Translating Chinese Culture

The process of Chinese--English translation

Valerie Pellatt, Eric T. Liu, Yalta Ya-Yun Chen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780415693127
• eBook ISBN: 9781317932475
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Languages
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Translating Chinese Culture is an innovative and comprehensive coursebook which addresses the issue of translating concepts of culture. Based on the framework of schema building, the course offers helpful guidance on how to get inside the mind of the Chinese author, how to understand what he or she is telling the Chinese-speaking audience, and how to convey this to an English speaking audience.

A wide range of authentic texts relating to different aspects of Chinese culture and aesthetics are presented throughout, followed by close reading discussions of how these practices are executed and how the aesthetics are perceived among Chinese artists, writers and readers. Also taken into consideration are the mode, audience and destination of the texts. Ideas are applied from linguistics and translation studies and each discussion is reinforced with a wide variety of practical and engaging exercises.

Thought-provoking yet highly accessible, Translating Chinese Culture will be essential reading for advanced undergraduates and postgraduate students of Translation and Chinese Studies. It will also appeal to a wide range of language studies and tutors through its stimulating discussion of the principles and purposes of translation.

1 Translating modern and contemporary Chinese art and artists

Art and artists as culture-specific entities

In this chapter we will explore the way in which discussion of the visual arts, or at least some of them, is expressed in Chinese, and how it might best be rendered into English. Human beings have been making images for thousands of years, in two dimensions and in three dimensions. Our culture of art must cross not only geo-political boundaries, but also generational boundaries. What our grandparents saw as tasteful and chic may now seem outmoded and vulgar to us, and what they would once have seen as indecent may, to us, be ravishingly beautiful. The differences are compounded when we work between languages and cultures, but on the other hand, we may be attracted by what is exotic, and identify with novelty.

In the following sections we see how artists describe their own motivations, ways of working and inner processes. Most artists are accustomed to working in visual, audio or tactile media, making their art communicate what writers would put into verbal media. This is something of an over-simplification, since some visual artists work with words, and in China painting is integrated with calligraphy and poetry. Yet even when the message of a painting or graphic is clear, a forest of discourse grows up around it, as artists and critics defend, deconstruct and debate. In this chapter we will look at translation of the meta-discourse of art: that is how artists and their critics or commentators talk about their work, how they fit into the cultural milieu, how they see their ways of working and how they use their art as a vehicle for change. We see how post-liberalisation artists have adapted and adopted from Western forms and techniques in order to shock and challenge

Traditional Chinese painting

The Chinese paint on paper, as do artists in many other cultures, and other supports, which are made from all sorts of materials, as in other cultures. In creating a ‘national’, or Chinese painting (国画), they use brushes, which are a universal tool of the painter, and they use water-based inks and colour paints on highly absorbent paper, ideally handmade. The tools of any artist range from the highly specialised to the mundane, and differ in detail between cultures. They may be regarded as culture-specific items, but as concrete items that can be described in terms of material, form and function, they present relatively few problems in translation. On a more abstract level, the styles of painting, the nature and appellation of the artists and the language of criticism and appreciation are also culture-specific items, but may present a greater degree of abstraction and a wider range of choices for the translator, inviting translators’ exploration of nuance and rhetoric.

While the brush is a universal tool for a painter, the way it is held and handled may be specific to the culture. As we will see in the following sections, the display and storage of a work of art may differ between cultures, but what drives an artist to create may be universal. The artists whose work is covered here ‘dovetail’ historically, covering a century of change. Wu Guanzhong was maturing as Qi Baishi reached old age, and our younger subject, Lin Tianmao, was maturing at about the time that Wu was reaching old age.

