International Perspective of Translation for Cultural Dialogue

By Guo Chenggang

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International Perspective of Translation for Cultural Dialogue

By Guo Chenggang

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the founding of Cultural Dialogue. I have been working as a translator for the magazine for 20 years. When I first came to the magazine, it was a quarterly. Then it became a bimonthly and then a monthly. The quarterly was only about 40 some pages long and now it tells stories in its 80 pages.

I remember the first story I did. It was in the autumn of 1995. The story was about a Japanese teacher who had visited Zhejiang to investigate the germ warfare conductedby the Japanese military during its invasion of China in World War II. He made a documentary and screened it in Japan. I still remember the computer, the printer, the floppy disk I used in translating and printing the document. In terms of computer and its peripherals, it was a totally different world. That assignment taught me about the significance of cultural exchanges.

大窩友愛希望小學新教學樓。右下為大窩小學舊貌。Left is the classroom building funded by Dr. Taplin and his Chinese friend Wang Bin; right is part of the previous school.

In the beginning years, I worked under the tutelage of Zhang Yijin, a university teacher and experienced translator. She read my translations, gave me valuable tips and taught me a list of dos and don'ts. With her as my mentor, the translation work at Cultural Dialogue got a procedure and a set of guidelines. After she left, I have been following the same procedure and guidelines. English translation has kept the style we established when I was translating under her guidance.

One of the things I must do is to check facts. I check names and places and some basic facts. I still check whenever I am not certain about things mentioned in a story. Many Chinese writers take things for certain and I need to think of overseas readers and ask if they do know of these things. The following thing occurred when I ran into a story and decided to check.

In early 2008 I got a story to translate. It read like a legend. While sightseeing as a tourist in Guilin, an American expert working in China met a young girl who was selling bottled water at a scenic spot. The two chatted and the girl learned of the disease the American suffered and invited him to stay at the village where she came from. The American stayed at the village and became healthy after taking some magic traditional Chinese medicine. Even American mainstream media took notice and the stories about the wonderful recovery splashed the major newspapers in the United States. The expert was able to continue to work in China and helped setting up a Hope school.

I checked. He was Julian Taplin, a distinguished expert who had worked in China for many years. No, he didn't receive traditional Chinese therapy and there was no miraculous recovery. No, the news media in America never reported about his health issue. Yes, he indeed helped establishing a hope school in Sichuan in southwestern China. The original story was not appropriate for the magazine.

I asked Julian Taplin if he could write an article about his assistance in building a hope school in Sichuan. He said yes gladly. Before long, a story arrived through email. In the article he talked about his work of psychology for children in China. He related how he got the idea of help funding a hope project in rural Sichuan, how he raised money at home and how his family and friends chipped in, how he and his wife attended the opening ceremony. He also talked about the future of the school. It is a heart-touching story with details and good photos. I gladly translated. The story came out in the issue of June, 2008. It is still a very good read today.

This memory stands out vividly when it comes to my translation experience with Cultural Dialogue. I remember feeling excited because I ran into a story about cultural exchanges between China and the rest of the world while checking information on a story. I also remember feeling alarmed by the original article from a freelancer who dared to make up things willfully. As a translator, I am now doing more than translating. Occasionally I write articles for the magazine from an international perspective. Translating for the magazine makes me aware of and appreciative of the importance of cultural dialogues going on in various ways and on various levels.