{"id":2500,"date":"2014-03-24T09:30:12","date_gmt":"2014-03-24T01:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=2500"},"modified":"2014-03-12T10:20:06","modified_gmt":"2014-03-12T02:20:06","slug":"interview-with-robert-hammond-dorsett-on-wen-yiduos-stagnant-water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=2500","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Robert Hammond Dorsett on Wen Yiduo’s Stagnant Water"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\"book<\/a>Robert Hammond Dorsett, translator of the newly released Stagnant Water & Other Poems<\/em><\/a> by Wen Yiduo \u805e\u4e00\u591a (1899 \u2013 1946), agreed to answer a few of my questions by way of interview:<\/p>\n

Can you describe how you got interested in Chinese \/ poetry \/ translation and in Wen Yiduo\u00a0 in particular?<\/strong><\/p>\n

An undergraduate course, entitled Keats and His Circle, started my interest: I have read and written poems ever since. After my residency in pediatrics, my wife, daughter and I traveled to Hong Kong, where I studied at the Yale-in-China program at the Chinese University. It was there I was introduced to Wen Yiduo, and, from then till now, I have carried his poems about, making notes and deciding on interpretations. It was only after I left medicine, decades later, that I had enough time to prepare my poems and translations for publication.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Do you see any parallels between Wen Yiduo\u2019s time and place and ours?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are so many parallels, as well as differences, that it is difficult for me to answer simply; I\u2019d rather say it is at the depth of the poems of Wen Yiduo that I encounter the same loss, regret, love, outrage at suffering and so forth that is common to humanity. It is from there, from the human realm, the poems emanate their immediacy. I can say I find a Wen Yiduo poem as fresh and current as any poem written now in English.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I find a tight condensation in your English, often more condensed than I find Wen Yiduo\u2019s Chinese to be. Can you say something about the audience you have in mind for Stagnant Water<\/i>, and what you imagine that audience\u2019s expectations to be?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Condensation in poetry, that is condensation that does not hinder either rhythm or clarity of voice, is, for me, a desideratum. I try to approach translation much the same way a composer approaches transcription\u2014as a reconstruction rather than a substitution. The key to Wen Yiduo, for me, is voice; I first decide who the speaker is, whether the voice is general or specific, and, if specific, who the speaker is, to whom she or he is speaking, under what conditions etc., and I try not to use any language that an ordinary person in that same situation wouldn\u2019t use. I have attempted not to make the foreign sound strange. I made these translations for anyone who loves poetry.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Thanks to Robert Hammond Dorsett for his answers!<\/p>\n

Click the image for ordering information on the book.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Robert Hammond Dorsett, translator of the newly released Stagnant Water & Other Poems by Wen Yiduo \u805e\u4e00\u591a (1899 \u2013 1946), agreed to answer a few of my questions by way of interview: Can you describe how you got interested in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3,16],"tags":[1365,1316,803],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8srwF-Ek","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2346,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=2346","url_meta":{"origin":2500,"position":0},"title":"New Wen Yiduo Translations by Robert Hammond Dorsett","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"January 2, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Announcing Stagnant Water & Other Poems by Wen Yiduo \u805e\u4e00\u591a (1899 \u2013 1946), translated by Robert Hammond Dorsett This stagnant ditch is hopeless. Clearly, not a place where beauty thrives. Better cultivate its ugliness. Perhaps its ugliness will create a world. \u9019\u662f\u4e00\u6e9d\u7d55\u671b\u7684\u6b7b\u6c34\uff0c \u9019\u88cf\u65b7\u4e0d\u662f\u7f8e\u7684\u6240\u5728\uff0c \u4e0d\u5982\u8b93\u7d66\u919c\u60e1\u4f86\u958b\u58be\uff0c \u770b\u4ed6\u9020\u51fa\u500b\u4ec0\u9ebc\u4e16\u754c\u3002 For more information including ordering\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Links"","block_context":{"text":"Links","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/brightcitybooks.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Wen-Cover-crop-200x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2537,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=2537","url_meta":{"origin":2500,"position":1},"title":"\u201cA Wen Yiduo Poem Is Like a Jewel\u201d","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"April 9, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"China Digital Times has interviewed Robert Hammond Dorsett about his newly released Wen Yiduo \u805e\u4e00\u591a translations, Stagnant Water & Other Poems. CDT: Wen himself worked within the tension between the classical Chinese of his education and the vernacular advocated by his contemporaries. Are there poems where one type of language\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Links"","block_context":{"text":"Links","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3338,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3338","url_meta":{"origin":2500,"position":2},"title":"Yip’s Qu Yuan forthcoming in Rothenberg’s new Technicians of the Sacred","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"December 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Jerome Rothenberg will be releasing an expanded version of his foundational anthology Technicians of the Sacred, and it will include an excerpt from a new translation of Qu Yuan \u5c48\u539f by Wai-lim Yip \u8449\u7dad\u5ec9. Rotheberg has published a preview on his blog at Jacket2, where he writes: The Nine Songs\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Links"","block_context":{"text":"Links","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/jacket2.org\/sites\/jacket2.org\/files\/imagecache\/wide_main_column\/nine%20songs_0.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1357,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=1357","url_meta":{"origin":2500,"position":3},"title":"Inferno Tango on Dissertation Reviews","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"November 8, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Dissertation Reviews has posted Dun Wang's review of Meng Liansu's The Inferno Tango: Gender Politics and Modern Chinese Poetry, 1917-1980. Here's how it begins: The Inferno Tango analyzes the gender politics of modern Chinese intellectuals through examining modern Chinese poetry from the 1910s to the 1980s. The author focuses on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Dissertation Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Dissertation Reviews","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=623"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2627,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=2627","url_meta":{"origin":2500,"position":4},"title":"Xi Chuan at the Copenhagen International Literature Festival","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"June 2, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The Writing China blog caught up with Xi Chuan (and Fan Wen \u8303\u7a33 and Wang Gang \u738b\u521a) at the Copenhagen International Literature Festival, and has posted their replies to a brief questionnaire. 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She writes:\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Links"","block_context":{"text":"Links","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"http:\/\/supchina.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/Xu-Zhimo.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/supchina.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/Xu-Zhimo.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2500"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2502,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500\/revisions\/2502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}