What it means to be an artist in the Chinese tradition: Qi Baishi

Qi Baishi (1863–1957) is one of the best-known Chinese painters of the twentieth century. Spanning two half-centuries in which China underwent major political and cultural changes, his work is still greatly admired today. While he was evidently a master of the traditional, he took the xieyi or impressionistic (写意) style to new heights of freedom, expanding the range of subjects in ever looser and bolder brushwork. Significantly, he rose from artisan, to craftsman, to painter, following a path that probably gave him greater insights into life than if he had been ‘born into’ the literati world of painting. The following excerpt is from He Huaishuo’s introduction to Qi’s autobiography 白石老人自述 (Old Baishi’s Autobiography). He reflects on why Qi is held in such great esteem, given that he was just one in a long line of superb painters and calligraphers. He Huaishuo first summarises the essence of a Chinese artist as traditionally and conventionally perceived:

Example 1a

齊白石繼承了文人畫傳統的精華。‘何謂文人畫？即畫中帶有文人之性質，含有文人之趣味。’而以‘思想、學問、才情、人品’ 為特質。這是陳衡恪（師曽）對文人畫的看法。‘文人畫’原來也被稱爲‘士大夫寫意畫’。具體而言，包括了幾個特色：寫意的技巧，以水墨爲主或淡設色，書畫同源（在用筆方面常以書法用筆為依據），詩（文）、書法與畫合一，加上篆刻，成爲‘三絕’或‘四絕’的綜合体。

(He Huaishuo in Qi 2001/2003: 19)

Qi Baishi continued the refinement of traditional literati painting. In the view of Chen Hengke (also known as Shi Zeng), literati painting has all the qualities and taste of the scholar artist. It embodies ideology, scholarship, talent and personality. ‘Literati painting’ was originally known as ‘the impressionistic style of the scholar’. In concrete terms, it had certain specific characteristics: the technique is chiefly ink painting, with some light colour, and the calligraphy and painting spring from the same source. The brush technique of the painting relies on calligraphy technique; the poetry and the calligraphy are integrated into the painting – a combination known as the three perfections. The addition of seal carving gives us the four perfections.

(Authors’ translation)

This short passage tells us a great deal about the veneration in which scholar-artists were held in China and the kind of person they were expected to be. The first challenge for the translator here is how to label the concept, well known in China, of wen ren – the literary person (文人). The concept distils, in the briefest possible way, the ideas of culture, refinement, education, talent in painting, skill in calligraphy, ability to carve seals, knowledge of poetry, intimacy with nature and landscape and rapport with other 文人. The dictionary gives us ‘man of letters’ (from a gender point of view this is largely correct, as traditionally, prior to 1911, few Chinese women would be poets and artists), ‘scholar’ and ‘literati’. We cannot possibly say that this broad notion of the artist does not exist in European or British culture, for it does: many of the great artists, from Leonardo to Lear, from Ruskin to Paolozzi, have been polymaths, people of broad and deep understanding of literature, art and artifice. The traditional Chinese perception of the artist may be more aesthetic, perhaps even tending towards the feminine or effete. There is a contrast in Chinese culture between the ideal literary male, whose qualities embodied wen, that is culture and refinement (文), and the ideal military wu male (武), who embodied physicality, roughness and aggression. The terms wen and wu are not confined to discussion of male character types: they are found, for example, in the preparation of Chinese medicine: 文火 (gentle heat) and 武火 (fierce or strong heat). The Chinese artist was not, generally speaking, an engineer or architect, though he might have considerable skill in garden design. He would not necessarily be a craftsman, though he would be able to carve the all-important seal that signed off his work. Prior to the twentieth century, he would almost certainly have been a civil servant, since all educated men aspired to recruitment to the Imperial civil service through the examination system. The examinations would have tested his knowledge of the Chinese classic works of literature, philosophy and history, and his ability to write the conventional essay and poetic genres.

So what do we call a 文人 in English? It may be the case here that we need a hyphenated solution such as ‘scholar-artist’ or ‘poet-artist’. Reverting to Latin is another option, in the choice of ‘literatus’, but most often this is used in the plural in English (literati) to denote a class of people. In Foster and Hartman’s English translation of Gernet, the term ‘lettered person’ is used, and expanded as ‘the man of culture and taste, qualified to exercise political functions’ (Gernet 1972/1999: 33). 士大夫 shi daifu, the term He cites above as an earlier label of the Chinese artist, is a synonym of 文人, but what is the difference? How are the terms distinguished in Chinese, and if there is a distinction, how can we reflect this distinction in English?

