Kango's 1624th original
Some time ago, The Hangzhou translator Jin Xiaoyu touched the hearts of the Chinese people.
He is a bipolar disorder and a talented translator.
Jin Xiaoyu
In media reports, I noticed a story about his translation:
While translating the English novel Mefisto by Irish writer John Banville, Jin Xiaoyu had a disagreement with the editor of the publishing house.
John Banville
The editor believes that Mefisto is a character in the novel, according to convention, to be transliterated, so the title should be "Mephistopheles", just like the world's masterpieces - "Don Quixote", "David Copperfield", "Jane Eyre", "John Christophe".
Originally, the translator compromised and passed, but Jin Xiaoyu is a perfectionist who is paranoid about the work, and his view is as follows:
Mefisto is a character in Goethe's Faust, a demon who lures humanity into depravity, and the writer John Banville gives the protagonist the name, alluding to his "seductive" nature.
Illustration of Faust
Instead of translating the title of the book into the obscure "Mephistopheles", it is better to use "The Seducer", which is directly in place and points out the essence.
Later, it turned out that "The Seducer" became a favorite translation of the reader.
Today, I will lead you to appreciate some beautiful titles and feel the charm of translation together.
1. The Crowd
In Gustav Le Pen's work on social psychology, a group of people in a group of people will have psychological, moral, and behavioral characteristics that are different from those of the individual, and if translated as "The Masses" or "The Crowd", it is completely off the line.
The translated title of "The Ragged Crowd" is completely in line with the description in the book, to the point, sharp and sharp.
2. Tales from the Thousand and One Nights
The book has two translations, "One Thousand and One Nights" and "Heavenly Nights", which I prefer, especially with a Chinese flavor.
"Tianfang" is the ancient name of the continent for the Arab region, because the "Kaaba" that Muslims made their pilgrimage to Mecca was also called "Kaaba", so the Arab region was called "Kaaba Country", and later called "Tianfang Kingdom".
"Ye Tan" is actually "Night Talk", written as "Night Tan" is due to ancient avoidance, because Tang Wuzong's name is Li Yan, so people use "Tan" instead of "Talk".
"Fantasy" later evolved into an idiom that was a metaphor for a bizarre statement.
4. Oliver Twist
Foreigners often name novels after the protagonist, but this is not in line with the tastes of Chinese readers.
The protagonist of the novel, Oliver Twist, is an orphan who tells the story of his tragic life and suffering.
Because the background of the novel is London, London is foggy due to natural reasons, and because most of the coal was used as a household fuel in the early 20th century, producing a lot of smoke, the superposition of the two smokes made London a veritable "fog capital".
Therefore, the translated name of "Orphans of the Mist" is very elegant, and it conveys a kind of miserable and tragic texture.
5. The Remains of the Day
Kazuo Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize in Literature for his book, the title The Remains of the Day, which literally translates to "the rest of the day."
But translated as "Long Days Leaving Traces", it suddenly has a mood, like a trace left in the air by the sunset seaside plane, which is beautiful.
However, it was later translated as "The Long Day Will End", replacing the sense of beauty with sadness, which may be more in line with the original intention of the novel.
Below, let's take a look at the mainstream English translations of our four great Chinese masterpieces, which are also very beautiful.
1. Romance of the Three Kingdoms
My personal favorite translation is Romance of the Three Kingdoms
The best translation is to translate "rendition" into Romance.
Romance originally described the romance between men and women, but the love and hatred and conflict of interests of various characters in the Three Kingdoms period were intertwined, like love, so the word Romance distilled this intricate relationship very well, in line with the essence of "interpretation".
Romance also has the meaning of adventure stories and legends, but I think the above understanding will be more interesting.
2. Journey to the West
My favorite translation of the name is Journey to the West
Some people with Sun Wukong as the protagonist, the title of the book translated as "Monkey", "The Monkey King", obviously inappropriate, "Journey to the West" records a team through 9981 difficulties, in the Western Heavens to get the true scriptures of the story, so Journey to the West, concise and concise, but also more in line with the essence of the title of the Chinese.
3. Dream of the Red Chamber
Some translations are translated according to the original name "The Stone", such as "The Story of the Stone" published by the British Penguin Press, but the name is slightly ordinary.
I prefer the translation of A Dream of Red Mansions, "Dreams in the Red Mansion," which is full of symbolism:
Red mansions are a metaphor for the glory and wealth of a large family, and dream points out the final ending - everything is like a dream bubble, a dream.
4. "Water Margin"
The most outrageous translation of the title of Water Margin that I've ever seen is "A Story of 105 Men and 3 Women" and "The Story of 105 Men and Three Mothers-in-Law."
What I prefer is these two versions, one is the American female writer Pearl Buck's All Men Are Brothers, which implicitly describes the connection between the good men of Liangshan.
Pearl S. Buck
Pearl Buck's version is good, but it's a bit self-indulgent, and I prefer the Jewish-Chinese translator Shabori's version, Outlaws of the Marsh, which is more in line with the title and plot of the Chinese.
Sidney Shapiro
If I hadn't said these two translators, many people probably wouldn't have known who made these wonderful translations? The authors of all the classical translations mentioned earlier are also little known.
Translators, compared with writers, are more like the "invisible people" behind literary works, but it is precisely because of the translator's finishing touch that many foreign classic works are famous in history and pay tribute to them.
If this video is liked by many people, I consider doing a translation of the title of the movie, if you like it, please like it and tell me.