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Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei: How a Chinese Poem Is Translated

Author	Eliot Weinberger
Language	English, Chinese, French, Spanish
Subject	Translation studies
Published	1987
Publisher	Moyer Bell
Publication place	United States
Pages	53
ISBN	978-0-918-82514-8 (pbk.)
Dewey Decimal	895.113
LC Class	PL2676.A683
Website	https://www.ndbooks.com/book/nineteen-ways-of-looking-at-wang-wei

Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei: How a Chinese Poem Is Translated is a 1987 study by the American author Eliot Weinberger, with an addendum written by the Mexican poet Octavio Paz. The work analyzes 19 renditions of the Chinese-language nature poem "Deer Grove", which was originally written by the Tang-era poet Wang Wei (699–759). Weinberger compares translations of the poem into English, French, and Spanish, and analyzes the difficulties that are encountered when translating Chinese poetry. Since its publication, the book has been referred to as an essential work on the subject of translation. An updated edition including additional "ways" was published in 2016.

Background

Chinese poetry and "Deer Grove"

When writing Chinese, each character is one syllable long, but corresponds to a unit of meaning called a morpheme, not just the syllable's pronunciation. Until the 20th century, almost all formal Chinese writing was in Literary Chinese, a prestige form that is particularly terse in character. Characters may have several related meanings and even function as different parts of speech; translation often involves deciding between plausible interpretations of a character in a given context. The prosody of Chinese poetry generally revolves around strict numbers of syllables and rhythms established by the tones of each syllable. According to Weinberger these qualities cannot be translated into Western languages, presenting a challenge for translators trying to write natural-sounding verse.

Wang Wei (699–759) is considered one of the most important Tang poets, representing what is considered a golden age for Chinese poetry. His poem "Deer Grove" (鹿柴; pinyin: Lù zhài) is part of the Wangchuan ji, a series of shanshui poems inspired by the natural beauty of locations around his estate on the Wang River (輞川; no relation) in Shaanxi. While the original manuscripts of the work have been lost, Wang was also a painter, and the stanzas in the Wangchuan ji likely accompanied paintings on long scrolls. The poem is a form of quatrain called a wujue, with each line being five characters long:

空山不見人，
但聞人語響；
返景入深林，
復照青苔上．

History of translation

In 1915, the American modernist poet Ezra Pound published Cathay, a collection of English translations of Chinese poems. Pound spoke no Chinese whatsoever, and made use of dictionaries and the ideographic meaning he perceived in characters to write his interpretations. As such, Cathay does not reflect a fluent speaker's understanding of the source poems. In his exposition, Weinberger considers the value of Pound's interpretations to be aesthetic instead of academic—adapting their presentation to English, rather than adhering to either English or Chinese conventions. He quotes T. S. Eliot's remark that Cathay represents "the invention of Chinese poetry in our time".

Analysis

Weinberger begins the book by stating, "Poetry is that which is worth translating." He briefly lays out his view that poetry lives in a "constant state of transformation". For Weinberger this transformation takes place both in the experience of each reading, as well as in the concrete alterations made to a text over time—including that normally considered to be "translation". The first "way" is the received text of the original poem. As the earliest extant manuscript of "Deer Grove" dates to the 17th century, Weinberger characterizes it as "Wang's landscape after 900 years of transformation". He then provides a pinyin transliteration and a character-by-character gloss of the poem as "ways". The remaining 16 "ways" are translations of the poem into English, French, and Spanish, presented in the chronological order of their publication. Over time, translations rely less on traditional English-language form:

Throughout, Weinberger points out recurring features that he feels poorly re-imagine Wang's poem. For example, several translations use personal pronouns such as I and we. These establish a discrete narrator, something which is not present in the source text. However, Weinberger rejects "accuracy" as an end in itself. He observes the different priorities expressed by translators who are primarily poets (such as Kenneth Rexroth) versus those who are primarily scholars (such as Burton Watson)—positively and negatively reviewing examples of both. Weinberger repeatedly criticizes what he sees as a need felt by some translators to "explain" and "make improvements" to the original, which he ascribes to an "unspoken contempt for the foreign poet". For example, regarding Chang Yin-nan and Lewis C. Walmsley's 1958 translation (No. 8) Weinberger remarks that, "It never occurs to Chang and Walmsley that Wang could have written the equivalent of casts motley patterns on the jade-green mosses had he wanted to. He didn't."

Publication history

An earlier version of Weinberger's survey was originally published in the 1979 anthology Zero: Contemporary Buddhist Thought. A Spanish translation was subsequently published in the Mexican magazine Vuelta, founded by Octavio Paz. Paz's own Spanish translation of "Deer Grove" was among those reviewed by Weinberger. The work was adapted into Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei by Moyer Bell, who published it as a paperback in 1987. The book also included an essay by Paz previously published in Vuelta.

