【Editor's Note】
Whitman's "Blades of Grass" has long been a classic, and the famous translator Zhao Luorui spent 12 years in his later years translating the first Chinese full text, but this full translation was out of print for many years. Recently, Zhao Luorui's full translation of the "Grass Leaf Collection" was republished, and The Paper was authorized to excerpt part of the preface to the translation written by Zhao Luorui.
Walt whitman
The American poet Walter Whitman was born on May 31, 1819 in the village of West Hill near Huntington, Long Island. He attended brooklyn for only five years as a child, worked as a handyman at a law firm at the age of eleven, and later learned to type in several typesetting workshops. For at least three years between the summer of 1836 and the spring of 1841, he worked as a village teacher throughout Long Island, changing nearly twelve schools. Soon he began publishing sentimental "cemetery-style" short stories and a few poems, and in 1836 ran a weekly magazine, The Long Islanders. He edited Dawn in New York and Twilight Gossip in Brooklyn until he became editor of the Daily Hawk in Brooklyn at the age of twenty-seven. It is estimated that between 1842 and 1848, he contributed or worked for at least eleven Newspapers and Periodicals in New York and Brooklyn. In 1840 he took part in the campaign in support of Van Buren's bid for president, and won the victory. Martin Van Buren was a radical democrat, Jackson's heir. Whitman remained passionate about politics, resigning more than once due to disagreements with newspaper bosses. His political views were radical at the time, believing in "free land" and opposing slavery. The so-called "free land" means that the common people are allowed to go to the west to open up the land without allowing the newly opened land to become a slave state. He was equally in favour of "free trade", in his own words: "I support any measure to break down barriers between nations: I demand that all nations open their doors." (May 1888)[1] adding: "Why advocate free trade ... It is for unity: free trade promotes unity. (December 1888) This position is no different from Jefferson's and Jackson's democracy, except that it has a little more humanitarian and internationalist flavor in Whitman (with regard to internationalism, the author has made many radical views in his poems and commentaries). Why did he so strongly demand democracy? To sum it up in two of his own words, he said: "The glory of America is due to the fact that she has forty million wise ordinary people, who are some of the smartest, smartest, healthiest, most moral people that have never been seen." (December 1889) Illustrates by reference to his other remarks that he considered a rising class in the country in this epoch was the vast majority of ordinary people, or average persons, including mechanics, coachmen, boatmen, fishermen, seafarers, men and women workers, and so on. He added: "I ask the people ... That is, the masses, the whole of the people — men, women, children — I demand that they possess everything that belongs to them — not just a part, most of it, but the whole — and I support whatever measures that give the people the proper opportunities — to enable them to live a fuller life... I demand that the people enjoy the rights they deserve. (January 1889) This is what he said in his later years, which is enough to show that this enthusiasm and conviction of the poet has always been unswerving, old and strong.
1848 was a pivotal year in Whitman's life. He was hired to work in the famous southern city of New Orleans as an editor of the newspaper Crescent.
He took his fourteen-year-old brother Jeff south via the middle, but did not live for three or four months before resigning and returning to New York. This trip was rare in Whitman's life, and he rarely traveled long distances. But more importantly, between 1845 and 1848, and especially 1848, Whitman was already calculating whether to be serious about being a writer. He has published many short stories and a small number of poems (mostly using traditional grammars). Among the novels was Franklin Evans (1842), an exhortation to quit drinking, which is said to have sold 20,000 copies. Reading was a necessity for his profession: when he was editor of the Daily Eagle, he wrote four hundred and twenty-five book reviews, including one hundred novels, twenty-two historical ones, fourteen biographies, forty-five religious ones, twenty-two poems, and so on. However, these works have little in common with the Blades of Grass published in 1855. According to Western scholars, between 1845 and 1848 he had written down some materials in his notes that would become the content of the Blades of Grass Collection, but he had not yet completely given up editing. In 1851 he also ran a small printing shop and also ran a house construction business. But he has reduced his political activity and turned more to music, literature, painting, sculpture, etc. For fifteen years (beginning in the mid-1830s), he admired the performances of all the famous Italian opera singers, including the tenor Betini and the great soprano Marietta Alboni, in New York. In his later years, Whitman said that "without Italian opera, there would be no Blades of Grass", which shows the depth of the influence. Yet in the field of literature and art, at least for a while, he was only an apprentice. What had been written before was only the work of a journalist and a newspaper editor, and it was not really literature. What is literature? What should be worked on and in what form? This should be something he has begun to seriously consider.
