Variation of Images in the English Translation of Li Qingzhao’s Poems

Kunming University,Yunnan,China Email:chenwenhui716@126.com

[Abstract]Li Qingzhao and her poems are disputed for generations and the images of the heroines in her poems are reconstructed even in heterogeneous culture,which are different from those in the culture of original texts.In the heterogeneous culture,the images of the heroines in her poems are varied inevitably.According to the analysis of the detailed poems,the relationships between variation and acceptance can be explored that language is the base of translation and the image variation,time and space are the conditions for image variation,and the aims of both faithfulness and betray are the acceptance of the target readers.

[Keywords]Li Qingzhao;poem;English translation;image variation

Introduction

Female images in the literary style of Ci,which is similar with poetry,are full of characteristics and are also important in Chinese poetry.The famous scholar,Ye Jiaying,believes in her academic research book about Ci that women in Ci are the incarnation of beauty and love between realistics and non-realistics,and thus the female images in Ci are the full of metaphor combined women in the realistics and imagination of non-realistics.(Ye,1997,p.227)The special characteristics gives the female images in Ci rich connotation and also gives readers more space of imagination.Although poetry and Ci are two comparatively different style in Chinese literature,there is no clear boundary between them when they are translated into English for English readers,and thus here in this paper,poem or poetry is used to replace Ci for English readers’acceptance.

Li Qingzhao is almost the most famous female poet in Chinese literary history although readers of later generations can read only dozens of her poems.Compared with the contemporary poets,Li Qingzhao is not a prolific poet and her female identification gives her more barriers from various perspectives.However,because of her special identification,revered literary talent and suffering living experience,the research of Li Qingzhao and her works attract more academic eyeballs from both China and western countries.

as far as the English translation of poetry is concerned,Kenneth Rexroth,the significant American poet or Chinese classical poetry translator has to be mentioned.Kenneth Rexroth loves Chinese culture and he even gives himself a Chinese name Wang Honggong,and he translated a lot of Chinese classical poems when he composed his famous poems.His masterpieces of Chinese classical translation areLove and Turning Year:One Hundred More Poems from the Chinese(1970),One Hundred Poems from the Chinese(1956),and Li Ch’ingchao,Complete Poems(1979),and since his achievements on the translation of Li Qingzhao’s poems,Kenneth Rexroth has been one of the representatives of Chinese classical poetry translators.In his translation,female images are varied interlingually and heterogeneously.

Female Images Variation in the English Translation

Li Qingzhao is one of the poets whose works are loved by Kenneth Rexroth,and the latter always regards Li Qingzhao as the only female poet who can master various literary style and makes great achievements on the creation of poetry.(Rexroth&Chung,1972,p.95)Across culture,readers find a female world which is more colorful in Kenneth Rexroth’s translation,and readers can even be given a different female image in Li Qingzhao’s poems with Rexroth’s translation.

The Image of a Drunken Woman in the Translation

The following creation by Li Qingzhao is her masterpiece and also attracts Rexroth’s translational eyeballs.

To the tune“A Dream Song”

I remember in His T’ing,/All the many times/We got lost in the sunset,/Happy with wine,/And could not find our way back./ When the evening came,/ Exhausted with pleasure,/ We turned our boat./ By mistake we found ourselves even deeper In the clusters of lotus blossoms./ And startled the gulls and egrets/ From the sand bars./ They crowded into the air/And hastily flapped away/To the opposite shore.(Rexroth&Chung,1979,p.48)

The translation is the full representation of special interpretation from the translator Kenneth Rexroth to Chinese culture.The original poem is not so long with only 33 Chinese characters,but there are 15 lines in the translation which includes 80 words.For Chinese poetry,one of the major features are the missing of the subject,which leaves much imaginable space to readers and in a further step,the structure of the sentence in Chinese grammar is free,in which the positions for most of the parts in a sentence can be exchanged or omitted,and the meanings of the sentence is complete.(Ye,1997,p.115)However,in English,translators always have to supplement the subject in a sentence to complete the structure and the meaning of it.Therefore,in the translation of the poem,Rexroth supplements the first person as the subject,which is as if the heroine tells her own happiness to readers and strengthen the readability of the translation.