The expressions ‘the three perfections’ (三絕) and ‘the four perfections’ (四絕) can be said to be culture-specific, for they are characteristic of Chinese definition and categorisation in their use of numbers in the service of abbreviation and memorisation, creating a quasi-jargon. Number expressions are used in English, but less frequently than in Chinese. What the respective three and four perfections are is clear from the context, so it is unnecessary for the translator to provide footnotes or lengthy parentheses, but 絕 has to be integrated coherently into the English text. 絕 is to cut off, in other words to define; it also implies excellence, in other words a cutting off from the ordinary. 三絕 and 四絕 are what define a true artist, and conventionally are called ‘perfections’ (Von Spee 2012: 17). We have become accustomed to Chinglish slogans such as the ‘four modernisations’, the ‘three represents’ and so on, but they do not always read comfortably in their grammatical micro-context. Does a twenty-first century translator need to adhere to conventions established many decades ago? It would be possible to translate as follows:

The definitive mastery of literati painting lies in the consummate skills of painting, calligraphy and poetry, rounded off by the fourth skill of seal carving.

This slightly adaptive approach avoids the clumsiness of slogans and the reduction to hyperbole of these very high-level skills. If the editor wished to keep the Chinese terms, especially for the purposes of an index, they could be added in brackets.

Qi Baishi rose to prominence as a painter over his long life not only by means of pure talent, but by ‘turning art around’:

Example 1b

齊白石的畫風既然是由八大、八怪、趙之謙、吳昌碩而來，繼承在野文人畫的傳統，而且其風格面目，尤其與八大、金農、老缶如此相近，爲什麽仍享有最高的評價？我認爲主要在於齊白石的創造性，表現在將傳統文人畫的美感情趣轉向移位，開闢了一個平民化、世俗化的繪畫天地，注入了生機活潑的世俗人情。

(He 2003: 18)

Qi Baishi’s style continued the ‘outsider’ tradition of Ba Da, the Eight Eccentrics, Zhao Zhiqian and Wu Changshuo, yet, whereas his style was, on the surface, similar to that of Ba Da, Jin Nong and Lao Ji, why does he enjoy so much greater critical acclaim? My belief is that his creativity lies in the way he has changed the direction of aesthetic appreciation, opening it up for ordinary people; he has universalised the universe of painting, filling it with the vigour and vitality of human emotion.

(Authors’ translation)

This explanation of Qi’s success appears to be a string of clichés, and perhaps that is what is required for a man who was and is a household name. His achievement is compared to that of his predecessors, including the ‘eight eccentrics’ or ‘mad monks’, working during the late years of the Ming dynasty and the early years of the Qing. They included Bada Shanren and Jin Nong. As artists who, by choice or by force of circumstance, did not hold positions as officials, they were outsiders (在野文人) (Hejzlar 1980: 24). A note on these earlier artists may be desirable, depending on the destination of the text.

Qi was creative. He took the image of the eccentric scholar-artist and turned it around, he made it accessible to everyone, he universalised it. This is where his achievement breaks the mould. In his autobiography he tells the story of his rise from cowherd to carpenter, and from carpenter to carver to painter. As in many cultures, the ‘art’ of Chinese painting and calligraphy are considered to be more elevated, and indeed, elitist, than the craftsman’s skills of carving, potting, weaving, lacquering etc. Qi tells how people would buy his paintings, but ask him not to sign them: they considered him of too lowly a social class to be publicly acknowledged. In the following excerpt we see the link between Qi’s artisan skills and his art, when he learns the traditional techniques of mounting pictures. The passage is a simple narrative, but is full of ‘the tools of the trade’: paper, fabric, timber and gadgets. It is also full of conventional Chinese third person reference and terms of address, which must be sensitively but readably rendered in English.

