Dr. Daniela Zhang-Czírková, from the Institute of Oriental Studies in Slovakia National Academy of Sciences, presented a lecture entitled "Translation and Introduction of A Dream of Red Mansions in Eastern Europe and Dai Dunbang’s Illustration of the Characters" for teachers and students in the School of Foreign Languages (SFL). ??Wang Pengfei, Vice Dean of SFL, hosted the lecture. Song Meihua, Director of the Department of Translation and Interpreting, as well as other teachers like Tang Jun, Ren Xiankai, Liu Mingyang, Ou Bangming, and Cheng Kaiwen attended the lecture.
Dr. Zhang first introduced Old?ich Král and Marina ?arnogurská, the renowned translators of the Czechic and Slovakian versions of A Dream of Red Mansions, recounting with fluent Chinese the general scene of the translation and spread of this Chinese masterpiece in Eastern Europe.
Born in Prague in 1930, Old?ich Král majored in Sinology in Charles University. He translated many Chinese classics such as Family by Ba Jin, The Scholars, Tao Te Ching, and Zhuangzi, etc, and published the Czechic translation of A Dream of Red Mansions during the period 1986 - 1988, which won him the National Prize for Literary Translation in 1988. Influenced by Zhuangzi, his translation version was endowed with philosophical contemplations, retaining the beauty of the original language style and giving the readers a sense of detachment. Marina ?arnogurská was born in Bratislava in 1940, and studied Sinology and philosophy in Charles University in Prague as well. She started to work in the Institute of Oriental Studies in Slovakia National Academy of Sciences in 1991. She also translated Tao Te Ching and A Dream of Red Mansions, but is more concerned with the reception by the readers and the acceptability of her translation. So her Slovakian version of A Dream of Red Mansions is much easier to understand.
Dr. Zhang then analyzed Dai Dunbang’s illustrations and portraits of the characters in A Dream of Red Mansions. She showed three different styles of Dai’s illustrations, and made a comparative study of the extent of influence that Chinese and Western painting styles exerted on his illustrations.
Dai Dunbang was born in Zhenjiang, Jiangsu Province in 1938 and graduated from Shanghai Normal University. He proclaimed himself to be a "grass-root artist" and is now a professor at the Institute of Humanities at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, as well as a member of the Chinese Society of A Dream of Red Mansions. During 1978-1980, Dai Dunbang illustrated for the English translation of A Dream of Red Mansions (by Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang, 1978-1980, Foreign Language Press, Peking); in 1938, he published a line-drawing edition of A Dream of Red Mansions named One Hundred Pictures of the Characters of A Dream of Red Mansions; and in 2000, he re-illustrated for A Dream of Red Mansions and published the New Paintings of A Dream of Red Mansions.
In the English version of A Dream of Red Mansions, Dai integrated Chinese and Western painting styles and adopted both Chinese traditional way of movement depiction and Western way of painting composition. Thus his illustrations not only preserve the Chinese classical charm but also cater to Western readers’ aesthetic demands. When talking of Dai’s line-drawing of A Dream of Red Mansions, Dr. Zhang discussed the line-drawings of the characters such as Wang Xifeng, Lin Daiyu, Yingchun, Second Sister You, etc., indicating that Dai sets his line drawings apart from the traditional Chinese ones since his drawings capture the characters’ expressions and bring out their personalities dramatically and vividly. Finally, Dr. Zhang offered her interpretations of several typical paintings selected from the New Paintings of A Dream of Red Mansions by Dai Dunbang, explaining that Dai had then formed his own unique painting style in the aspects of color, style, image and expression of the figures in these paintings. This version is regarded as Dai’s magnum opus.
In the last part of the lecture, Dr. Zhang answered questions raised by teachers and students regarding the recognition of the two translation versions of A Dream of Red Mansions respectively by Old?ich Král and Marina ?arnogurská and their acceptability among the general readers, as well as issues about foreign languages learning and translation studies. The sharing of her Chinese learning experience brought the curtain down on the interactive lecture.
The success of the lecture is exemplary of SFL’s close association with European academic circle in the research on multi-language translation of and overseas studies on A Dream of Red Mansions, and also showcases SFL’s pioneering strides in response to the internationalization strategy of Southwest Jiaotong University.