清明三题双语诗

Trio Bilingual Poems on Qingming

Preface:

Qingming (清明) is a special Chinese day/festival. The Wikipedia has it that Qingming also known as Tomb-Sweeping Day in English. During Qingming, Chinese families visit the tombs of their ancestors to clean the gravesites, pray to their ancestors, and make ritual offerings, as written in Poem 1 below. Qingming can also be translated according to what a poem is depicted. For example, a certain period around Qingming is vernal, people also go out for spring outing, and then Qingmingis known as the Spring Outing Days, as in Poem 2. Sometimes it is translated into the Pure and Bright Day too, as the third poem bellow. That’s to say, translation is translating meaning, not the words one by one.

1.清明

作者｜杜牧（唐）

译｜吴伟雄（广东）

清明时节雨纷纷，路上行人欲断魂。

借问酒家何处有，牧童遥指杏花村。

The Tomb Sweeping Day*

By DU Mu（Tang Dynasty）

Tr. WU Weixiong(China)

It drizzles thick and fast this mourning day;

The mourner travels, heart lost in dismay. **   
When asked for a wineshop to kill his gloomy time, 

A cowkid points to Apricot Hamlet faraway.

Note:

*Why is day but not festival in this version topic? According to a study on 30 English versions of the poem, 25 ones, or 83%, are for day in topic translation. Practically, people usually sweep the ancestors’ graves in one day, mainly on the day of Qingming in a specific year, for example, 5 April, 2022. 

**Then why only one mourner travels in the poem? Prof. YANG Hongru, a noted scholar, had it in a study that a single one traveling to sweep his ancestors’ tombs feels lonelier in dismay. And the man who asked for a wineshop to kill his gloomy time should be the poet himself. That is logical.

2.苏堤清明即事

作者｜吴惟信 (宋）

英译｜吴伟雄 （中国）

梨花风起正清明，游子寻春半出城。

日暮笙歌收拾去，万株杨柳属流莺。

Causeway Su on the Spring Outing Days

By WU Weixin（Song Dynasty）

Tr. WU Weixiong（China)

The Spring Outing Days are greeted by pear flowers; *

Most people are outing to Causeway Su for leisure hours.

When a day’s recreation stopping at sunset time,

In the willows the homing orioles enjoy the prime. **

Note:

*Qingming Festival is also known as the Spring Outing Days（踏青节）. The wind that accompanies the florescence is called the florescence wind. The blooming pear flowers usher in the Spring Outing Days. According to the artistic conception of this poem, people outing are not lonely nor gloomy but cheerful in high spirit. Therefore, the topic is put into Causeway SU on the Spring Outing Days, according to the concrete meaning of the poem.

**The poem depicts that people are going out for spring outing on the Causeway SU during the day time; at dust when the tourists are homed, the homing orioles enjoy their prime time in the willows by the water.  

3.清明

作者｜王禹偁（宋）

英译｜吴伟雄（中国）

无花无酒过清明，兴味萧然似野僧。

昨日邻家乞新火，晓窗分与读书灯。

The Pure and Bright Day*

By WANG Yucheng

Tr. WU Weixiong（China)

This very Day I’ve neither wine nor flowers,

Like a monk roaming outside in lonely hours.

I begged my neighbor for a new fire** last night

To light my lamp, hence I’ve read until sky bright.

Note: 

*The speaker of the poem, the poet, is poor, having neither wine nor flowers for the special day. He begged for the new fire the night before Qingming. Then,lighting a reading lamp, he vigorously studies the whole night by the window till dawn, indicating a poor scholar’s ambition for knowledge, never short of the inspirational feelings. By getting the new fire, he also gained the light. The topic, Clear and Bright Day,conforms to the poetic and the new fire implies his hope for a bright future.

** New fire: in ancient customs, the two days before the Pure and Bright Day, or the Tomb-Sweeping Day,was the Unheated-Food Festival, and because there was no fire then, people could only eat the unheated. After that, fire was light up again, hence the "new fire".

英译者简介：

吴伟雄，广东新会人，英语译审。中国译协四、五届理事，专家会员，获“资深翻译家”证书。在广东肇庆、云浮两市从事外事管理和翻译工作多年，外交部授“资深地方外事工作者”称号。曾赴五大洲20多个国家任随团翻译或参加国际会议。广东省译协和广州外事翻译学会创会理事，肇庆、云浮两市译协创会会长、荣誉会长。2006-2017年，任北理工珠海学院外国语学院教授，授《汉英互译》、《英语诗歌选读》、《中英诗歌鉴赏》等，曾任《独立学院外语界》主编。在《中国翻译》，《中国科技翻译》和《上海翻译》发文16篇，出版编著5本。2005年在中国译协和桂林市府合办的“桂林山水甲天下”名句国际译文征集活动中获连珠三奖：优秀奖（第一名），入围奖和鼓励奖。

特邀金牌双语主播简介：

王劫苏，出生于辽宁省沈阳市，北京理工大学珠海学院英语教师。硕士研究生毕业于法国巴黎第三大学。研究兴趣：语言学，中西文化差异，心理学。先后开设大学英语，英语语音，雅思英语，西方文化概论，法语等课程。

本期总编：静好（英国）

注：本期配图来自网络。