Example 1c

我們家鄉，向來是沒有裱畫鋪的，只有幾個會裱畫的人，在四鄉各處，來來往往，應活做工，蕭薌陔師傅就是其中的一人。我在沁園師家讀書的時候，沁園師曾把蕭師傅請到家裏，一方面叫他裱畫，一方面叫大公子仙逋，跟他學做這門手藝。特地勻出了三間大廳，屋内中間，放著一張尺碼很長很大的紅漆桌子，四壁墻上釘著平整乾淨的木板格子，所有軸幹、軸頭、別子、綾絹、絲條、宣紙以及排筆、漿糊之類置備得齊齊備備，應有盡有。沁園師對我說： “瀕生，你也可以學學！你是一個畫家，學會了，裝裱自己的東西，就透著方便些。給人家做做活，也可以作爲副業謀生。”沁園師處處為我打算，真是無微不至。我也覺得他的話，很有道理，就同仙逋，跟著蕭師傅，從托紙到上軸，一層一層的手續，都學會了。

(Qi 2001: 77)

There had never been a picture mounting shop in my home town, just a few people who could do the job, who travelled about from place to place, taking jobs as and when. Master Xiao Xianggai was one of them. When I was studying at the home of Master Qin Yuan, Master Qin invited Master Xiao to his house to mount some pictures, and at the same time teach this craft to Master Qin’s eldest son Xian Bu. He had set aside three big rooms. In the centre stood an enormous red-lacquered table, and on the walls were hung wooden boards, all very neat and clean. There were dowels, knobs, clips, silk gauze, silk strips, xuan paper, paste brushes and paste – all the materials needed for mounting pictures. Master Qin Yuan said to me: ‘Pinsheng, you can learn too. You are a painter, and if you can learn to do mounting, you can do your own things, and that will be much more convenient. You could do it for other people too, as a sideline.’ Qin Yuan always had a thought for me; he was very considerate. He was absolutely right. I joined Xian Bu and together we learned from Xiao Xianggai every step of the procedure, from making the paper support to fixing on the roller.

(Authors’ translation)

A good English version would need some re-structuring within the sentences, as Qi Baishi’s narrative contains a number of typical Chinese ‘paratactic’ sentences, strings of co-ordinating clauses, or short sentences (短句), divided by commas. These might be replaced in English by full stops, and they might need to be re-ordered. Often, explicit linking words are needed to indicate co-ordinating, causal, conditional and temporal links.

Titles and terms of address are important culture-specific items. English is miserly in its use of titles and endearments in the second person, for courtesy in English dialogue is much more likely to be expressed through complex verb forms, and respectful titles are not repeated unduly in narration, but are expressed as pronouns. Throughout the passage, Qi refers to his seniors in the trade as Master (師傅), the usual term in Chinese for a craftsman who is senior in age or in experience and skill. It is an honorific, used to this day to address older men in a professional or working context. In this short passage two characteristics of Chinese writing are shown: respectful reference to seniors, and repetition of the full noun phrase (Master Xiao Xianggai). This means of expression should probably be kept, rather than exchanged for ‘Mr,’ as the events are taking place at the end of the nineteenth century. In order to preserve the cultural feel of an earlier time, the slightly archaic form is appropriate. In English, the general term ‘master craftsman’ is still used, and many crafts and skills have official qualifications or designations of ‘master’: there are master classes, masters’ degrees, masters of colleges and of hunts. It is a term of deep respect for a highly skilled professional. The use of the titles in this passage would help to avoid the ambiguity of an English pronoun-heavy approach, since all the characters referred to in the passage are male.

While referring courteously to his seniors, Qi narrates in a matter-of-fact, reader-friendly register: he is telling his story as an ordinary man who rose gradually and coincidently to fame. There would be no...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1. Translating modern and contemporary Chinese art and artists: Art and artists as culture-specific entities
• 2. Chinese characters: National, cultural and personal identity
• 3. Calligraphy: Physical and spiritual aspects of writing
• 4. The meaning of clothes: Cultural, political and historical significance
• 5. The role of the Chinese nursery rhyme in disseminating traditional values in a modern world
• 6. Transcreation as a means of delivering poetry to an Other audience: rap adaptation and sinophonic poetry
• 7. Absurdity and irony in modern Chinese literature
• 8. Drama translation: A case study of collaborative translation
• 9. Translating films
• Appendix
• Bibliography
• Index