Let's start with the raw language at first: the poem in its original Chinese, followed by the pronunciation with a word-for-word dictionary translation. Then, I'll try my hand at a full English translation.
001张九龄:感遇四首之一
孤鸿海上来,池潢不敢顾。
侧见双翠鸟,巢在三珠树。
矫矫珍木巅,得无金丸惧。
美服患人指,高明逼神恶。
今我游冥冥,弋者何所慕。
Gū hóng hǎi shàng lái, chíhuáng bù gǎn gù.
Lone swan ocean on come, pool puddle not dare visit
Cē jiàn shuāng cuìniǎo, cháo zài sānzhūshù
side see pair kingfishers, nest at three pearl tree
Jiǎojiǎo zhēn mù diān, dé wú jīnwán jù.
arrogant / military(x2) treasure wood peak, how not gold pellet terror
měifù huàn rén zhǐ, gāo míng yù shén wù.
beautiful clothes worry men point, high shine meet god hate
jīn wǒ yóu míngmíng, yìzhě hé suǒ mù
now I swim / wander high and far, arrow -ingperson how where admire
Zhang Jiuling, Four Poems of Encountering - 1
Lone swan comes over ocean; pools and ponds it dare not visit.
Beside, see a pair of kingfishers, nesting in a triple pearl tree.
Mighty on their treasure-wood peak, how can they not fear a sling's gold stones?
Beautifully clothed, beware pointing fingers; greatness and glory bring spirits' wrath.
Now I ramble high and far; archers, what hope have they?
Internet just ate my first comment. Boo internet.
ReplyDeleteIn brief: I'm especially interested in your last line, which first I thought confusing and now I tend to think rather wonderfully sparse, forcing the reader into some useful thinking.
And it is hilarious that I write this, having just told it to you directly. The internet must know.
A further thought: you have avoided the (in Tang shi) oft-assumed first person pronoun like the plague, and indeed steered clear of many possible pronoun inserts. What's your thinking on inserting English pronouns, especially given how incredibly common it is? I myself do it a lot, but I certainly don't have any kind of ideological commitment to such a translation paradigm. If I had to describe this common paradigm, by the way, I'd say it holds that English phrases, whether "poetikal" or not, just like pronouns. In a way, this view is about making the Chinese fit English -- and you have by that measure instead tried to make the English fit the Chinese.
ReplyDeleteThe internet must know, indeed! I agree that the last line verges on the confusing. I wasn't certain how explicit to make the fact that the "hope" was the archers' hope of hitting a target (or lack thereof).
ReplyDeleteAs for pronouns, I have a post in mind for later this week, but to spoil a little: you're spot on in that I was skewing away from using pronouns in this translation where they weren't explicit in the Chinese source. This isn't a doctrine of mine, more of an experiment in what an ambiguously located narrative voice would sound like in English.
Also, I'm intrigued by how different English translations of Chinese poetry are from the originals in form. Rigid metric verse becomes effulgent, rhymes disappear, etc. I wanted to try maintaining as much of the Chinese word order as I could without it sounding weird. Avoiding pronouns was part of that, since pronouns often come loaded with extra verbiage. I'll try a different approach next time, but this was an interesting experiment.
(This is also why the last line feels a bit twisted, by the way: I wanted to preserve the "Archers what hope" structure of the Chinese. Maybe this was a case of going too far in the service of an experimental approach.)
I really don't mean to sound like a pedantic prick, but I suppose I've already screwed the pooch on that.
ReplyDelete金丸 were not gold, and were not fired from a sling. 金 here is being used in its older meaning of "metallic" and 丸 is "pellet" or "bullet." The weapon used to propel such pellets was a 弹弓 or "Bullet-Bow" which was essentially a crossbow modified with a barrel which could fire round projectiles. They were often used for wildfowling. Granted the treasure and reference to mythical wonders gives the 金 an added nuance regarding the gold meaning. But I don't think it's enough to justify "gold stones" as if this were some sort of surreal vista.
弋者何所慕 is more "what will the hunter now set his heart on?" because of the use of 所.