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Translation ReviewNumber Seventy 2005

The University of Texas at Dallas

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Translation ReviewNo. 70, 2005

SPECIAL ISSUE:

Chinese Literature

John BalcomGuest Editor

Introduction....................................................................................................................................................................................................John Balcom

On the Role of the Translator.......................................................................................................................................................................N. G. D. Malmqvist

An Interview with Burton Watson..............................................................................................................................................................John Balcom

Lu Yu (Lu You), Twelve Poems...............................................................................................................................................................1Burton Watson

Bo Juyi and Guan Panpan: the Swallow Tower Poems...........................................................................................................................1Geoffrey R. Waters

On Li Bais Jeweled Staircase Grievance..............................................................................................................................................2Steve Bradbury

Flirting with the Explicit: Euphemism and Eroticism in the Chinese Lyric ........................................................................................2Mike Farman

A Conversation with J. P. Sandy Seaton..............................................................................................................................................3Steve Bradbury

What Develops in a Dark Room Dazzles Brighter than Light: Resistance and the Translation of Chinese Poetry..........................4Simon Patton

On a Poem by Bei Dao ...............................................................................................................................................................................4John Balcom

Translating Ideogram into a Culture of Phonogram in Tae-Sok Ohs PlayBellflower....................................................................5Hyung-Jin Lee

Waiting for a Better Translation................................................................................................................................................................5Nancy Tsai

Book Reviews

Poems of the Masters: Chinas Classic Anthology of Tang and Sung Dynasty Verse,tr. by Red Pine.............................................6Reviewed by Mike Farman

Big Breasts and Wide Hips, by Mo Yan,tr. by Howard Goldblatt....................................................................................................7Reviewed by Christopher Lupke

Contributors .............................................................................................................................................................................................7

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Translation Review 53

Translating Ideogram into a Culture of Phonogram in Tae-Sok Ohs Play Bellflowerby Hyung-Jin Lee

As the theater scholars who analyze a dramatic text need totake into account the performance-oriented nature of thetext, as well as its literary values, in the same context thetranslator of a play into another language has to be moreconscious of its inherent performability. The ultimatepurpose of theater translation is to see the translated playperformed in the target language on stage before a live au-dience, while not excluding the readers sitting curled up onthe couch at home.

However, placing more than due emphasis on the impor-tance of performability in theater translation often frus-trates the translators, as it may unintentionally bind them tothe nearly impossible task of translating performability.

Whereas Stanislawski or Brecht would have assumed thatthe responsibility for decoding the gestic text lay with theperformers, the assumption in the translation process isthat this responsibility can be assumed by the translator sit-ting at a desk and imagining the performance dimension.Common sense should tell us that this cannot be taken se-riously (Bassnett-McGuire, Translating for the Theatre100).

Nevertheless, it is clear that the need for instant commu-nicability is more urgent in theater translation than inother literary genres, such as poetry or the novel, where

readers, unlike the theater audience, are given more activecontrol over the reception of a literary work. For instance,while readers can stop their reading at any time and ponderit or resume reading from any point, the theater audienceobviously may not stop the performance in the middle.Therefore, a priority in theater translation should be givento the communication with the audience in a more directand immediate way.

Furthermore, while the translation of poetry or novels mayresort to the use of references and explanation in dashesand parentheses within the text for clarification, in theatertranslation these auxiliary means of written explanation losetheir timely function on stage and become literally ineffec-tual to theater audiences in live performance. Thus, for thesake of instant communication in translation, a certain de-gree of the modification of format or style of the originaldramatic text is inevitable in the process of theater transla-tion. Bassnett-McGuire suggests that consequently thetask of the translator must be to determine what thosestructures are and to translate them in to the TL [target

language], even though this may lead to major shifts on thelinguistic and stylistic planes (Translation Studies122).Recently, while translating the Korean playBellflower(1992),written by Tae-Sok Oh, into English, I was intrigued byseveral challenges with regard to instant communicabil-ity. One problem with the translation of this play had todo with transmitting an indigenous cultural existencewhose close English equivalent is unlikely to be found in aWestern context.

