Our News, Your News

Six In & Out of Titles... - News #6

By Jack Hargreaves, March 14, '21

This fortnight we trace the origin of the cosmos with the Nuosu creation story and look to the future with oracle-penman Chen Qiufan. If you're looking to practice your pronunciation, there's Bopomofo poetry or Jidi Majia in Scots, but if all you really want is to sit back and relax with a film, Taiwanese cinema has something for everyone.

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All the Good Stuff (and the bad) - News #5

By Jack Hargreaves, March 2, '21

I don't know if the amount of news is increasing each week or if we're just getting better at finding it! Feast your eyes on this delectable selection of all things Chinese lit in translation.

Some of you have asked us if you'll be able to sign up to receive the newsletter by email. We definitely plan to start sending out a regular newsletter, but when is yet undecided. So for the time being, return here every two weeks as you have been for your Chinese lit fix.

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Happy Lantern Festival and Happy Belated Lunar New Year!

By Yao Lirong, February 26, '21

As you may have seen, for 2021, we’ve already started a new series of Sunday Sentences and biweekly news posts, which we hope will add some fun and dynamism to the world of Chinese literature in translation. Meanwhile, we would like to draw your attention to our new video program, Interview with Julia Lovell on her new translation of Journey to the West. Some interesting questions are discussed, from which you can see how Julia ‘created’ the new Monkey King. Finally, a lot is happening behind the scenes at Paper Republic. For example, we are working on a series of educational events to help emerging and established translators. Please watch this space for more!

Today is the fifteenth day of the Year of the Ox, the Lantern Festival! People will be celebrating the day with families or friends, eating Glutinous Rice Balls and solving lantern riddles.

Today is also the final day of the traditional Chinese New Year celebrations, when people leave their families and go back to work in the cities, carrying with them bags of homemade specialties and high hopes for the new year.

No matter where you are and what you are working on, we wish you and your family a safe, healthy, productive, and happy new year.

From all of us at Paper Republic

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Interview with Julia Lovell on her new translation of Journey to the West

By Eric Abrahamsen, February 16, '21

Not content with the complete works of Lu Xun, Julia Lovell has taken on another momentous project in a new translation of Journey to the West, aka Monkey King. Watch as she joins Emily Jones and Dylan King in conversation about the translation process, and the story's place in Chinese and world culture.

Bonus feature: read Nicky Harman's review of the translation on the Asian Books Blog

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Unlucky for Some - News #4

By Jack Hargreaves, February 13, '21

LOTS to read this week: poetry aplenty, a story from the inimitable Zhu Yue, another review of Strange Beasts of China, extract from Uyghur writer Alat Asem's work, and a discussion with translator Carlos Roja about The Four Books. Dig in!

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Sunday Sentence for Schools

By Jack Hargreaves, January 29, '21

We're back! And we're starting 2021 with two sentences from two wonderful children's books.

The first is from 《好困好困新年》by Meng Yanan 孟亚楠, translated by winner of the 6th Bai Meigui Translation Competition, Izzy Hasson, as Sleepy, Sleepy New Year and published by Balestier Press.

The second is from 《我要作好孩子》 by Huang Beijia 黄蓓佳, translated by Nicky Harman as I Want to Be Good, to be published by New Classic Press this February.

The sentences and their context are below, but first some brief instructions for those joining us for the first time or in case 2020 has made you forget how this works.

  1. You have two weeks to complete your own translations of the sentences below.
  2. Once you're happy with them, post them in the comments at the bottom of the page. If you like, tell us what you liked about doing the translation or about the text or what you found difficult.
  3. Read others' translations, ask them questions in the comments, admire their work and generally just geek out as much as you like!

[Pictures reproduced by kind permission of the publisher.]

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Notes on Paper Republic and the Translation Community, Part 2

By Eric Abrahamsen, January 21, '21

A few days ago we published a statement on the site regarding Paper Republic's stance on racism, and support for BIPOC translators. After more discussion with the community, we posted a further statement on Twitter, which we're reposting here:

Paper Republic condemns the racism that has played, and continues to play, a fundamental role in shaping the fields of translation and publishing, and in preventing the voices of BIPOC translators from being heard.

We condemn racist translation practices both overt and covert, including bridge translation, and any other practice which devalues or discounts the work of BIPOC translators.

We apologize to Yilin Wang for the personal racist attacks she's had to endure during the course of this exchange, and we apologize to everyone watching for how long it's taken us to respond appropriately to the situation.

Our immediate course of action will be to take responsibility for community postings on Paper Republic: we will no longer permit unmoderated posts.

For the longer term, we are starting conversations with people in the community, and are considering what active programming we can put in place to support BIPOC translators and writers.

This initiative will require more research; we're likely to take Yilin's suggestion of either a community survey, or a "town hall" type event.

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Read all about it! - News #2

By Jack Hargreaves, January 20, '21

Here it is, what you've all been waiting for, the definitive round-up of all things Chinese / literature / translation / everything in-between. It was brilliant after the first instalment to receive requests for newsletter subscription, which is definitely our aim -- to have this drop in your inbox every two weeks -- but for now it remains in its nascent form.
If there's anything you'd like to see more of, less of, just the right amount of, please comment below. If you've stumbled upon news we've missed, or on any stories or extracts (I've found zero (EDIT: two)), pop them in the comments too.
See you again in two weeks!

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Japanese Colonial Era Dorms Designated "Taiwan Literature Base"

By Bruce Humes, January 20, '21

A group of historical buildings in Taipei has been given a new lease on life and rechristened as the Taiwan Literature Base (台灣文學基地).

One of its functions: Writers in Residence Project. Hopefully, this will eventually evolve into one where translators can meet up with local authors.

Comprised of seven Japanese-style edifices, the 1,157-square meter complex used to house dormitories for Japanese officials in the colonial period before the facility was repurposed to become a hub for literary exchanges.

Taiwan generally refers to the 1895-1945 period of rule by the Japanese as 日治台灣, while on the mainland, the same period in Taiwan is often referred to using the adjective 日據.

Click here for a tour in English.

The project appears to be co-sponsored by Tainan's Literature Museum (台灣文學館), where I happily worked on translation projects 5-6 days weekly during 2019-20.

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