Meaningful Misunderstanding and Mistranslations: On Mao Dun's "A Survey of New Jewish Literature"

• In Event: Historical Interactions and Mutual Understandings: Jews and China

Abstract

In 1921, during the “New Cultural Movement” that aimed to transform Chinese literature from classic to vernacular style, Mao Dun penned an influential article, “A Survey of New Jewish Literature.” This piece, which was part of a broader effort to introduce literary works from “weak nations” to Chinese readers, marked the first instance of modern Yiddish literature being introduced to the Chinese audience. In his article, Mao Dun provided a concise history of modern Yiddish literature, which he referred to as “New Jewish Literature,” and translated a few excerpts from modern Yiddish works into Chinese using their English translations.
Although it was the first article that introduced modern Yiddish works to Chinese readers, Mao Dun made a few factual mistakes. He misunderstood the relationship between Yiddish and Hebrew, believing that Yiddish is the vernacular form of Hebrew, just like oral Chinese (baihua) and classic Chinese (wenyan), and hoping to reform modern Chinese literature through modeling the emergence of modern Yiddish literature. Apart from this misunderstanding, in his translated passages, such as Sholem Abramovitsch’s Fishke the Lame, he mistranslated several words and phrases; for instance, he translated “earlock” to “earring.” In addition, his understanding of the status of different Yiddish writers in literary history was also problematic. For instance, he argued, “Sholem Aleichem inherited Peretz’s literary legacy to write his works.”
These discrepancies in Mao Dun’s article raise two crucial questions. First, what were the sources that informed his understanding of modern Yiddish literature? Second, if his interpretations extended beyond the content of these sources, what insights did he glean about modern Chinese literature from his readings of modern Yiddish literature?
This research is centered on these questions and argues that these misunderstandings and mistranslations show Mao Dun’s view of proving the universal validity of the Chinese cultural reformists’ ideal from a culture under the same historical circumstances but out of Chinese experiences.

Author

• Anruo Bao, Shanghai International Studies University