DICKENS IN CHINESE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 259, 25 July 1908, Page 12

DICKENS IN CHINESE.

w iii va A. correspondent of tho "Daily News," writing on' "pidgin-English" recently, suggested that" this "absurd distortion" of the languago might with the growing demand in phin'a',.f<)'r; , Eriglish novels. Tho " News" ;is ,J , doubtful on the point. Discussing . the appetite for English works, it remarks:— How Dickens can possibly be put into a Qhinese„ v dr_ess y/e cannot conceive—Sam Wel-■leri"-Mrs.-6ampi' aiid-Diok Swiveller, 'wo imagine, cannot but lose something by translation for the' Celestial reador —but the fact is undoubtedly so. v It- is also unfortunately tho case that much of the translating of English and other European novels;-for the .Chinosoi public.' is-very badly and ignorantly ::d6n6:'.:.:WoVh'avo, 'moreovor, a- 1 suspicion that g'rgat.;novels are road for the -sake "of ; their supremely ludicrous character ill Chlnoso eyos. - As'an able observer on the spiit has'written. s , " It, must bo : borne in mind that our romantiej.atid sentimental treatment' of the rolationsvof -tho. sexes, is a thing so foreign to Oriental ethics'"that-the horo of the ordinary European novel appears to the Chinese mind as a person of perverted moral sense and doubtful-sanity. For this reason one < appreciates tho fact that translations Of Dumas and Dickons impress the Chinese reader less than they amaze him, and that detective stories and tales of adventure command a more sympathetic audipneo. To the Celestial mind the love affairs of David Copperfield can only detract from the human interest of that hero; a Chinoso novelist would have solved his difficulties, and avoided much unnecessary pathos, by making' him woo and marry Dora and Agnes simultaneously."

It ik at least possible that our novels amuse as much as they amaze. From 200 to'3oo of such translations are on sale, and steadily circulating, in China; and of thom tho most popular is "La Dame aux Camelias." .■■i Others that -sell freely aro Robinson Crusoe," .Ir.vih'g's -." Sketch'; - ,'Book;" " Uncle Tom's Cabin," " Ivahhoe," " Dawn," '" The Talis- ' man,'"..'.'.'Los;Mis'erables," "Manon. Lescaut," ,thc;; Nights,", and .."Sherlock i;Holmes." ;';;The ; selectibn mado by tho trans- ! of a - ; catholic taste. To' urit'suggfe'ts''th'e delirium of' desultoriness.