Arts of the Contact Zone

1

Lost in Translation or Gained in Creation:

Classical Chinese Poetry Re-Created as English Poetry1

Roslyn Joy Ricci

Centre for Asian Studies

University of Adelaide

Introduction

The well-known Robert Frost2 witticism that ‘poetry is what disappears in translation’

is only valid if poetic translation aims to produce a ‘perfect re-creation of the original,’3

however, I suggest that successful translators re-create poetry in another language as opposed

to translating it into a second language.4 The aim of re-creating poetry is to attempt to produce

the same reader-response as the original poem did. This generic formula holds true in the

specific case of Chinese poetry re-created as English poetry. I use the term ‘re-created’ for

poetic translation because literal translation of poetry struggles to produce the same reader

response as the original poem does.

1 ‘This paper was presented at the 15th Biennial Conference of the Asian Studies Association of

Australia in Canberra 29th June-2 July 2004. It has been peer-reviewed and appears on the Conference

Proceedings website by permission of the author who retains copyright. The paper will be

downloaded for fair use under the Copyright Act (1954), its later amendments and other relevant

legislation.’

2 American poet Robert Frost (1874-1963).

3 James JY Liu, The Poetry of Li Shang-yin, 1969, p. 34.

4 Yan Fu (1853-1921) set the standard for translation from a modern Chinese perspective: primarily

‘xмn’ (faithfulness), then d• (fluency) and finally y• elegant). Elegance must give way to fluency and

fluency to faithfulness.

2

This paper explores the challenges to, and strengths of, classical Chinese poetry recreated

as English poetry as a transcultural poetry integral to a world poetic critique as

proposed by Stephen Owen. It examines issues of contextualisation, critical theories, notions

of ‘Otherness’ and the possibility of ‘world poetry’ along with Owen’s reply to my reading of

his thesis.

During the latter half of the twentieth-century, the trend of presenting poems in the light of

critical theory and within their historical