Brief Introduction of the Chine Translation History
Chine translation theory was born out of contact with vassal states during the Zhou Dynasty. It developed through translations of Buddhist scripture into Chine. It is a respon to the universals of the experience of translation and to the specifics of the experience of translating from specific source languages into Chine. It also developed in the context of Chine literary and intellectual tradition.
The modern Standard Mandarin word fanyi 翻譯 "translate; translation" compounds fan "turn over; cross over; translate" and yi "translate; interpret". Some related synonyms are tongyi 通譯 "interpret; translate", chuanyi 傳譯 "interpret; translate", and zhuanyi 轉譯 "translate; retranslate".
The Chine classics contain various words meaning "interpreter; translator", for instance, sheren 舌人 (lit. "tongue person") and fanshe 反舌 (lit. "return tongue"). The Classic of Rites records four regional words: ji 寄 "nd; entrust; rely on" for Dongyi 東夷 "Eastern Yi-barbarians", xiang 象 "be like; remble; image" for Nanman 南蠻 "Southern Man-barbarian
s", didi 狄鞮 "Di-barbarian boots" for qq邮箱官方网站Xirong 西戎 "Western Rong-barbarians", and yi 譯 "translate; interpret" for Beidi 北狄 "Northern Di-barbarians".
In tho five regions, the languages of the people were not mutually intelligible, and their likings and desires were different. To make what was in their minds apprehended, and to communicate their likings and desires, (there were officers), — in the east, called transmitters; in the south, reprentationists; in the west, Tî-tîs; and in the north, interpreters. (王制 "The Royal Regulations", tr. James Legge 1885 vol. 27, pp. 229-230)
A Western Han work attributes a dialogue about translation to Confucius. Confucius advis a ruler who wishes to learn foreign languages not to bother. Confucius tells the ruler to focus on governance and let the translators handle translation.
The earliest bit of translation theory may be the phra "names should follow their bearers, while things should follow China." In other words, names should be transliterated, while things should be translated by meaning.
In the late Qing Dynasty and the Republican Period, reformers such as Liang Qichao, Hu Shi and Zhou Zuoren began looking at translation practice and theory of the great translators in Chine history.丰收在望打一字
Zhi Qian (3rd c. AD)
Zhi Qian (网游之奈何倾城支謙)'s preface (序) is the first work who purpo is to express an opinion about translation practice. The preface was included in a work of the Liang Dynasty. It recounts an historical anecdote of 224AD, at the beginning of the Three Kingdoms period. A party of Buddhist monks came to Wuchang. One of them, Zhu Jiangyan by name, was asked to translate some passage from scripture. He did so, in rough Chine. When Zhi Qian questioned the lack of elegance, another monk, named Wei Qi (維衹), responded that the meaning of the Buddha should be translated simply, without loss, in an easy-to-understand manner: literary adornment is unnecessary. All prent concurred and quoted two traditional maxims: Laozi's "beautiful words are untrue, true words are not beautiful" and Confucius's "speech cannot be fully recorded by writing, and speech cannot fully capture meaning".微信语音如何转发
Zhi Qian's own translations of Buddhist texts are elegant and literary, so the "direct translation" advocated in the anecdote is likely Wei Qi's position, not Zhi Qian's.
Dao An (314-385AD)
Dao An focud on loss in translation. His theory is the Five Forms of Loss (五失本):
1.Changing the word order. Sanskrit word order is free with a tendency to SOV. Chine is SVO.
2.Adding literary embellishment where the original is in plain style.
3.Eliminating repetitiveness in argumentation and panegyric (頌文).
4.Cutting the concluding summary ction (有含义的网名義說).
5.Cutting the recapitulative material in introductory ction.
Dao An criticized other translators for loss in translation, asking: how they would feel if a translator cut the boring bits out of classics like the Shi Jing or the Classic of History?
He also expanded upon the difficulty of translation, with his theory of the Three Difficulties (王有为三不易):
1.Communicating the Dharma to a different audience from the one the Buddha addresd.
2.Translating the words of a saint.
3.Translating texts which have been painstakingly compod by generations of disciples.
Kumarajiva (344-413AD)
Kumarajiva’s translation practice was to translate for meaning. The story goes that one day Kumarajiva criticized his disciple Sengrui for translating “heaven es man, and man es heaven” (天見人,人見天). Kumarajiva felt that “man and heaven connect, the two able to e each other” (人天交接,兩得相見) would be more idiomatic, though heaven es man, man es heaven is perfectly idiomatic.
In another tale, Kumarajiva discuss the problem of translating incantations at the end of sutras. In the original there is attention to aesthetics, but the n of beauty and the literary form (dependent on the particularities of Sanskrit) are lost in translation. It is like chewing up rice and feeding it to people (商品代码嚼飯與人).