An updated edition featuring 10 additional "ways"—including translations into German—was published by New Directions in 2016:

Reception

Since its release, Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei has been held up both as a helpful primer for those investigating Tang poetry, as well as a classic work on the subject of translation. Weinberger's appraisals have been characterized as "celebrations" when positive, and as "withering" when negative. His approach has been credited for its balance of scholarship and intuition as pioneered by Pound.

In a postface to the book itself, Weinberger relates a personal anecdote about a "furious professor" who wrote to him following the essay's previous publication in Vuelta. In the letter, the professor accused Weinberg of "crimes against Chinese poetry", and referred him to a translation of "Deer Grove" from the 1950s by the sinologist Peter A. Boodberg that had been "curious neglected". Boodberg presented his translation as "a still inadequate, yet philologically correct, rendition of the stanza (with due attention to grapho-syntactic overtones and enjambment)". Weinberger himself characterizes it as "sound like Gerard Manley Hopkins on LSD" and "the strangest of all Weis", and thanks the professor for making him aware of it. Weinberger relates further interactions following the original book's publication in a second postface to the 2016 edition.

See also

• Le Ton beau de Marot – Book-length examination of a single translation of a minor French poem
• Translating Beowulf
  • "On Translating Beowulf" – Essay by J. R. R. Tolkien
• Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird – Poem by Wallace Stevens that inspired the title of Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei

References

1. Weinberger, Eliot; Paz, Octavio (1987). Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei: How a Chinese Poem is Translated. Mount Kisco, NY: Moyer Bell. ISBN 978-0-918825-14-8.
2. ———; ——— (2016). Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei (with More Ways). New York: New Directions. ISBN 978-0-8112-2620-2.

Citations

1. ^ Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 3.
2. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 5.
3. Liu 2011, p. 55.
4. ^ Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. 1, 3, 5.
5. Cohen 2018.
6. ^ Link 2016.
7. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 9.
8. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 1.
9. Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. 5, 7.
10. Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. 7, 29.
11. Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. 1, 7.
12. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 23.
13. Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. 9, 17, 19.
14. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 17.
15. Weinberger & Paz 1987, pp. i, 51.
16. Fang, Xia (2021). "Translation as creative writing practice". New Writing. 18 (2): 162–176. doi:10.1080/14790726.2020.1762665. ISSN 1479-0726.
17. Stein, Lorin (17 June 2016). "Staff Picks: Dads, Doublemint, Dumplingette". The Paris Review. New York. ISSN 0031-2037. Retrieved 2024-02-01.
18. Saussy, Haun (2023). "Ways of Reading Worlds in Chinese Poetry". Prism. 20 (1): 10–25. doi:10.1215/25783491-10395117. ISSN 2578-3491.
19. Wallace 2016.
20. Boodberg, Peter A. (1969) . "Philology in Translation-Land" (PDF). Tsing-Hua Journal of Chinese Studies. 7 (2): 2–3. ISSN 0577-9170. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2017-03-17.
21. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 51.
22. Weinberger & Paz 2016, p. 54.
23. Drake 1990, p. 6.