Ohs play historicizes the critical time of the late nine-teenth-century Joseon dynasty (13921910), the lastdynasty on the Korean peninsula, which eventually suc-cumbed to Japanese colonial exploitation in 1910 for thirty

five years. In the critical disintegration of social conscious-ness that coincided with the loss of the countrys sover-eignty already imminent in the 1890s, the time in whichthe play is set cultural and social structures and the foun-dation of the dynasty became so fragile that it was violentlydismantled, losing its juridical and cultural authority. Oneexample of the disintegration of the social and moral con-sciousness is reflected in the play through the character

Jong-Us selling of (pronounced jok-bo), which can

be roughly translated as a family genealogy book.

While an equivalent of a family genealogy book may be

found in Western culture, the social and practical implica-tions of the family genealogy book in the Joseon dynastymight have differed significantly from those of the poten-tial Western counterpart. The Joseon dynasty was strictlybased on a class system, and so a family genealogy bookwas one of the few official and practical means to verifypersonal identification as well as social class status. In theWest, the role of genealogy text is limited to serving as achronological record of a family tree. Furthermore, in theJoseon dynasty, aristocratic-class families were able tomaintain their economic and social privileges through theinheritance of a family estate and to obtain government

posts from their ancestors, as verified by this family gene-alogy book. Thus, it is no wonder that social and economicprivileges associated with this family genealogy book andits accompanied identification tags were enormouslyvalued.

Though local administrative offices were supposed to keeptheir own authentic copies of these family genealogy booksand exercise strict jurisdiction over any modification of the

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record, these were no longer practically effective as the lateJoseon dynasty was about to collapse amid the rapid disin-tegration of the social class system. In this chaotic time, theillegal trading of inherited class status by means of the fam-ily genealogy book between an impoverished aristocraticclass and affluent merchant class was far from rare, a cul-

tural phenomenon somewhat comparable to the trading ofa government post in sixteenth- and seventeenth-centuryFrance. In this play, through the forgery or illegal tradingof the family genealogy book, the affluent merchant classattempted to advance in social class as well as receive anexemption benefit for taxes and military duty.

In Ohs play, while the trading of a government post be-comes feasible through the selling of the family genealogybook, its cultural practice might be unfamiliar to Westernaudiences. Thus, in the process of translation it is necessaryto establish a proper correlation between the ownership of

family-inherited government posts and the practical valueand role of the family genealogy book itself. In order toclose the cultural difference in translation, I directly addedmy own explanatory line in the dialogue of Jong-U, an aris-tocrat character, about the implied value and function ofthe family genealogy book (but this will let you take myfamily-inherited government post) rather than use a foot-note or endnote. In this particular play, the endnote couldbe used to explain the term nyang, a basic monetary unit inthe Joseon dynasty, for this does not urgently require animmediate understanding of the meaning in the play on thepart of audience as well as readers.

Consequently, I expect the additional explanatory line inthe dialogue to help Western theater audiences as well asreaders understand without further delay the nature andimplied role of this family genealogy book at the moment itis taken out by Jong-U for Mr. Gu just as much as the simi-lar implication could be naturally understood by a Koreanaudience with the Korean play or text. In addition, this in-serted line is designed to minimize its external impact onthe dialogue structure as well as the internal one on thecontext of the dialogue.

However, a more serious challenge to the translation of the

play arose during the process of translating an ideograminto a phonetic word. While a common misunderstandingis that the Korean language derived from the Chinese ideo-graphic language, historically King Sejong of the Joseondynasty and his commissioned scholars created in 1443 a

phonetics-based Korean alphabetic system (read as

Han-geul) with only 14 consonants and 10 vowels,whose original purpose was to act as an alphabet that

would be easy for common people to learn and use. De-spite the passionate efforts of the king, however, the Chi-nese language still remained the official written languagefor most class-conscious aristocrats until the collapse of theJoseon dynasty. One major reason for conservative aristo-crats fervent objection to this user-friendly alphabetic sys-

tem was the desire to preserve their historically heldcultural and social privileges and maintain hierarchical classdistinction through the exclusive knowledge and use ofChinese language.

