At the beginning of July, I met new friends and wrote the preface to the newly translated 24 Andersen fairy tales. I felt hope and comfort in my heart.
It seems that
met Miss Gege by fate to talk about other things. She's not really out of character, that's just her name. But her manners are classy and a bit out of character. Then we talked about her family. "My grandfather is a painter, his name is Gao Ma De." I was stunned, Gao Ma De, could it be that Ma De? Yes, it’s Ma De who paints opera characters. I secretly thought to myself that maybe it was fate that I would get to know Mr. Mader’s granddaughter like this.
I can’t draw, but I love watching paintings. I don’t watch much theater, but I love watching the movements and expressions of opera characters in paintings. I remember when I first saw Ma De’s paintings, my eyes seemed to light up. All of a sudden, I felt that the paintings I loved to see before, although they were good, seemed to be missing something. Either they lacked some aura, or they lacked a bit of bookishness. In short, they lacked something that could move me more. It seems that what I am waiting for is Ma De’s painting. There is nothing artificial or superfluous. Every line and every color block is just to preserve the beautiful moment. Nothing more, nothing less, just expressive.
Ma De Painting
Gege told me that before her grandfather passed away at the age of ninety, he was blind in his left eye, but he still continued to paint every day. I asked why, and she replied with the words in my little book: "Just because of love." Mr. Ma De loves to watch Kunqu Opera, and he must watch almost every performance of the famous Kunqu Opera. Performing and singing at home, "sometimes even holding one's voice to sing the leading role" are all signs of obsession. He likes ink painting and oil painting. The women he painted are somewhat similar to the ladies painted by Lin Fengmian, but he doesn't like Mr. Lin very much - judging from the paintings, his use of colors is indeed brighter and more elegant. He likes music, both Western and ethnic. Hearing this, I thought about it and asked, "Does he like the violin?" Gege said that he did and played it herself. What to pull? Mendelssohn. Playing such a concerto is really unexpected. It turns out that the infiltration can be so deep and the temperament can be smoked out in this way.
马德 Painted by
Mr. Ma De is also a horse, two wheels older than me. At first, he was watching Chuan Ziyi's plays. Many years later, I watched a performance by Chuan Ziyi's direct disciples, the "Kun Da Ban", in the Experimental Theater of the Opera School. Today, all this has become distant. More than half a century later, Mr. Mader, who I have always admired, but who has been hidden in my heart for so long and almost thought he had forgotten it, would so wonderfully allow his granddaughter to come and talk to me about "Translation of Biancao". If it weren't for Fate, what is it?
Andersen is really amazing
Before translating this "Selected Fairy Tales by Andersen", I also translated "The Little Prince" and "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland". These three books are all classic works of children's literature.
If I were to use one word to summarize my overall impression of these three books, then I would say that "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" is funny, "The Little Prince" is poetic, and "Andersen's Selected Fairy Tales" is compassionate.
Of course, this is just my personal impression, or the tone I feel when translated. For example, when I was translating "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," I always thought about and did not dare to neglect the idea of "translating it for fun." There are so many interesting and funny places in the original text. When translating, you cannot just rely on adding notes to "explain" them. Instead, you must try your best to make the translated text interesting and funny, so that readers can smile knowingly.
The impression is inevitably general. Specifically, the 34 Andersen fairy tales included in this book all have their own unique colors. "The Princess and the Pea" is about a princess who is incredibly sensitive. She sleeps on twenty mattresses and an eiderdown quilt, and a pea underneath actually stings her. This kind of fairy tale (including another one in this book, "Poor Hans") is obviously influenced by folk tales, with a rustic, rough style, and even some nonsense.
Andersen's works include more works, a wider range of works, and more familiar works to readers, such as "The Ugly Duckling", "The Daughter of the Sea", "The Little Match Girl" and "The Wild Swan".Andersen was born in a shoemaker's family. He has a deep resonance with the suffering in the world and a sympathetic sympathy for the suffering people. His unremitting yearning and pursuit of beauty, and the broad love revealed in his writing, have raised the fairy tales he created to an unprecedented height and become eternal classics.
Andersen also wrote a type of works that are different from fairy tales in the usual sense, such as "The Path of Thorns and Glory", "Shadow", "Aunt" and so on. "The Thorny Road to Glory" is more like a prose poem. The pioneers in the long history of mankind have trudged on the thorny road of glory in pursuit of truth - from Socrates, Homer, Galileo to Fulton, the inventor of the steam turbine. Appearing in scenes. "Shadow", "Aunt", "Somewhat Interesting" and other chapters may be more accurately described as novels. A person's shadow will become shorter in tropical areas, and will become very long when the body blocks the light source. These details that we are often unaware of triggered Andersen's inspiration and made him write "The Shadow" This is a longer novel. A shadow of a man became human and unfortunately (yet quite literally) endowed with the ugliest aspects of human nature. His master - a learned man who eulogized truth, goodness and beauty - was so poor that he had to become the shadow of a shadow. Finally, the eloquent shadow married the princess, but the upright and kind-hearted and knowledgeable man was executed on the day of the shadow's wedding.
The pictures accompanying this article are all selected from " Selected Illustrations"
There are more than 160 works of Andersen's fairy tales, and this selected translation has selected less than a quarter of them. The selection principles are: first, select Andersen's works from various writing periods, and try not to miss out on famous works and representative works. The second is to select those passages that particularly touch people's hearts - first of all, those that moved me as a translator, moved me, and made me couldn't help but admire "Andersen is really amazing!" when I finished the translation. (I will never forget the touching feeling when translating some passages in "The Ugly Duckling" and "Somewhat Interesting". Those words written in tears are very precious to me personally.)
I hope this translation can be Readers who read Andersen's fairy tales with admiration - young readers or older readers - will not be too disappointed. If they are like me and want to say "Andersen is amazing!" almost every time they read an article, then I will feel that all the efforts I have put in are worth it. (Zhou Kexi)
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