On Drama Translation
On Drama Translation
Like their contemporary prose translators who were introducing Western fiction to China, budding dramatists were enthusiastic about bringing Western plays to the Chinese stage. The first play was staged in Japan from an adaptation of Lin Shu 's translation of Uncle Tom 's Cabin. A Chinese student in Japan named Li Shutong adapted the script. The play was put on by members of the Chun Liu (Spring Willow) Drama Society. Their performance marked a complete break from traditional theatrical practices. After the May 4th Movement, complete translations of plays were published and used in productions. Many established writers began to try their hand at writing scripts for the stage. Also in the introduction of foreign masterpieces, a lot of famous translators were produced. If we have a try at drama, we can find it very difficult, more difficult than the translation of novels. Actually, drama is very different from novel. And drama translation must be done in a much different way. First, drama scripts are written for stage performance. So the translated scripts must be suitable for the audience. But poems, prose and novels are written for reading. Though sometimes foreign scripts are produced only for reading, there are seldom the cases. Also the foreign playwrights would be against that. Second, drama performance is a comprehensive ways of acting. It is an audio-visual art, which needs lighting, stage properties, and sound effects. The lines by the actors contribute a great deal to the success of the play. The audience relies heavily on the lines of the play. Most of them are ordinary people, but not erudite scholars. The actors usually don’t repeat the words except for the sake of laying stress. If the lines are too obscure, the audience will get confused as a play goes on without a stop.
Third, there aren’t any annotations in a stage performance. In a novel, the hidden intention of the characters, the natural and social background, cause
Like their contemporary prose translators who were introducing Western fiction to China, budding dramatists were enthusiastic about bringing Western plays to the Chinese stage. The first play was staged in Japan from an adaptation of Lin Shu 's translation of Uncle Tom 's Cabin. A Chinese student in Japan named Li Shutong adapted the script. The play was put on by members of the Chun Liu (Spring Willow) Drama Society. Their performance marked a complete break from traditional theatrical practices. After the May 4th Movement, complete translations of plays were published and used in productions. Many established writers began to try their hand at writing scripts for the stage. Also in the introduction of foreign masterpieces, a lot of famous translators were produced. If we have a try at drama, we can find it very difficult, more difficult than the translation of novels. Actually, drama is very different from novel. And drama translation must be done in a much different way. First, drama scripts are written for stage performance. So the translated scripts must be suitable for the audience. But poems, prose and novels are written for reading. Though sometimes foreign scripts are produced only for reading, there are seldom the cases. Also the foreign playwrights would be against that. Second, drama performance is a comprehensive ways of acting. It is an audio-visual art, which needs lighting, stage properties, and sound effects. The lines by the actors contribute a great deal to the success of the play. The audience relies heavily on the lines of the play. Most of them are ordinary people, but not erudite scholars. The actors usually don’t repeat the words except for the sake of laying stress. If the lines are too obscure, the audience will get confused as a play goes on without a stop.
Third, there aren’t any annotations in a stage performance. In a novel, the hidden intention of the characters, the natural and social background, cause
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