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Feng Menglong published Stories Old and New in the 17th century in China; it's a collection of stories which were traditionally told by popular story-tellers. Cyril Birch then chose six stories from that collection that he saw as "representative" and translated them and presented them in this book which I read.
It makes for a very interesting read, to be sure, but I am curious about how actually representative Birch's selections are or aren't. And also I have concerns about what biases Birch's translation has introduced! There's one place where his endnote makes it clear he has bowdlerized something: "I have however preferred to follow the 1947 reprint of the original in omitting a few phrases, which add nothing but might be found offensive." He also in one story translates the name of a type of bird local to China as a "canary" because it'll be more familiar to the presumed reader. Which means I do not exactly trust him as a translator to be presenting me with stories that are a close reflection of the original. Even though he noted these two egregious changes in his endnotes, what other more insidious changes might he have made without thinking it worth mentioning?
At any rate I did enjoy reading the collection. I appreciate that these are traditional stories collected and retold by a person from the same culture as the stories themselves; so many folk stories now available to read were collected by 19th century upper-class European men to "save" the oral traditions that their own colonialism was in the process of wiping out, which is sure a thing. China has its own traditions and its own history of publishing and scholarship though, and the stories in this book come out of that instead! Even if my monolingual self had to read them through the lens of Cyril Birch. SIGH.
My favourite story in the collection was The Canary Murders, which is a fun murder mystery about all the knock-on effects of people dying as a result of one initial murder. Good times. My least favourite was probably The Fairy's Rescue, which I found just kind of uninteresting. Possibly I lack the cultural context to be able to emotionally invest in the story. It's definitely the story with by far the most explanatory endnotes, but endnotes can only do so much in bringing a reader along for the ride. Or possibly having my eyee glaze over for all the poetry was more detrimental for this story because it's got a higher proportion of poetry.
I do want to give special recognition to The Lady Who Was A Beggar, which contains two morality tales within it, each about a spousal rejection, and the difference in what happens to the rejecting spouse when it's the wife vs the husband is sure, uh, NOTABLE. The wife who rejects her husband dies in shame. The husband who rejects his wife (by trying to murder her!!) gets a second chance at happiness in their relationship and remarries her!
It makes for a very interesting read, to be sure, but I am curious about how actually representative Birch's selections are or aren't. And also I have concerns about what biases Birch's translation has introduced! There's one place where his endnote makes it clear he has bowdlerized something: "I have however preferred to follow the 1947 reprint of the original in omitting a few phrases, which add nothing but might be found offensive." He also in one story translates the name of a type of bird local to China as a "canary" because it'll be more familiar to the presumed reader. Which means I do not exactly trust him as a translator to be presenting me with stories that are a close reflection of the original. Even though he noted these two egregious changes in his endnotes, what other more insidious changes might he have made without thinking it worth mentioning?
At any rate I did enjoy reading the collection. I appreciate that these are traditional stories collected and retold by a person from the same culture as the stories themselves; so many folk stories now available to read were collected by 19th century upper-class European men to "save" the oral traditions that their own colonialism was in the process of wiping out, which is sure a thing. China has its own traditions and its own history of publishing and scholarship though, and the stories in this book come out of that instead! Even if my monolingual self had to read them through the lens of Cyril Birch. SIGH.
My favourite story in the collection was The Canary Murders, which is a fun murder mystery about all the knock-on effects of people dying as a result of one initial murder. Good times. My least favourite was probably The Fairy's Rescue, which I found just kind of uninteresting. Possibly I lack the cultural context to be able to emotionally invest in the story. It's definitely the story with by far the most explanatory endnotes, but endnotes can only do so much in bringing a reader along for the ride. Or possibly having my eyee glaze over for all the poetry was more detrimental for this story because it's got a higher proportion of poetry.
I do want to give special recognition to The Lady Who Was A Beggar, which contains two morality tales within it, each about a spousal rejection, and the difference in what happens to the rejecting spouse when it's the wife vs the husband is sure, uh, NOTABLE. The wife who rejects her husband dies in shame. The husband who rejects his wife (by trying to murder her!!) gets a second chance at happiness in their relationship and remarries her!