In the plays scene in which Jong-U tries to sell his gov-ernment post to Mr. Gu, a non-aristocratic, illiterate char-acter, the title of the government post he puts up for sale iswritten in Chinese characters, though read in the soundvalue of the Korean alphabet similar to the way Ameri-cans read the original Greek word as theatre.

The use of the Chinese title of the government post () in the play text is intended to highlight Jong-Us

higher-class status as well as the illiteracy of Mr. Gu, who istrying to buy aristocratic status with money. In this context,Mr. Gu is supposedly unable to figure out the meaning ofthe Chinese title as well as the nature of the post when thetitle is first mentioned. Thus, his lack of knowledge andunderstanding of the Chinese language leads him to repeatand re-repeat the same question to Jong-U about the post.

With regard to the translation of the use of a foreign wordin the text, Henry S. Schogt claims that a very common

technique consists in repeating the foreign element imme-diately in the next sentence or in the same paragraph, usingits equivalent in the main language, or in using the foreignelement as a repeat of something that has been expressedjust before in the main language. No matter which tech-nique is used, the position of the foreign word or sentenceis marginal in the development of the story (113).

However, while the meaning of a foreign word may have aminimal impact in the context of the play, the use of theChinese word in this particular play could become morethan something marginal in the process of translation. Inthis play, it is particularly interesting to note that the play-wright himself uses the original Chinese word, not the Ko-rean sound value, for the government post in the dialogue,a practice that is neither common nor popular these days.More attention needs to be paid to the fact that when thegovernment post is first mentioned by Jong-U, its title,though read in the Korean sound value, is written in Chi-nese, but as the title is mentioned again for clarification, itis written in Korean.

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Bellflower 1written by Tae-Sok Oh & translated by Hyung-Jin Lee

. .

: .

: ( .)

.

: () .

: . .

: . . .

: .

.

: .

:

.

: . .

. .

.

: .: . 30 .

( .)

: .

. .

.

: .

: .

: , 300 . ( .)

: .

: .

: . ,

. (12-13)

(Mr. Gu appears. He and Jong-U bow deeply to each other.)

MR. GU: I heard that you put your government post up for sale.Why are you instead of carrying on the inheritance?

JONG-U: (He shows a family genealogy book wrapped in a piece of cloth.)I dont know how much it is worth, but this will let you takemy family-inherited government post.2

MR. GU: (He is illiterate.) What is the title of this governmentpost?

JONG-U:Its a managerial position at Hyo-chang-won. Here theregister has an official stamp from the Yuk-Won-Gung thathas jurisdiction over it.

MR. GU: So it is. But why do you put this on sale? Whats thematter?

JONG-U: With the money I garner by selling this post, Ill havetravel funds to go to Japan. Once I have visited Japan, anothergovernment post will be available.

MR. GU: A government post you receive in Japan? Is that onebetter than this one?

JONG-U: Its not what I receive in Japan; it is a government posas a special royal envoy that will allow me to directly report to

His Royal Highness what I see and hear in Japan as it is.

MR. GU: Thats what an express messenger does. Oh my, thathurts my legs and I dont even want it. To me this one looksbetter. A managerial position at Hyo-chang-won what doesthis post do?

JONG-U: Its the general manager position at the royal ceme-tery.

MR. GU: The general manager at the royal cemetery the gen-eral manager at the royal cemetery it indeed is a managerposition, right?Ill pay thirtynyang.3 (He takes out brass coins.)

JONG-U: This family identification tag it seems to me thatyou dont understand exactly what this really is. Please holdthis in your hand. With this, your children are eligible to takecivil service exams. What did you say you do for a living on

Jong-no Street?

MR. GU: I sell linen and cotton.

JONG-U: With this tag, drapery stores benefit from a tax exemption.

