典籍翻译专刊｜倪豪士：走进历史长河——我与《史记》翻译

[编者按]

♢ 本文刊于《翻译界》2020年第2期（总第10期）。本文版权归《翻译界》所有，转载时请注明出处。

♢ 《翻译界》由北京外国语大学英语学院编辑，外语教学与研究出版社出版。作为学术性翻译研究期刊，本刊将发表与翻译现象相关的原创性研究，包括翻译理论与实证研究，国外有影响的翻译理论与研究方法的论文译稿。同时，本刊还关注口笔译教学研究，重视产、学、研三者结合，以行业现状引导翻译教学与研究，以翻译研究促进语言行业的成长。编辑部热诚欢迎优秀来稿。在线投稿平台：http://fyij.cbpt.cnki.net。

♢ 点击文末链接，可获取全文。

作者简介

William H. NIENHAUSER, Jr. (倪豪士) majored in Chinese literature at Indiana University and Bonn University receiving his PhD in 1973 under Professor Liu Wuji 柳无忌. That year Nienhauser became Assistant Professor of East Asian Literature (University of Wisconsin). He has been Halls-Bascom Chair Professor of Chinese Literature since 1995. His publications include Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature and eight volumes of translations from the Shiji (The Grand Scribe’s Records) and he was a founding editor of Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews (CLEAR). In 2003 he was awarded a Forschungspreis (Research Prize) for lifetime achievement from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. 

Email: [e-mail]

Abstract

In the beginning was the text. And the text was called Taishigong ji 太史公记 or Taishigong shu 太史公书. There  are various understandings of Taishigong 太史公, but any translated title shows that the shi 史 in Shiji is short for official title not for “history” or even “historian”. Thus, translations such as Records of History, Historical Records, Records of the Scribe, or even Records of the Historian are inaccurate. While our rendering of the Grand Scribe’s Records may still be open to discussion, the precondition of that discussion is to recognize the “Shi” as both an abbreviation and address for Taishigong. I have often been asked to describe the Shiji in a few words. Some of my attempts include “a national narrative of early China” or “a combination of the Old Testament and Herodotus”. But they both fall short of Wang Chong’s 王充 (27-97) metaphoric depiction, “those books written in the Han Dynasty were numerous: Sima Qian is the Yellow River and Yang Xiong the Han River, the remainder are the Jing  and Wei rivers” 汉作书者多，司马子长、杨子云，河、汉也，其余泾、渭也. Although I am not a good swimmer, in what follows, I shall try to explain how I swam in Sima Qian’s river.

Keywords: Sima Qian; Shiji; translation; Chinese; history

摘要

《史记》是中国第一部纪传体通史，最初称为《太史公记》或《太史公书》。“太史公”有多种解释，但各种译名都表明《史记》中的“史”是“太史公”的简称，而不是“历史”，更不是“史学家”。因此，诸如Records of History、Historical Records、Records of the Scribe、Records of the Historian等英文译名都是不准确的。我们提出的Grand Scribe’s Records这一译法表明《史记》中的“史”是“太史公”的简称。经常有人让我用几句话介绍《史记》，我给出的回答包括“早期中国的国家叙事”以及“集《旧约》和希罗多德史学著作为一体的一本书”，不过王充（27—97）所作的隐喻性描述更为贴切，“汉作书者多，司马子长、杨子云，河、汉也，其余泾、渭也”。尽管本人不擅游泳，在本文中我阐述了自己是如何跋涉于司马迁的历史长河的。 

关键词：司马迁；《史记》；翻译；汉语；历史

1. Early Studies

My earliest contact with China and its people came when I read Thirty Seconds over Tokyo, one of the Landmark Books, as a child. The descriptions of how Chinese ordinary people aided the pilots who parachuted out of their planes in Shandong after this famous first air raid on the Japanese capital were fascinating. After a semester at Fenn College (now Cleveland State University) studying engineering, I realized I did not want to become an engineer, much to the dismay of my father (but not my professors). After talking to U.S. Army recruiters (I had just turned 18 at the time), they convinced me that I should become a spy. So I enlisted in January 1962, and spent two months in basic infantry training. Towards the end of that period, I took an examination that qualified me for the Army Language School in Monterey, California. My hope was to study Russian, but the army advisors told me to put down Chinese as my first choice and Russian as my second, then change back to Russian when I arrived at the school. In my naïveté, I followed their advice. Upon arrival, I found that the U.S. Army does not entertain such changes, so along with eight other enlisted men I found myself studying Chinese. We had six hours of class every day, five days a week, and a great deal of homework. For each class hour, a different native Chinese teacher appeared. After only a few weeks I realized that these teachers had an involvement with their students beyond anything I had experienced. Gradually, I became convinced that selecting Chinese as my choice was preordained. And, of course, I did not become a spy. My fellow classmates at the Army Languages School all had college experience and their influence and guidance helped me to decide to leave the army at the end of my three-year enlistment and enroll at Indiana University.I knew little about the Chinese program at Indiana, only that Bloomington was not too far from my home in northeastern Ohio, and that the university would give me twenty-six credits for the work I had done at the Army Language School. I began class in the spring of 1965 and took Y. J. Chih’s (1917-2016) fourth-year Chinese class which focused on reading modern political documents and Chinese newspapers. By the spring of 1966, after summer school in 1965, I got my BA summa cum laude, and began graduate study, intending to work on one of the late-Qing novelists (Wu Woyao 吴沃尧 was my first choice). Over the next few years, I finished eight semesters of Japanese, and all the offered courses on Chinese literature and history. Although my advisors were Irving Yucheng Lo 罗郁正 (1922-2005) for the MA and Wu-chi Liu 柳无忌 (1907-2002) for the PhD, Friedrich Bischoff was also a tremendous influence. It was from him that I became interested in the fu genre. I wrote my MA thesis on the “Meiren” 美人 and “Changmen” 长门 fu attributed to Sima Xiangru 司马相如 (179-117 BC). After two years of graduate school in Bloomington, I was skeptical about going on with my studies. Professor Bischoff suggested going to Germany where there was no tuition, and I would be able to think more about my future. I had an NDEA Title IV three-year fellowship at the time, so my wife and I decided to follow Bischoff’s advice. Admitted to the University of Bonn, I studied there for a year under Peter Olbricht, learning about Tang texts (especially Liu Zongyuan 柳宗元, 773-819) and German academic life. Then, I returned to Bloomington to resume study at Indiana University in the fall of 1969. Following up on my earlier research, I began to read more about Han Dynasty literature, eventually writing my dissertation on “Literary and Historical Aspects of the Xijing zaji 西京杂记 (Miscellaneous Records of the Western Capital)” which I finished in the fall of 1972. At the same time, I worked with Professor Liu and fellow students on a biographical study of Liu Zongyuan for the Twayne World Author Series (published in 1973). In Liu Zongyuan’s writings, especially the allegorical biographies, I recognized the strong influence of Sima Qian’s style and structure. I began looking for a teaching position in 1971, but found none. Then, after teaching German at Indiana University as Visiting Assistant Professor for a year, I came to the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1973 where I have been teaching ever since.全文未完，读者可点击下方链接，获取全文。

美编：张飞宇

审校：蒋剑峰