MCLC: revolutionary lit in English (1)

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Laughlin, Charles <cal5m at eservices.virginia.edu>
Subject: revolutionary lit in English (1)
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That 1978 translation of Red Crag is actually not bad, I have looked at it
closely.

The short answer to your question is that American translators have not
been keen on translating revolutionary literature at all. However, it's
interesting because before the period of reform and opening, I think a lot
of college professors were teaching this and similar novels published by
Foreign Languages Press, such as Liu Qing's The Builders, Zhou Erfu's
Morning in Shanghai, Mao Dun's Midnight, The White-Haired Girl (this is
evidenced by multiple copies of these titles collecting dust in many
university libraries).

In addition, there have been a couple of extraordinary efforts by Western
scholars to publish revolutionary and socialist literature, such as the
anthology edited by Hsu Kai-yu in 1980 called Literature of the People's
Republic of China, Sherman Cochran's partial translation of Mao Dun's
anthology One Day in China, and Madeline Zelin's translation of Mao Dun's
Rainbow, which I would call "revolutionary," although not in the "Red
Classics" way Red Crag is.

(Of course I'm not distinguishing between pre- and post-1949 here; Mao
Dun's works of course are from the 1930s).

You might also consider using film, such as the film adaptation of Red
Crag (I think it was mid-1960s), New Young Heroes (新儿女英雄传), Three
Family 
Lane (三家巷), Sanliwan (三里湾), which might now be available with passable
English subtitles, not to mention the Revolutionary Model Operas. Seeing
revolutionary culture in cinematic form may be easier for students to get
into, although that probably depends on the student. Bad subtitles can
really ruin an interesting movie!

Charles Laughlin
University of Virginia