Translations

1. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 3. The received text of the original poem.
2. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 5. Pinyin transliteration.
3. Weinberger & Paz 1987, p. 7. Character-by-character gloss.
4. Fletcher, W. J. B. (1919). Gems of Chinese Verse. Shanghai: Commercial Press. OCLC 4885825.
5. Kiang, Kang-hu; Bynner, Witter (1929). The Jade Mountain. New York: Knopf. OCLC 14012348.
6. Jenyns, Soame (1944). Further Poems of the Tang Dynasty. London: John Murray. OCLC 324795.
7. Margouliès, Georges (1948). Anthologie raisonnée de la littérature chinoise (in French). Paris: Payot. OCLC 2110270.
8. Wei, Wang (1959). Poems. Translated by Walmsley, Lewis; Chang, Yin-nan. Rutland, VT: Charles E. Tuttle. OCLC 31719404.
9. Ch'ên, Jerome; Bullock, Michael (1970) . Poems of Solitude. Rutland, VT & Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle. ISBN 978-0-8048-0912-2.
10. Liu, James J. Y. (1962). The Art of Chinese Poetry. University of Chicago Press. OCLC 326728.
11. Rexroth, Kenneth (1970). Rexroth, Kenneth (ed.). Love and the Turning Year. New York: New Directions. ISBN 978-0-8112-0179-7.
12. Watson, Burton (1971). Chinese Lyricism. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-03465-4.
13. Wang, Wei (1972). Hiding the Universe. Translated by Yip, Wai-lim. New York: Grossmann. ISBN 978-0-670-37095-5.
14. Robinson, George W. (1970). Poems of Wang Wei. Harmondsworth: Penguin. ISBN 978-0-14-044296-0.
15. Paz, Octavio (1978) . Versiones y diversiones (in Spanish) (2nd ed.). Mexico City: Joaquín Mortiz. ISBN 978-968-27-0041-5.
16. McNaughton, William (1974). Chinese Literature. Rutland, VT: Charles E. Tuttle. ISBN 978-0-8048-0882-8.
17. Cheng, François (1982) . L'écriture poétique chinoise (in French). Paris: Éditions du Seuil. ISBN 978-2-02-004534-6.
18. Chang, H. C. (1977). Chinese Literature II: Nature Poetry. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-05367-9.
19. Journal for the protection of all beings. San Francisco: City Lights. 4. Fall 1978. OCLC 58884200.
20. Debon, Günther (1988). Mein Haus liegt menschenfern doch nah den Dingen. Dreitausend Jahre chinesischer Poesie (in German). Munich: Diederichs. ISBN 978-3-424-00938-5.
21. Klöpsch, Volker (1991). Der seidene Faden. Gedichte der Tang (in German). Frankfurt am Main: Insel Verlag. ISBN 978-3-458-16187-5.
22. Wang, Wei (2009). Jenseits der weißen Wolken (in German). Translated by Schuhmacher, Stephan. Munich: Deutsche Taschenbuch Verlag. ISBN 978-3-423-13816-1.
23. Cheng, François (1990). Entre source et nuage: la poésie chinoise réinventée (in French). Paris: Michel. ISBN 978-2-226-04811-0.
24. Cheng, François (1996) . L'écriture poétique chinoise (in French) (Revised ed.). Paris: Éditions du Seuil. ISBN 978-2-02-029928-2.
25. Carré, Patrick (1989). Les saisons bleues: l'œuvre de Wang Wei (in French). Paris: Phébus. ISBN 978-2-85940-115-3.
26. Wang, Wei (1991). Laughing Lost in the Mountains: Poems of Wang Wei. Translated by Barnstone, Tony; Barnstone, Willis; Xu, Haixin. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England. ISBN 978-0-87451-563-3.
27. Seth, Vikram (1992). Three Chinese Poets. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-16653-4.
28. Mair, Victor H.; Bodman, Richard W. (1994). The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-07428-5.
29. Owen, Stephen (1996). An Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911. New York: W. W. Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-03823-1.
30. Hamill, Sam (2000). Crossing the Yellow River. Rochester, NY: BOA Editions. ISBN 978-1-880238-97-4.
31. Sze, Arthur (2001). The Silk Dragon. Port Townsend, WA: Copper Canyon. ISBN 978-1-55659-153-2.
32. Hinton, David (2002). Mountain Home. Washington, DC: Counterpoint. ISBN 978-1-58243-149-9.
33. Hinton, David (2006). The Selected Poems of Wang Wei. New York: New Directions. ISBN 978-0-8112-1618-0.
34. Seaton, Jerome P. (2006). The Shambhala Anthology of Chinese Poetry. Boston: Shambhala. ISBN 978-1-57062-862-7.

Works cited

• Cohen, Jonathan (26 April 2018). "Empty Hills—Deep Woods—Green Moss: William Carlos Williams's Chinese Experiment". Words Without Borders. ISSN 1936-1459. Archived from the original on 2024-01-30. Retrieved 2024-01-30.
• van Crevel, Maghiel; Klein, Lucas, eds. (2019). Chinese Poetry and Translation: Rights and Wrongs. Amsterdam University Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctvs32rh7.4. ISBN 978-90-485-4272-7.
• Drake, Chris (26 May 1990). On Translating Japanese Poetry and Poetic Prose (PDF). First International Japanese-English Translation Conference. Hakone, Japan. pp. 1–26. Retrieved 19 June 2024.
• Guilbault, Russell (28 February 2017). "Nineteen Ways of Looking at Wang Wei by Eliot Weinberger". Three Percent. University of Rochester. Archived from the original on 2024-01-28. Retrieved 2024-01-28.
• Kirsch, Adam (19 May 2009). "Disturbances of Peace". The New Republic. ISSN 0028-6583. Archived from the original on 2024-01-28. Retrieved 2024-01-28.
• Klein, Lucas (2014). "Not Altogether an Illusion: Translation and Translucence in the Work of Burton Watson". World Literature Today. Vol. 88, no. 3–4. p. 57. doi:10.7588/worllitetoda.88.3-4.0057.
• Link, Perry (24 November 2016). "A Magician of Chinese Poetry". The New York Review of Books. ISSN 0028-7504. Archived from the original on 2024-01-28. Retrieved 2024-01-28.
• Liu, Jun (2011). "Lichtung and Lu Zhai: Nine ways of looking at trans-civilizational imaginations of Wang Wei". Journal of East-West Thought. 1 (1): 53–78. ISSN 2161-7236.
• Wallace, David S. (15 December 2016). "Unfamiliar Tongues: Eliot Weinberger's Travels in the Republic of Letters". Los Angeles Review of Books. OCLC 904358349. Archived from the original on 27 January 2024. Retrieved 27 January 2024.

• 1987 non-fiction books
• Essays about translation
• Books about the Chinese language