Great Works I: Remixing Memory

While reading the various versions of “The Song of Ch’ang Kan” there were many apparent differences but most seemed to say the same story. I felt that some poems were a lot more difficult to read then others, the hardest one being “That Parting at Ch’ang Kan” by W.J.B. Fletcher because of the thick accent he tried implementing. That was for sure my least favorite because of the difficulty I had in understanding the different points he was trying to get across. Some of the lines also become clearer as I had read the different poems and heard the different interpreters’ versions of the same line. One example is the 3rd line of Ezra Pound’s translation “You came by on bamboo stilts, playing horse” when I read this I was confused because of vague speech, and I didn’t understand what point she was trying to get across until I read the other versions where it was much more clear. Some examples of the other simpler to understand versions include “ When you, my Lover, came riding on a bamboo horse” by Witter Bynner and “You would come, riding on your bamboo horse” by Shigeyoshi Obata. Another clear distinction between the different poems is the varying amounts of affection accounted for by the author. In Shigeyoshi Obata’s translation he doesn’t have many descriptions for moments of love, heartbreak, or happiness except for one instance in his 13th line; but then in Witter Bynner’s translation he often mentions these feelings.

The mentioning of these feelings is why “A Song of Ch’and Kan” by Bynner was my favorite. Witter mentions the river merchant as the wife’s “lover” in line 3, as both of them being happy-hearted in line 6, and then in line 25 mentions the wife’s heart as breaking. The differences are interesting because of how the poem sounds less solemn and rigid and adds life to the poem. It makes it sound more like an interesting love story.