I have been working on an E-Prime version of the Tao Te Ching, and I am posting the first seven chapters. E-Prime is a subset of the English language. It's just like English without the verb to be. It eliminates the passive voice, and forces speakers and writers to communicate more concretely, minimizing subjective statements. ("The weather was terrible" becomes "It snowed for three days straight.") It is sometimes used for scientific papers. It eliminates the paradox of light's wave/particle duality. You wouldn't be allowed to say "light is both a wave and a particle." You could only say "under certain conditions light behaves as a wave, and under certain conditions it behaves as a particle."
Typically, E-Prime translators tackle texts that were originally written in English. So my translation of the Tao Te Ching may be a little absurd or irrelevant to some degree. In the popular consciousness, the ultimate Taoist maxim is "just be". So I thought it might be interesting to try to convey all the principles of the Tao Te Ching without that word. I am also dissatisfied with most existing English translation. So there.
I do not read Chinese. I am using this website that has the original Chinese text with links to various definitions for the characters. I have also been referencing English translations. If you want to compare my first seven chapters with other translations, you can find a bunch here.
6 comments:
I'm unable to give this prop consideration right now, but it sounds beyond beyond awesome. We gotta talk about this!
The tao of eprime post deserves more attention!
Are people not able to follow the link or are people just not interested in translation? The idea behind this is amazing and so far the translation seems quite uncanny. This is also super-contemporary writing that relates directly to the "algorithm" post - like the Oulipo (French process-driven lit. group) you have created a challenge for yourself and now are doing the sweat work. Also, the writing seems to embody the principals of no-mind that were born of the tao te ching. The whole thing is an example of how creating a structure and a rigid system of rules actually enables freedom of thought, how limitation is essential to creativity. I would thing total cool dude and logan would be way into this. Perhaps the fact that you are using an ancient text that seems to appeal to an kind of spirituality that is sometimes looked down upon is distracting people from seeing how contemporary and exciting this is. (Though I have to say, anyone who actually looks down on the tao or on ancient China for that matter is fucking brain-busted). Maybe you need to consider how to create an "in" for people like the pizza-bloated fools on this site who refuse to see the exciting aspects of this project. How can you emphasize the process of translation and excision of "to be" so that it is more visceral and sensual instead of contemplative and slightly obscure? Could this project be presented in a different media - i.e. (stupid idea time) an animation or video where we can watch the translation happen and the is's disappear? Or maybe you just need to invite some more writers and translators to the site?
i took a look at it earlier - im not intimately familiar with the tao te ching, so the differences weren't jumping out at me. the idea sounded totally awesome tho.
when i get the chance, i will take a look at the original and compare.
This is definitely along the lines of the algorithmic thread, and is very intriguing. Mainly, I've been waiting to comment until I re-read the original, since it's been about six years, so that I could get a better perspective.
I need to take a speed reading course. This group has been posting so many great articles (and fuck, books), that it's taking my lame, slow reading ass forever to catch up.
But regardless, this does deserve more attention than it's getting, so all you literate fools step up.
Anyway, I'd like to hear more from R.M. about whether this is intended to be a purely literary work, or whether it could branch out into new media.
"Literate fools" - I think that the EPN tends to focus on visual art and music because there is a certain anti-academic tradition in how people speak about both of these arts (a reaction to the dense prose used in academic discussions about art?), but the anti-academic discussion of lit. is, what, book clubs or something? Anyway, I hope to post some of my work with language and I'd like to see Logan post some of his amazing poetry...
I just wrote a really long reply and then I lost my connection and that sucks!!! Okay, this one will be more succinct.
Eff - You bring up a problematic aspect of my translation. It's not a translation of an English text. So it wouldn't really lend itself to something like showing the isses disappear (though that would be really cool otherwise).
The E-prime decision I think goes along with my vision of the translation. Making an English version of the TTC which isn't too interpretive, yet focusses specifically on concretizing the chapters, rendering them in such a way that they ring true even when taken literally. I think that modern readers of the TTC immediately jump to the deep inscrutable mystical level with this text and never ask to mean something in the tangible world. I think that's a mistake. So though my translation is pretty modern, and also has an axe to grind, I've been looking at it from the standpoint of trying to scrub off the film of ineffectual masturbatory meaningless mysticism that has accumulated with many of the extant English translations, and readings.
As for other media, I am definitely open to the idea though I wasn't thinking about it at the time. If you have an idea that you think would make sense with main point of the project, than I'd really like to hear it.
Thanks for your thoughts
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