Announcements have been made for the 2009 PEN Translation Grants, though the press release has not yet appeared online, we'll link to it when it does. The only Chinese-language grant went to my translation of Wang Xiaobo's collection of essays, My Spiritual Homeland. You can download a PDF translation of "The Silent Majority", one of the essays from this collection, by clicking here. This essay was originally published in the Asia Literary Review.
By Eric Abrahamsen, April 22, 3:28p.m.
So here we are in London. After a couple of days of recovery (and sightseeing!) our first event involving Han Dong took place yesterday, at the Young Vic. The event was a part of the two day Free the Word program put on by International PEN, and featured seven or eight poets and writers from around the world reading for five to ten minutes each. There were homages to Harold Pinter and Adrian Mitchell, tales of detention, homelessness, and the unfriendly welcome that awaits immigrants at the British Home Office.
I'll just make two observations:
Of all the authors (who came from Cameroon, Iraq, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Mexico, among other places), only Han Dong had interpretation. The rest weren't all up to BBC broadcast standards, but they spoke English. I found this interesting – I'm not sure whether it says more about China, about the rest of the world, or about the PEN event. Chinese writers who speak fluent English are rare (nonexistant?). Most of the other foreign writers had written about their experiences as immigrants to the UK.
Chinese writers get dissident status just by virtue of being both Chinese, and writers. Every one of the readers that day read something against the establishment – tales of police brutality, protest, living down and out – except Han Dong. He read about the dusk, and visiting a prostitute, and the sound of glasses clinking. Whatever may be anti-establishment about Han Dong (and I believe there's plenty) is not immediately obvious in his poetry, at least not the way it was obvious in the other readings. And yet he was happily welcomed into the company, a brother in suffering. I wonder if they were confused by what they got.
I don't think he quite identified, at any rate. I just now asked him, "Han Dong, do you think you're an oppressed writer?"
"Who?" he asked. (He was absorbed in a copy of We All Sing Revolutionary Songs [革命歌曲大家唱], which he'd found, against all odds, in the home of our London host. He'd also had two Guinesses.)
"You, of course!"
"Me? Who would oppress me?" He had been put in a particularly good mood by My Home is on the Songhua River (我的家在东北松花江上) and didn't seem to recall his burdens.
By Eric Abrahamsen, April 20, 5:32p.m.
We've made a few additions to the site recently, so please have a look around. The first is a directory of translators, to make it easier for publishers to locate appropriate translators; that list will be growing filters and searches over the next couple of weeks. The second is resources sections aimed at both publishers and translators, with frequently asked questions, and general background information. We want to expand these sections as much as possible, so please do leave suggestions in the comments here or on the resources themselves, or email us.
By Eric Abrahamsen, April 20, 9:42a.m.
To his various accusers:
Of all the types of value judgments, the worst is the vilification of those who have thought too much and too deeply, who have gone beyond the grasp of their accusers. While we experience the pleasures of thought we cause no harm to anyone; unfortunately, there are always some who feel they have taken harm. Honestly, it is not everyone who can feel this kind of pleasure, but we cannot be held responsible for that. I can see no reason for the negation of such pleasures, unless one takes a despicable sort of jealousy into account. There are some in this world who like variety, and some who like simplicity; I have never observed those who love variety to be jealous of those who like simplicity, nor cause them any harm, I have only ever seen the opposite. If I know anything at all about science and art, it is that they are fed equally by the broad river of the pleasure of thought. This river benefits all humankind but it does not, as some imagine, flow for any one of us alone, just as those who take pleasure in thought were not born for anyone but themselves.
From 思维的乐趣 (The Pleasure of Thought), from his collection 我的精神家园 (My Spiritual Homeland).
By Eric Abrahamsen, April 5, 11:36a.m.
