A decent amount of chinese literature is available in english , especially modern chinese literature. I don't know about the quality of translations though. Is it because,for at least modern Chinese literature,most of it is published by small university presses and have a limited print run? Classic chinese works have been published by major presses in recent years, have they been slowly gaining a good reputation?
Because the culture has been historically insular? Also, in the western world American media tends to dominate, from movies to television and literature. Yes, the UK does seem to export a good amount too, but it is an English speaking country. Chinese literature is not more popular, just like Romanian and Brazilian literature is not more popular in the western world, because it is not originally in English.
Because much is lost in translation, especially classic poetry...
I was referring to popularity among serious literature, who do read foreign fiction.
Good question. Which books would you recommend? I would love to learn more about Chinese literature...
I haven't read much honestly, but I would recommend lu xun and lao she. Lu xun is the greatest modern chinese writer and wrote mostly short stories, which are completely available in English. For lao she, i would recommend rickshaw boy, which had a large influence on the modern chinese novel.
I suspect that Chinese literature is more "popular" with Anglo-American readers than English, French, Italian, and German literature is with Chinese readers.
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Why is that?
Nonsense.Originally Posted by 奇異果
Because of the obnoxious nature of Chinese people reading their literature as "My literature" instead of displaying it as "our" literature.
There is a cultural obsession with the "our belongings" and "our heritage" amongst much of the Chinese population, and among the vast population of China as a whole. Though Chinese students - and trust me I have taught over 2000 of them - may say their literature is the best in the world, they cannot tell you why. The great classics of Chinese literature are probably better read outside of China.
For instance, the single most important book in Chinese literature, judging by the scale and volume of the scholarship and discussion among classical authors and scholars, is the Yi Jing, a book seldom discussed in contemporary China. Whereas a minor collection of Aphorisms, the Analects of Confucius which traditionally were a minor work have become a defining cultural obsession - a marketing tool the same way Shakespeare, or Dante are marketing tools for the respective adopted cultures.
The bulk of classically read poems - that is, what every student from age 3 until age 20 will encounter - have already been translated in pristine editions. That being said however, despite the insistence Chinese scholars have with dictating how wide-ranging and interesting Chinese poets were, coming from all walks of life, etc., the clear feature of all these works is their monotony. They are all written by similar people with similar experiences. We generally do not relate well to our own medieval literature, which explains quite simply why readers in the western world would not relate well to someone else's medieval poetry, much less later imitations of it - particularly since the autobiographical nature of the work is in the foreground, and we simply don't care about the lives of others so distant from us.
Another problem is simply that the works are not interesting, even to Chinese readers. For all the talk of how great Chinese literature is, I do not see many Chinese people reading much of it. Of the classical Canon, the so called 13 classics, or even the 4 books and 5 classics, I would wager the average Chinese graduate of university has read maybe a few of the shorter selections. That is a foundation entry level set of texts - the wealth of other texts in China go consistently unread.
Very few cultures have managed to preserve such traditions. By making them particularly worshiped, and unread, China has managed a double feat of both encouraging pride in an idealized classical heritage, as well as discouraging the reading of such a heritage, which would ultimately lead to the clear conclusion that this stuff is medieval both in outlook and in content. Continuous lies like the classical language being inaccessible to all but experts help to dissuade students from even attempting.
As for the American audience, well, there is no shortage of great world literature out there. The well read person may pick up certain Chinese texts - journey to the west, Confucius' analects, the Lao Zi, or the like - but there is absolutely no requirement culturally to do so. The reason Japanese works are better enjoyed is simply because they speak to a Western audience better, not because they are easier to translate (which they aren't).
Many works in Chinese by Japanese authors have been translated to relatively good acclaim, thus disproving your point.
To be honest though, it is actually very similar. They have a lot of quality translations from the modernist period still readily available and consumed, with of course a particular emphasis on French and Russian authors. World literature is about the same by now in China for classical authors, though they do not read them in their original languages.
I would say, however, that the most successful international literature other than English in the world is Japanese right now - every East Asian, and most European and North American audiences have felt a strong influence, particularly with modernist works. The Chinese government is trying to restrict this influence with no success; as a product Japanese art is far better received than that of anywhere but the United States.
Wouldn't this largely apply to nearly every country and canon? How many university students are familiar with even someone like John Donne? And I suspect your average Brit has not read Chaucer or (much) Shakespeare, and if they do read English literature in English schools is the average student reading it very attentively? I think readers of literature are a pretty small minority globally.
Last edited by Clopin; 08-28-2015 at 12:32 AM.
