" It can only be different from him. Of course, not only because of this, because everyone's background is different, the Shakespeare he came into contact with and recognized was different. Zhang Chong said of the original intention of the new translation of the poem.

From 1991 to 1992, when Zhang Chong was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University, he happened to see Shakespeare's 38th play, "Two Noble Relatives", in the bookstore, and he liked it, and it happened that his doctoral dissertation was to write Shakespeare research, so he decided to try to translate. This newly discovered Shakespeare opera was actually internationally included in the Complete Works of Shakespeare in the 1970s, but little is known about it on the Chinese side.

When Zhang Chong began to translate, he did not know that Sun Fali, a professor at the Department of Foreign Languages of Southwest Normal University, was also translating, but he felt that in the face of Shakespeare translation, which is basically in the form of prose, why not try to translate in the form of poetry? After the translation was completed, Zhang Chong showed it to Fang Ping. Fang Ping felt very good after reading it, and at that time, Fang Ping was doing a translation of Shakespeare's complete works of poetry, so he invited him to join in. In addition to "Two Noble Relatives", Zhang Chong also translated four legendary plays, and "Edward III", which is considered to be a 60% probability of being Shakespeare's earliest play.

Why did he think of translating in the poetic style, Zhang Chong recalled, this is first of all because he began to know Shakespeare from English, and at the beginning he was exposed to the original appearance of Shakespeare in poetry.

"For Me, Shakespeare's poetic and prose styles are not only simple works of expression, but according to the current formalist critical theory and other theories, the form is meaningful, and for Shakespeare, his form is naturally meaningful." Zhang Chong explained.

In Shakespeare, for example, people of lower social status may speak in prose style, while once the scene shifts to a conversation between noble or elegant women, it is mostly poetic. In addition, most of the poems in Shakespeare are non-rhyming poems, and occasionally when they rhyme, they are often the need to turn the curtain. "Often Shakespeare would use four lines of rhyming poems when the scenes changed, a bit like classical Chinese opera, like the upper and lower poems in the yuan miscellaneous drama." Zhang Chong introduced.

Published in 2014 on the 450th anniversary of Shakespeare's birth, this new poetic translation draws on the latest successes in international shakespearean studies, including 38 Shakespeare plays and 1 controversial Edward III, with 4.7 million words. Fang Ping, the chief translator and editor-in-chief, undertook most of the translation and revision work, but unfortunately did not see the advent of the complete collection, and he pointed out before his death in 2008: "This new set of poetry translations of Shakespeare's Complete Works is not only new in this way, it is a new translation according to the original literary style (poetic style), but also wants to re-indicate that under the inspiration of a new concept, a new understanding of Shakespeare is inspired by a new concept. ”

Zhang Chong explained, "We always think that classics are placed on the bookshelf for people to admire, but in fact, they are not, and the origin of classics must be grassroots. Shakespeare's plays are meant to allow people above to act and people below to watch. Therefore, in the process of translation, Fang Ping has been trying to shift the Shakespeare text from the traditional "desk drama" to the "stage script".