The result was the great epoch-making 1855 edition of Blades of Grass, which included a long preface summarizing the author's new literary and artistic perspectives and twelve great poems of seminal significance in the history of American literature. These two achievements show that the writer's creative thinking has taken a qualitative leap. Taking the preface as an example, there are some ideas that writers may have had long ago, but they are said here with a lot of sound. Almost all views are outlandish and unheard of. For example, in the mid-19th century, the vast majority of Americans and almost all foreigners believed that the United States was uncultured, that American life was vulgar, and that it needed to learn from Europe religiously. But the author begins by saying: "At any time in the world, the American poetry consciousness may be the most abundant, and the United States itself is basically the greatest poem." He also said: "The best expression of the genius of the United States is the ordinary man ... The president takes off his hat on them instead of them on him — these are poems that don't rhyme. "A poet must be commensurate with a people ... His spirit should echo the spirit of his country... He is the embodiment of her geography, ecology, rivers and lakes. "The arbitration of the state will not be her president but her poet." "He is the Prophet and Prophet ... He has a personality... He himself is complete... Others are as perfect as he is, but he can see and they can't. "People want him to point the way between reality and their souls." The poet also made demands for political freedom. He believed that the attitude of a great poet was to "inspire slaves and intimidate tyrants"; his greatest test was "present" and henceforth extended to the long future. Regarding the rhythm of poetry, he said: "The perfect poetic form should allow the rhythm to grow freely, and should accurately and comfortably produce buds like bushes of cloves or roses, shaped as compact as chestnuts, citrus, melons and pears, and emitting the elusive aroma of the form." This eight-page long preface (arranged in double columns according to the folio of the first edition) of about 10,000 words, full of passion, full of new ideas and strong vitality, unveils a new chapter in the art of poetry in the new era, especially In American poetry.
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The first edition of Blades of Grass
The first edition of The Blade of Grass appeared in the bookstore in early July 1855. The poet sent some to the celebrities of the American literary scene at that time. On July 21 Emerson wrote a heartfelt letter of tribute to the author: "This is a very unusual work that the United States has to offer so far that combines talent and wisdom... I'm very happy about it... I found an unparalleled amount of content in unparalleled language... I salute you for the beginning of your great cause..." Thoreau and Elcott, the famous literati of New England, visited the poet who was just beginning his talents. However, the general and main reaction was apathy. Abusive comments such as articles in the New York Code argue that poetry collections are characterized by "dirty" and "obscene." The article in the Critics in London argues: "Walter Whitman has nothing to do with art, just as stupid pigs and mathematics have no connection... He deserves to be whipped by law enforcers. The Communicator in Boston called it "arrogant, arrogant, vulgar, nonsense." The Boston Post says it indulges in the brazenness of the god of reproduction — worshipping "obscenity" and so on. In the same year, Whitman himself wrote three self-commentaries anonymously, expounding some of the arguments he cared about most in frank and colloquial terms. This is not surprising: the content and form of the first edition are very foreign to conservative literati and the general reader; the form is peculiar, and the ideas are bolder. At a time when Puritanism was still dominant, singing the praises of the flesh and explicitly depicting sexual acts would not be forgiven.