MR. GU: Tax, tax three hundred nyang. (He takes out brasscoins.)

JONG-U: You are quite a generous man.

MR. GU: Will this be enough for the ferry fare to Japan?

JONG-U: I will supplement it by carrying this back rack and sell-ing water. Wa-ter! Wa-ter!

____________________________

1 Oh, Tae-Sok. Do-Ra-Ji(Bellflower). Seoul: Pyeong-min-sa Press, 2001.My English translation of the play will be included inAnthology of Con-temporary Korean Theatre, ed. Richard Nichols, forthcoming in 2006.

2 Underlines, in both Korean and English, have been added for refer-ence and comparison. The boldface clause was added in translation.

3 Nyangwas a basic monetary unit (coin) in Korea, used for more than800 years until Japanese colonization began officially in 1910.

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Considering the fact that, while Mr. Gus lines in the Ko-rean play text do not contain a single Chinese character,Jong-Us lines contain several Chinese characters for thegovernmental titles and places, it is important to note thedifference in the use of Korean and Chinese characters andto reflect its implication in translation.

Under the circumstances, one quick and simple solution tothe problem is to fully translate the post title into Englishwhen it is first brought up and delete the repeated seconddialogue about the title. However, the translator is thenfaced with a dilemma: once the original Chinese title of thepost is translated fully into English at the time the title isfirst mentioned by Jong-U as a general manager positionat Hyo-chang-won royal cemetery, it would already havecompletely revealed the nature of the post to Mr. Gu andprevented any further possibility of contrasting the illiter-acy of Mr. Gu with the aristocratic status of Jong-U. This

eventually blocks the playwrights intention to highlight theongoing process of the disintegration of the social classsystem and its hypocrisy, reflected in this particular dia-logue. In addition, what could be more problematic is thatthe over-clarification makes the next few lines, where Mr.Gu asks Jong-U again about the post, literally repetitiousand obsolete. In the next dialogue, while Mr. Gu mentionsthe title in Korean sound value, repeating it after Jong-U,Mr. Gu is still ignorant of the meaning and nature of thepost title that he is trying to buy from Jong-U.

Thus, as the over-clarification could likely miss the hiddensocial implications of the context as well as its stinging

criticism, I rather chose an intentional and selective sup-pression and temporary delay of the meaning to make theimplication alive as well as keep the dialogue structure in-tact. As the Chinese title of the post is supposed to soundGreek to Mr. Gu when it is first mentioned, instead oftranslating the title fully into English, a selective and tem-porary suppression of the meaning in translation was im-plemented to delay Mr. Gus understanding of it.

First, rather than fully translating the title as a managerposition at Hyo-chang-won royal cemetery, I intentionallysuppressed any reference to the cemetery. Also, while the

name of the place, written in Chinese , refers toHyo-chang-won Cemetery Garden, the original namewas simply replaced in translation with its English soundequivalent, Hyo-chang-won, without any reference to theroyal cemetery. By so doing, the English translation pro-vides the audience with no further information about theplace other than just the Korean name just as, in a quitesimilar way, the name of Hyo-chang-won alone does notring a bell with Mr. Gu in the first dialogue. In addition,

the intentional suppression of the meaning helps to contex-tually legitimize Mr. Gus continuing ignorance of the placeHyo-chang-won and allows him to repeat the same ques-tion. More importantly, this temporary suppression of themeaning in translation helps to keep the dialogue structureand sequence largely intact.

Second, the implied title of tomb manager was deliber-ately avoided in translation and selectively modified into anon-specific term of managerial position in the first dia-logue, so that this limited alternative term provides Mr. Guwith a minimum and vague level of understanding that the

post is of an aristocratic nature. In fact, the post title

refers to a lower ranking public officer position in chargeof the management of the royal cemetery. After the titlewas first mentioned, it appears that, while Mr. Gu is stillnot sure what this government post is about, his interestand curiosity stem from knowing that it is indeed an aristo-

cratic post, as the title ends with the Chinese character ,

pronounced sa in Korean sound value. Although veryfew commoners could read and understand Chinese then,they were at least able to sense that generally any profes-sion whose official title ends with the Korean sound valuesa was, whether prestigious or not, likely an aristocraticpost.