In the translation,readers are given a poetic background with sunset.The heroine goes back home after she drinks wine happily in the pavilion besides the lake.But,she loses her way because of weariness and drunkenness,and strays into the clusters of lotus blossoms,startling the gulls and the egrets sleeping in the sand.Then,the gulls and the egrets fly into the sky for a while and after that stop in the sand of the other side of the lake.In all,the poetic artistic conception in the original poem is represented in the translation with the translator’s understanding and interpretation,and in the translation,the image of the heroine is reconstructed.However,in the translation,the image of the heroine is reconstructed not only with happiness but also with drunkenness.Drinking is almost one of the most important topics in Chinese classical poetry for both poets and women poets.Drinking is one of the common and easy approaches for women poets to get rid of the tragic suffering in their lives.(Yang,2001,p.76)In Li Qingzhao’s poems,drinking wine is also an unneglected topic since 27 poems are about drinking,and so an image of heroine with personalities of openness and melancholy is shown in the translation by Rexroth.Besides“happy with wine”,Rexroth gives a title of“Joy of Wine”to the poem in order to emphasize the topic of drinking wine and reconstruct the heroine’s image of drinking wine.Drinking wine is just like the blood in her(Li Qingzhao)spiritual world,and gives her beautiful and free image in the history.(She,2004,p.141)

In fact,aside of Kenneth Rexroth,other English translator also reconstructs the image of the heroine in Li Qingzhao’s poems as a drunken woman,such as James Cryer,a famous American poetry translator or American modern scholar,gives the translation to the fourth line as“so deep in wine/we did not know/the way home”(Cryer,1984,p.61).In Cryer’s translation,the heroine in the poem is still a drunken woman,and furthermore,Cryer gives the title“Wine Joy”to the poem,which is also the emphasis of the drinking wine.

The Image of a Dissolute Woman in the Translation

The connotation in Li Qingzhao’s poems is so rich that it involves not only drinking wine but also something else,such as love.Li Qingzhao’s poems are famous for love,especially the sweet love and sad miss between a couple.Different from the topic of love in the poems by the male poets,the love in Li Qingzhao’s poems is implicit and delicate,and To the tune“I Paint My Lips Red”is a typical example.In Chinese culture and literature,the scene that a naive girl is playing in the beautiful spring is described in the original poem.This description is believe as the common method from Li Qingzhao,and this poem is always regarded as a vivid self-description for Li Qingzhao.(Chen,2002,p.10)

after kicking on the swing,/ Lasciviously,I get up and rouge my palms./ Thick dew on a frail flower,/ Perspiration soaks my thin dress./ A new guest enters./ My stockings come down/ And my hairpins fall out./ Embarrassed,I run away,/And then flirtatiously against the door,/Tasting a green plum.(Rexroth&Chung,1972,p.43)

actually,this poem is believed to belong to another woman poet who has no name according to Rexroth,because Rexroth analyzes the heroine of this poem as a prostitute and the description in the poem is the work for the prostitute,and thus it does not impossible belong to Li Qingzhao,although sometimes it is believed to be created by her.(Rexroth & Chung,1972,p.129)Rexroth thinks that“kicking on the swing”means the love affairs between a man and a woman,and it is a metaphor of love for Chinese women.(Rexroth&Chung,1972,p.129)Based on this,“lasciviously”and“flirtatiously”are used in the translation to describe the heroine’s behavior,and these words are impossible used for the description of a naïve and innocent girl.

It is found that there are great differences between the images from the intralingual interpretation and interlingual interpretation.In another poem about the difficulties for Cowboy and Weaving Girl’s meet in Chinese culture,the image of the heroine is reconstructed with love-making.“Once a year the Cowboy and Weaving Girl meet./Imagine the year-long bitterness of their parting./Now suddenly in the midst of their love-making/The wind blows first clear and then rain.”(Rexroth & Chung,1972,p.74)Rexroth masters the Chinese culture,and he learns about that“midst and rain”implicitly means love between a couple.Combined the Chinese culture and English culture,Rexroth interprets the connotation in the original poem excessively.When giving the meanings of sensuality in the poems by Li Qingzhao the meanings of sensuality,Li herself is regarded as a woman poet who is good at creating pornographic literature.

The image of the heroine in Li Qingzhao’s poem reconstructed as a dissolute woman is also found in James Cryer’s translation.In the line,“and laugh/to my sweet friend/tonight/you are within/my silken curtains/your pillow,your mat/will grow cold.”(Cryer,1984,p.13)The original poetic line shows the talk and laugh between couples,but in Cryer’s translation,“sweet friend”means lover,and“silken curtains”,“pillow and mat”,“cold”are the direct and bold showing of love form the heroine.Chinese classical poems,including Li Qingzhao’s poems,contains much implicit meanings,and with translation,the images in the original poems are given more or even different connotation,and are varied.