Between 1857 and 1859, Whitman frequented a basement restaurant in New York called Pfaff. There was a bohemian literati and artist. There, Whitman befriended Henry Clapp, editor-in-chief of the newly formed Saturday Weekly (1858). The latter, newly returned from Paris, despised Puritanism and often deliberately made moves that made the polite gentlemen shudder. Whitman's famous essay", "From the Cradle of Constant Swing", was first published in the Christmas issue of the Saturday Weekly on December 27, 1859. Pufaf restaurant is famous for its famous wine, but among these informal writers, critics, poets, and actors, Whitman is one of the more silent and restrained, never drunk. This is also the end of Whitman's life as an artist. As a self-taught writer, he was familiar with the Bible and the works of Homer, Shakespeare, Scott, Pence, George San, and Dickens. But his laid-back lifestyle and strong sense of self far outweigh any mentorship. He was exposed to the works of many famous literati and philosophers, including Emerson, Carlisle, and even Hegel, but his ideology and artistic approach always strongly maintained his personal unique style.
In order to introduce the poet's subsequent creative achievements, it is necessary to explain the main editions of the Blades of Grass and their arrangement. Scholars are accustomed to believing that there are nine editions of the Blades of Grass. Of great importance is the first edition, as described above. The second edition of 1856 added twenty new poems (including the famous passage "All the Way Across the Brooklyn Ferry," "The Song of the Broad Axe," and "The Song of the Great Road"), and added Emerson's famous letter together with his own reply (which was not sent) as an appendix and a "generational order." What disturbed Emerson was that Whitman used his fame to brag about himself, and even printed the most crucial sentence of Emerson's letter in gilding the spine: "I salute the beginning of your great cause." The third edition (1860) was important because it included two groups of poems, The Descendants of Adam and The Reed Flute, and From the Swinging Cradle. Most of these two groups of poems belong to the best works of the writer. The first poem in this edition was later titled "From Baumanok" and is autobiographical. The third edition is also important because the authors have some new ideas for the arrangement of the entire collection here. He gradually gave up the order of writing, but arranged the poems according to their themes and contents; and as they grew older, they gradually developed into personal biographies of the author, that is, his life's experiences and feelings. As early as the third edition of the poem "Goodbye", the author has said: "This is not a book, and whoever touches it is in contact with a person." The fourth edition of 1867 included two poems, "The Drums Are Loud, And" and "In Memory of President Lincoln", "Life Before and After the Civil War." The two subsequent editions added the group poem "Inscriptions" (which clarified the theme of the complete collection of Blades of Grass) until the final edition[2] (seventh edition, 1881-1882). In the seventh edition, the author made the final revision of the content and text, the title of the work was fixed, and the position of each poem was also fixed. The poems written thereafter are collected as supplements I and II at the end of the complete collection, and the poems that were not published before their death become supplement III. This final arrangement completes the whole process of the poet's growth. The collection begins with the group of poems "Inscriptions", which points out the main content of the outline of the whole collection; "From Baumanok" is the beginning of the autobiographical form, followed by the epic "My Own Song", which is a very representative personality. The Descendants of Adam and the Reed Flute describe the relationships that the poet has always cared about: the love between men and women, the friendship between men, and especially the latter, which the poet celebrates all his life and is regarded as the cornerstone of democracy. More than a dozen "songs" turn the "self" to the world and vividly describe some of the author's most interesting subjects, reflecting the author's typical values. "Migratory birds", "ocean currents" and "roadsides" are also generally named after the image of migratory birds and places such as the sea and the main road, writing about the poet's various profound feelings. "Drums Rattling" and "In Memory of President Lincoln" are his life experiences and personal feelings; "Autumn Streams" writes about life scenes from postwar recovery; and then transitions from life to death, including the group poems "Whispers of Divine Death", "From Noon to starry Night" and "Parting Song". This arrangement only outlines the life of a poet, and not every group of poems has strict coherence. The age of each poem is even less important to the author. The poet himself put it well: "The best autobiography is not built successfully but grows naturally." He even argues that the two supplements[3] to the end of the collection should also be part of his whole life, though their value is incomparable to that of his prime-age work. Some Western scholars tend to describe loosely structured poems as highly conscious arrangements, which seems far-fetched. This final arrangement was decided after the author's seven editions were adjusted, and was not consciously written gradually according to the author's life experience. Some Western scholars regard the complete collection of "Blades of Grass" as a great epic, but there is a certain truth. This "self" in the whole collection is more magnificent and more fulfilling than the "self" in "My Own Song". It is important for the poet to emphasize the individual strength of his poetry, even to say that it is not a poem but a person. He said, "Blades of Grass... It was always an attempt to record a person, a flesh-and-blood person (the one I was in the second half of the 19th century in the United States), freely, fully, and truthfully. I have not found a single similar personal account in today's literature which satisfies me."