Interestingly, however, in a scene where Jong-U, whenasked by Mr. Gu, elaborates on the nature of the post moreclearly, the playwright makes an interesting language

choice. Here Jong-U uses a Korean title, (a ceme-tery manager), which is easier to read and understand evenfor illiterate commoners, instead of using the correspond-ing Chinese characters for a cemetery manager, which is

. Therefore, the title is contextually trans-

lated into Korean, rather than being left untranslated withits Korean sound value (Neung-myo-jang). It is clear thatthe alternative choice of language, in both Chinese and Ko-rean, demonstrates the playwrights own intention to em-phasize the hierarchic process of communicative discoursebetween Jong-U, an aristocrat, and Mr. Gu, an illiterate,which requires a deliberately asynchronous understanding

of the meaning in the dialogue. In addition, as this deliber-ate choice of language is clearly reflected in the Korean textthat incorporates Chinese characters, it has become an im-portant task for the translator in the English translation toreflect the implication of the use of different languageswithout incorporating foreign-language elements. For thismatter, the translators active interference in the suppres-sion and delay of the meaning could be one of the effectivemeans to maintain the structural integrity of the play.

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Translating dialogue for the theater requires more carefuland immediate attention to the well-structured develop-ment of communication because the structure of the dia-logue itself is a subtly structured condensation of actions.Accordingly, Brigitte Schultze asserts that the dual contextof dramatic language oral communication with its mark-

ers of spontaneity and situation, and literature with its time-bound aesthetic codes is a permanent challenge for trans-lators (189). In a similar context, theater translators arefaced with two critical challenges. On the one hand, just astranslators of other literary genres, they are asked to befaithful to the original structure and dialogue of the play,leaving the dialogue structure as intact as possible. On theother hand, theater translators are asked to be more con-cerned with communicability as well as performabilityfor the sake of the live audience and actors.

One thing that differentiates drama texts from texts of

other literary genres is the performance-oriented nature ofdrama text. This also underscores the peculiar nature of in-terdependence between drama text and performance in themeaning-creation process. No text is ever completed. It isalways meanings in process. Similarly, no matter how thor-ough and detailed the performance processes may be, aproduction does not complete those processes, it simplycreates a new text for a particular time, place and recep-tion (Birch 12). This openness eventually allows theatertranslators to become more actively involved and intervenein the meaning-creation process through translation.

In this play, the alternative use of the different languages,

ideographic and phonetic, which are intended to disclose

and problematize implicated cultural hierarchies betweenthe characters, demands more active intervention by atranslator. In the process of translation, thus, the inten-tional and selective suppression and delay of meaning wasnecessary and used effectively. In doing so, I was able tomake the use of the ideogram as alive as possible in the dif-

ferent linguistic contexts of phonetics in translation, with-out changing or harming the structure and logics of thedialogue in the source text.

Works Cited

Bassnett-McGuire, Susan. Translation Studies. 2nd ed. New York:Routledge, 2002.

. Translating for the Theatre: The Case Against Performabil-

ity. TTR: Traduction, terminologie, redaction. 4.1 (1991): 99111.

Birch, David. The Language of Drama. London: Macmillan, 1991.

Oh, Tae-Sok. Do-Ra-Ji(Bellflower). Seoul: Pyeong-min-sa Press,2001. 743. (Korean)

Schogt, Henry G. Linguistics, Literary Analysis, and Literary Transla-tion. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988.

Schultze, Brigitte. Highways, Byways, and Blind Alleys in Trans-lating Drama: Historical and Systematic Aspects of a Cul-tural Technique. Translating Literatures, Translating Cultures.Ed. Kurt Mueller-Vollmer and Michael Irmscher. Stanford,

CA: Stanford University Press, 1998. 177196.