Confessions of a researchaholic

July 19, 2010

Birthday

Filed under: Imaginary — liyiwei @ 4:09 pm
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To me, Chinese is more of an art than a language, and most Chinese literature, especially these classical ones, cannot be translated to another language without losing their original beauty and meaning.

Below is a modern short poem (fragment?) that I have found to be more or less translatable without being sacrilegious.
(Let me know if you have a better translation; I cannot even make it rhyme.)

母難日
The day Mother suffered

余光中的一段詩
A poem by Guan-Chun Yu

今生今世
In this life
我最忘情的哭聲有兩次
Twice I cried my heart out

一次在我生命的開始
Once at the beginning of my life
一次在妳生命的告終
The other at the end of yours

第一次我不會記得是聽妳說的
The first one I cannot remember but you told me so
第二次妳不會曉得我說也沒用
The second one you cannot know even if I tell you

但兩次哭聲的中間啊
But between these two cries
有無窮無盡的笑聲
Are endless laughs

一遍一遍又一遍
That has been going on and on
迴盪了整整三十年
For 30 years

1 Comment »

  1. Nice translation!
    Yu is one of my favorite poets.

    Comment by Lvdi — July 22, 2010 @ 6:37 pm | Reply


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