Lost in translation for more than 40 years

Lin Yutang is one of the best-known writers and translators in modern China.[Photo/China Daily]

An unpublished English translation of the Chinese classic novel Dream of the Red Chamber by the writer and translator Lin Yutang (1895-1976) has been uncovered in Japan, Nankai University in Tianjin recently announced.

The novel, written by Cao Xueqin in the 18th century, is widely considered the pinnacle of Chinese fiction.

Two complete English versions were published in the 1970s－one by David Hawkes, a British Sinologist, with the title The Story of the Red Stone, and another by Yang Xianyi and his wife, Gladys Yang, titled A Dream of Red Mansions.

There has long been talk that Lin had also translated the book.

The work was finally uncovered last year by Song Dan, then a PhD candidate at Nankai University doing her thesis on Japanese translation of the novel at Waseda University in Tokyo.

Song noticed that Ryoichi Sato, a Japanese translator, had noted in his book that he was translating from Lin's English version of the novel, which Lin sent him in 1973.

She then tracked down relatives of the late translator, who was the former head of the Japanese Translators Association, and they told her they had donated the manuscript of Lin's translation to a local library.

Song read the original work in the library and took photos. But she could not take the work out of the library or reveal its name at the time, at the request of Sato's relatives, Song says.