Variation and Acceptance

When Chinese classical poems are translated by sinologists,something different between the original poems and the translation is found.However,in translation,readers are not always given rewriting of the original poems,but variation based on the original poem.As far as the variation of images in translation is concerned,some elements can be talked about,including language,time and space,and even faith and betray.

Language is the base of translation and image variation.The base of translation origins from the texts with the broad meanings,and the texts are the source of information and the foundation to construct ideological concepts,image and imagination.According to the philosopher,Hans-Georg Gadamer,the bases of writing texts are language for translators,but the interpretation of the texts does not just involve language,and furthermore,the key to understand the importance of translation process is to learn about the world in which people live.(Bassnett & Lefevere,2010,p.137)The thinking process from a translator is to analyze the texts,to construct concepts with cross-cultural image and imagination,to realize the establishment of the real concepts and images,and to translate with the logic and approaches which can be accepted by the target readers.However,in this process,images variation and concepts remoulding are unavoidable for target readers’acceptance.Therefore,as to the translation of Li Qingzhao’s poems by Rexroth,the image variation of the heroine in the original poem is also unavoidable and necessary for English readers’acceptance in the heterogeneous cultural background.

Time and space are the important conditions for the variation in the translation.Johann Wolfgang von Goethe thinks that the stage of translation is the further step of the writing stage,since the translator is behind the original writer.(Wang,2016,p.23)The viewpoint from Goethe also shows the process of time and space for translation.The translation by Rexroth is finished almost one thousand years after the creation of the original poem,and during the process of temporal changes,the changes of languages and concepts and the readers’acceptance of the translation appear inevitably.Therefore,the temporal gap between the original poem by Li Qingzhao and the translation by Rexroth is one of the necessaries for the variation of the translation,and the variation shows not only the cognitive changes from the translators,but also the changes of words and literary styles from the translators.On the other side,translation activity is the transformation of language location and cultural concepts from one language to another language,and from one culture to another culture or other cultures.In the transformation,since the words and sentences are defined again and cultural concepts are interpreted again in other cultural fields,reading environment changes according to the changes of readers’acceptance approaches and logics.Without the flow of the time and the displacement of the space,variation is impossible and on the contrary,time and space are the conditions for the variation of translation.

Translation is the combination of faithfulness and betray.The creative treason in the translation is unavoidable on the base of the faithfulness to the original texts,writers of the original texts and the reading environment from the original texts.Actually,there are more doubts to the faithfulness of the English translation of the Chinese classical poetry than to the creative treason.believes translation as the rewrite to the original texts.(Lefevere,1992,p.xi)Therefore,translators are the rewriters,and even the traitors in a sense.They always betray the regulations in the original texts since they have to put the target texts into the target culture.(Lefevere,1992,p.13)The translation by Rexroth is the proof of this viewpoint.However,translation is from the original texts,and Rexroth gives faithful translation when the translation of the images does not influence readers’acceptance from the target language,and meanwhile,the translator conveys the interpreting logic and approaches to these images from the heterogeneous customs and culture.Faithfulness and betray show the process of translation from the original texts to the variation of the concepts and images,the process of variation from one cultural regulations to another cultural regulations,and in this process,foreign customs and culture are transformed under the circumstances of target readers’acceptance.

Conclusion

Li Qingzhao and her poems are typical examples for scholars to research the image variation in the process of translation because of her identification of female writer.According to the analysis of the image variation from the translation of Li Qingzhao’s poems,it is concluded that images are varied in the process of translation and in this process,language is the base for translation and variation,time and space are the necessary conditions for translation and variation,and both faithfulness and betray aim at the target readers’acceptance.Image variation always follows translation.

Nowadays,one of the Chinese cultural strategies is to make Chinese culture spread out of China,but the conflicts between variation and images are always found from the original texts and the target texts,and then they can give translators some enlightenment to translate and spread Chinese culture.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks should go to Philosophy and Social Sciences Planning Office of Yunnan Province who supports my Yunnan Provincial Philosophy and Social Sciences Planning Project in 2019:Research on the Contextuality and Image Variation of the English Translation for Chinese Classical Poems(YB 2019056).