中岁颇好道，晚家南山陲。
兴来每独往，胜事空自知。
行到水穷处，坐看云起时。
偶然值林叟，谈笑无还期。
We're going to see if AI can make more readable.
First though, the popular English translation:
In my middle years I came to much love the Way
and late made my home by South Mountain's edge.
When the mood comes upon me, I go off alone,
and have glorious moments all to myself.
I walk to the point where a stream ends,
and sitting, watch when the clouds rise.
By chance I meet old men in the woods;
we laugh and chat, no fixed time to turn home.
Ugh. Clunky.
I was raised on Kipling (thanks, colonialism!) and internalised a belief that poetry should rhyme. Instead of spending hours matching synonyms, I decided to ask ChatGPT to rewrite the translation.
In my middle years I found a love for the Way,
On South Mountain's frontier I chose to stay.When the mood takes hold, I seek a lonely place,
To revel in the solitude I gloriously embrace.I wander to where a stream meets its end,
And there I sit, watching clouds ascend.Sometimes I chance upon old men in the groves,
We laugh and chat, no fixed time to turn home.
Much nicer!
OK, so that isn't pure AI. I got ChatGPT to do three versions then picked the best lines, replacing some words along the way. I also used the final line from the original translation because it just worked better.
That's generally the way things go with technology. You get better results when humans (though fewer and requiring less expertise) drive it.
Why bother?
This poem exemplifies the 'Poetry of Retreat' and the theme of the scholar withdrawing from the expectations of a life in state service. Yet, it also balances the fatalism of Buddhism, the naturism of Daoism, and the civility of Confucianism.
It's hard to notice that from the established translation if you're immediately put off by its lack of rhythm and rhyme.
So rough prose may cause you to miss out on a theme that resonates or a valuable piece of context with which to position later works.
When we think of retiring to a cabin in the woods (yet still having your Mum do your laundry) we think of Henry David Thoreau. However, it is now clear that Walden echoed a sentiment of withdrawal that had been equally well-articulated a thousand years previously.
Why now?
I'm not the first to think that Chinese poetry could be put into English better. Ezra Pound famously had a stab, but his modernist prose hasn't aged well, and, y'know, Nazism.
There are others who do a rock solid job like the former President of Hong Kong's LegCo. (He probably identifies with the poets themselves after losing his job to government collapse and suddenly having lots of time for poetry.)
But they do it manually. And in the case of Pound, with no knowledge of Chinese. To be honest, I was rolling up my sleeves to mine rhymes out of my own vocabulary. I'm so glad AI gives a lazy option. It means I can do more of them.
Where TF is Zhongnan?
No other commentary has looked at the location, but I think it's significant. Zhongnan is just a little south of the then-capital Xi'An. That means:
- It gets more sun.
- You can see the shenanigans in the capital while not being touched by them.
Comments
Post a Comment