The strongest and unchanging belief in Whitman's philosophy of life is American-style democracy. The title of the poem "Blade of Grass" is a concrete manifestation of this idea (see the afterword to the humble translation of "My Own Song"). There are too many such sentimental and strongly religious remarks in his talks,[4] letters, prefaces, and commentaries. There are at least three monographs: On Democracy (1867), On the Sanctity of Individuality (1868), and Prospects for Democracy (1871). The first poem of the final version of The Blades of Grass, "I Sing Myself" (1867), was written twelve years after the first edition. Ever since the poet decided to arrange the poems in the form of an autobiography, he wanted to put the group of poems "Inscriptions" at the beginning of the volume to clarify the central idea of the poetry collection, and "I Sing Myself" was the first of them.
I sing myself, a single, detached person,
But also the word democracy, the word whole.
These are the two main aspects of democracy: on the one hand, the individual or individual, and on the other hand equally important is democracy, that is, the whole. The individual and the individual are independent and can develop into perfection or near-perfection; it leads to diversity, to a nation with its own strengths that is close to perfection. Democracy, on the other hand, is the whole, the collective, which requires consistency, a unity, what Whitman calls the friendship between men, the stickiness, the relationship between partners, not loose but condensed (the poet calls himself the "poet of partners"). Whitman's ideas of democracy are not limited to theory. More than a decade of editing life has familiarized him with the real democratic form of government, he has participated in many political activities, personally experienced many political struggles, and written the Eighteenth Presidential Election[6], advocating the entry of ordinary workers into American politics. In His Essay "The Prospects for Democracy," he fully exposes the dark side of American democracy, but he believes in the vision of democracy and its powerful vitality: this confidence has never wavered.
I sang physiology from head to toe,
It's not just the looks or the mind that deserve to be dedicated to the poet, I mean the value of the whole structure is much greater,
Female and male I sing the same.
Here the psalmist asks for the praises of the whole man, both in body and soul, and that the whole is more valuable than the part.
The authors' equal evaluation of women is also consistent. For American society in the mid-19th century, this may still be a novelty.
Singing the vastness of life full of passion, pulse and strength,
In a good mood, supporting the most free actions formed under the guidance of the divine laws, I sing of modern man.
exegesis
1. The quotation is accompanied by a chronology of "With Walt Whitman in Camden" (by Horace Traubel), compiled by Horace Klauber. Six volumes out: 1906, 1908, 1914, 1959, 1964, 1982.
2. The translator invented this name because the author had already finalized the main body of the complete collection of Blades of Grass in 1881, and although he earnestly instructed that the "final edition" (1892) should be used as the basis for the future, the "final edition" only had two more supplements than the "final edition" and did not change the 1881 edition.
3. Supplement III was added by Klauber after the poet's death.
4. I.e. The preamble to "Together with Walter Whitman in Camden" in six volumes.
5. The Prospect of Democracy is a rewrite of the first two papers.
6. Written in 1856, the author was not published until 1956.
"Grass Leaves Collection" (all 2 volumes), [United States] Walter Whitman / by Zhao Luorui / Translation, Jiangsu Phoenix Literature and Art Publishing House Houlang, September 2020 edition.
Source: The Paper