So with the courage of a clown, or a cur, or a kite jerkin tight at it's tether
I don't know about that. I've been getting more and more into medieval literature lately. It is so different from what we write today that it has an exotic and mysterious allure like that of Chinese and Persian literature. Frankly, I get bored reading modern literature because I feel like I know it too well. It doesn't offer any surprises. But medieval literature, and medieval culture has a mysticism, an allegory, elaborate use of metaphor, world seen through a warrior culture prism aspect to it which is appealing. Beowulf, The Tain, the Nibelungenlied, Arthurian and Roland legends, etc are just fun sword and sorcery stories reminiscent of Conan the Barbarian. When I first started reading the Viking sagas I had that shock of the new experience I felt back in high school the first time I saw Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. I'd never seen those elements put together in quite that combination before. I didn't fully understand it but I liked it.
As for being turned off by the autobiographical nature of the poems, I am intensely interested in details of Ovid's exile or Tu Fu's travels through war torn China. The Confessions of St. Augustine like A Moveable Feast, or Casanova's Story of My Life has an enduring attraction for readers many years later. I also like personal stuff from Catullus where he writes about the death of his brother or jokes with his friends. One of the most amusing passages of Horace has him describing in a parody of the Iliad how he was spirited away in a cloud from the battle of Philippi. Archilochus' frank discussion of his sexual conquests and people he doesn't like is part of his charm. Everything about Dante's Divine Comedy is autobiographical. Besides, isn't like your whole job studying poets from a long time ago?
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Still, we read 4 Shakespeare plays, 4 modern plays, 10 novels, and a whole lot of poems and essays in High School in the City of Toronto. China doesn't even come close. Granted their classical literature is linguistically more distant than Shakespeare is to our current language, but that doesn't excuse anything.
I made a list of required reading, just as a general feeling, and what it came down to were a set of entry level texts, and essays with notes and answers provided for the respective test questions. Hardly even close to the language I received in public school. This of course, would vary somewhat by state in the States, or else vary by system or school in England, but I can't see even a close comparison between even the worst systems, and the vast majority of rural education in a semi-developed country.
Du Fu is an interesting character from war torn China. Try the ones who grew up in piece time. Well, 800 or so Du Fu poems are extant, if you take any poet from the Song Period onward, you are looking at several thousand poems a person. Ironically, however, the judgment in criteria is often based on how close they are an imitation to Du Fu.
This all being said, you are not the norm. I read Chinese literature for pleasure and professionally. We are both mere eccentrics. The majority of Europeans or North Americans know perhaps only a few kitsch pieces of Chinese literature, misunderstood for Western audiences. Chinese people themselves prefer novels and modern literature, which, ironically, are more an imitation (with varying success) of Western modernist and realist works in general. The whole arts boom in the 80s leading to Mo Yan's nobel prize is basically a knockoff of the Magical Realism movement in Latin America.
Medieval European literature is hardly a popular field, despite some great works and terrific scholarship to make it more accessible. You may enjoy it, but even the vast majority of readers on these forums, who, by reading are already going against the norm, do not particularly care for it. We are not talking even about seminal works like Beowulf, we are talking about obscure works.
Sure, Chinese people may read Du Fu or Li Bai, but how many will read obscure poets from the period? The same is with Elizabethan literature in English - how many people read the more obscure dramatists, let alone the authors working in Latin. There is generally this tendency to ignore the old or inaccessible. Why then would someone have a tendency to turn and read obscure works, or ancient inaccessible works in another language?
I would say, however, that the most successful international literature other than English in the world is Japanese right now - every East Asian, and most European and North American audiences have felt a strong influence, particularly with modernist works. The Chinese government is trying to restrict this influence with no success; as a product Japanese art is far better received than that of anywhere but the United States.
There is an interesting correlation here with the visual arts. Western European art (French, Italian, Austro-German, Dutch, English, and Spanish) and American Art dominate the world art markets and discussions/studies of art... but Japanese art is by far the most influential and popular of Non-Western art. Part of this is likely due to fact that Japanese art shares much with the sensibilities of Modern Western art. The spatial elements and graphic nature of Japanese prints had a profound impact upon the Impressionists, Post-Impressionists, and Expressionists. The decorative aspects of Japanese screen painting... especially of the Momoyama period... impacted artists such as Gustav Klimt, Alphonse Mucha, and many artists and illustrators of the Art Nouveau and Art Deco period. The "Minimalism" and sensitivity to natural materials of Japanese architecture and design had a great impact upon Western Modernist architecture and design.
Chinese art strikes me... and many others... as overwrought... almost Baroque. As much as I love Persian and Islamic art, it is little-known in Western art circles in comparison to Japanese art. The same could be said of Indian art, African art, South American Art, etc... Western art circles will likely be far more familiar with Hokusai, Hiroshige, and Utamaro than any names of Chinese, Persian, or South American artists. The Japanese have been more successful in digesting Western influences and turning it into something really original. While there are a number of Chinese artists beginning to make a name, too often they seem overly indebted to Western/American Pop Art and installations. One rarely hears of American artists building upon more recent Chinese or Indian art, where this is not true of Japanese art.
Beware of the man with just one book. -Ovid
The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.- Mark Twain
My Blog: Of Delicious Recoil
http://stlukesguild.tumblr.com/
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