tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Mar 20 12:03:21 2003
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Re: Tao Te Ching Chp. 25
- From: "Agnieszka Solska" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Tao Te Ching Chp. 25
- Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2003 18:12:51 +0000
ja' ghunchu'wI':
>>'u'Daq Dun loSvam'e'.
>>DunwI' je ghaH nuv'e'.
>>These four are great in the universe
>>and mankind is one of them.
>
>...'ej wa' DunwI' 'oH nuv'e'.
>
>I'm not getting "mankind" out of nuv, but I don't really have a better
>idea. Perhaps something with {Segh}? The invented term *{nuvtay'} comes to
>mind strongly enough that I'll mention it. though I won't promote it.
Actually, there is no reason to change the Klingon version: {nuv} or {ghot}
are good translations of the Chinese "ren". My problem is finding the
English equivalent that will work here.
Because Chinese and Klingon nouns are not marked for gender, in the English
vesion I tend to use sex-neutral forms, such as "they", "those who... " or
"people" rather than "he" or "man". Here I could easily translate the
Chinese "ren" as "people" or "humans" except that
"and people/humans are one of them"
seems to make for an awkward line. Still, I might be wrong – I can't really
trust my intuitions about what sounds right in English. If you think this
reads fine, I'll modify the English version.
Having said this, the whole problem could be bypassed if I chose to go by
those versions of Tao Te Ching which do not speak here of "ren" at all.
Instead they use "wang" (king):
These four are great in the universe
and the king is one of them
These versions mention "ren" later in the line that says "People follow the
rules of the earth", which leads some scholars to speculate that "wang" is a
copyist error. Maybe it is, maybe it's not, whatever I do I'll have to stick
to one version anyway.
'ISqu'
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