Category Archives: Translation

Peimin Ni wins Scaglione Prize in translation

MLA’S SCAGLIONE PRIZE FOR A TRANSLATION OF A SCHOLARLY STUDY OF LITERATURE AWARDED TO PEIMIN NI FOR UNDERSTANDING THE ANALECTS OF CONFUCIUS AND TO SYLVIA ADRIAN NOTINI FOR THE VENETIAN QUR’AN; JOHN MARINCOLA TO RECEIVE HONORABLE MENTION FOR ON WRITING HISTORY

New York, NY – 4 December 2019 – The Modern Language Association of America today announced it is awarding its thirteenth Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for a Translation of a Scholarly Study of Literature to Peimin Ni, of Grand Valley State University, for Understanding the Analects of Confucius: A New Translation of Lunyu with Annotations, published by the State University of New York Press, and to Sylvia Adrian Notini, of the University of Bologna, for her translation of Pier Mattia Tommasino’s The Venetian Qur’an: A Renaissance Companion to Islam, published by the University of Pennsylvania Press. John Marincola, of Florida State University, is receiving an honorable mention for On Writing History: From Herodotus to Herodian, published by Penguin.

Please click here to download a PDF of the full press release.

CFP: A Crisis, or a New Direction?: Reconsidering the Translation of Chinese Philosophy

CFP: A Crisis, or a New Direction?: Reconsidering the Translation of Chinese Philosophy, 16-17 October 2020

We invite paper proposals for a symposium to be held in October 2020 at the International Academy for Chinese Studies (IACS國際漢學家基地) at Peking University. The focus will be on past and contemporary attempts to tackle Chinese philosophy through translation in the Western world, from the Jesuit missionaries to present-day translators working in the academia and beyond. We seek contributions that focus on the cultural impact of translated Chinese philosophical masterworks in the West at different historical periods. This is the fourth symposium in a five-symposium series, which is part of a grander project led by IACS Director Prof. Yuan Xingpei 袁行霈 that covers multiple themes of cultural dialogs between China and the rest of the world.

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CALL FOR MANUSCRIPTS: The Hsu-Tang Library of Classical Chinese Literature

Stefan Vranka, Commissioning Editor at Oxford University Press, would like to alert interested parties to the following call for manuscripts (please note that the Oxford Chinese Thought series is focused on philosophical works while the new series is devoted to all of Chinese literature, broadly defined):

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New Book: Treatise on Awakening Mahāyāna Faith

Oxford University Press has published a second translation in the Oxford Chinese Thought series, which is the Treatise on Awakening Mahāyāna Faith, a translation of the Dasheng qixin lun 大乘起信論. We are very pleased to make widely available this scholarly translation of one of the most influential texts in East Asian Buddhism. This is the product of years of careful work by John Jorgensen, Dan Lusthaus, John Makeham, and Mark Strange. A short description follows below the fold.

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New translation of Xinyu 新語

Just a quick announcement that Elisa Levi Sabattini and I are about to publish a new translation of Xinyu:

https://brill.com/view/title/56294?rskey=msXfbz&result=1

Also watch out for my new book on classical Chinese philosophy, forthcoming from Princeton University Press.  Since I’m not ashamed of self-promotion, I’ll be posting with details in due course.

New Book: Zhu Xi

Zhu Xi: Selected Writings has been published. This is the first volume in the new translation series, Oxford Chinese Thought.

This is the first book-length translation to give a comprehensive look at Zhu Xi’s thought and his place in history, literature, philosophy, and religion. It includes Zhu’s writings or lessons on a wide variety of topics, including his ethics, metaphysics, political thought, views on ghosts and spirits, objections to Daoism and Buddhism, selected commentaries, and his thoughts on literature, poetry, and current social conditions. The volume is edited by Philip J. Ivanhoe with contributions from experts in various areas and aspects of Zhu Xi’s writings.

The book has been released directly into paperback and there is a companion website that includes the Chinese text for all translated materials, both of which we hope will appeal to instructors looking to adopt the volume for their courses. The paperback edition is quite affordable, and the easy reference to the Chinese text gives language instructors a way to teach Song dynasty Chinese as applied to a variety of topics and genres.

The table of contents is below the fold.

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CFP: A Conference on Asian Philosophical Texts

September 9–10 2019

At Research Institute for Japanese Studies (RIJS), Kanda University of International Studies, 1-4-1 Mihama-ku, Wakaba, Chiba-shi 261-0014, Japan.

This conference aims at providing a platform for scholars in the field of Asian Studies and world philosophies to both discuss and perform the task of translating Asian philosophical texts into western languages. Any papers on the philosophy of translation, critical analyses of existing translations, or ongoing translation projects are welcomed.

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Call for translation manuscripts

The editors of a new series entitled “Asian Philosophical Texts” are still looking for submissions for the inaugural publication (submission deadline in July, published in late 2019). If you (or anyone you know) are interested in contributing to the project, Takeshi Morisato takeshi.morisato@gmail.com (one of the editors) is happy to receive contributions and to answer any questions.

Here is a link: http://mimesisinternational.com/category/asian-philosophical-texts/

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New Analects Translation

Paul van Els of Leiden University writes…

This new translation of the Lunyu, which recently came out, may have escaped the attention of Warp, Weft, and Way blog readers, as it was published by what appears to be an obscure press:

Li, Chris Wen-Chao. 2018. What Confucius Really Said: The Complete Analects in a Skopos-Centric Translation. San Francisco: Maison 174. (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1727464494/)

Purists might frown upon this translation, if only because the real Confucius could not and would not have quoted Katy Perry as saying “You’re hot then you’re cold, You’re yes then you’re no, You’re in then you’re out, You’re up then you’re down” (p. 164). Still, Li’s work is a creative take on the ancient text, and translations such as “Confucius @MasterSays: Guys who talk sweet and smile all the time are scum.” (p. 3) might strike a chord with the Twitter generation.