But Mr. Xu Yuanchong met difficulties head-on.

Xu Yuanchong and Francois Cheng in Rome in 1950

Xu Yuanchong at Lifetime Achievement Awarding Ceremony of Translation Culture

Xu Yuanchong and his Wife Talked with Zhu Guangya, Zhu’s wife and Yang Zhenning

Kitchen Cabinet Member Postcard Sent from Barack H. Obama, American President

Xu Yuanchong and his Teachers and Friends

Xu Yuanchong Won Lifetime Achievement Award of Translation Culture

Everyone knows that “Poetry is what something easy to be lost in its translation”, but Mr. Xu Yuanchong devoted more than half of his life to translating poetry, Chinese classic poetry in particular. In western culture, translation is comparatively speaking easy, due to 90% equation between the languages of English, French, German, etc. However, only 40 to 50 percent equation can be found between Chinese and western words. The gap of difference between Chinese and western poetry is even bigger, translation is more difficult. Mr. Zhu Guangqian said in his article “Comparison on the sentiments in Chinese and western poetry”: “Generally speaking, western poetry is straight forward. Chinese poetry is more tactful and metaphorical. Western poetry is more profound. Chinese poetry is more subtle. Western poetry is more elaborate, Chinese poetry is terse.” To translate Chinese classic poetry is tantamount to challenging the Everest of translation.

On the basis of decades of translation practices, Mr. Xu Yuanchong established his “theory of literature translation for Chinese school of translators.” He said that China is the country which has published the greatest number of translated books in the world. In China there are a lot of books translated from foreign languages into Chinese, and vice versa. This is rare in other countries. There are no foreigners in the world who published any works which were translated from Chinese into English or English into Chinese. It shows the fact that the level of translation in China is higher than that of other countries. Theory comes from practice, without translation practices, it is impossible to establish the theory of mutual translations between Chinese and English languages. Therefore, the highest level of translation theory at present in the world is the theory that solved the mutual translation questions between Chinese and English or between Chinese and western languages. Many people said that Chinese translation is not as good as that of the west. They even use western theory in their translation. In fact, western translation theory could not reach the level of Chinese translation theory. Now the Peking University wants to build itself into a first class university in the world. But first it should know what subjects it has have reached the first class level of the world. I dare say that Chinese translation has reached the first class level of the world.