《中式英语》登上百老汇

David Henry Hwang's entertaining new play, Chinglish , which has just opened on Broadway, is about what is lost and what gets inflated in translation. It begins with a British consultant giving the main character, American businessman Daniel Cavanaugh, some advice so he can get around the widespread problem of poor interpreting: "When doing business in China, always bring your own translator."

剧作家黄哲伦(David Henry Hwang)的喜剧新作《中式英语》(Chinglish)最近在百老汇(Broadway)上演，该剧讲述的是翻译中失去和被夸大的东西。该剧一开场，一名英国顾问给剧中主人公美国商人丹尼尔．卡瓦诺(Daniel Cavanaugh)提供了一些建议，这样他就能避开普遍存在的蹩脚翻译问题：“在中国经商，要永远带着自己的翻译。”

Daniel has come to Guiyang, the small provincial capital of Guizhou, to sell English signage to the city for its fancy new arts centre. Ever since French architect Paul Andreu built a titanium and glass fantasy of a cultural centre above an artificial lake in Beijing ahead of the 2008 Olympics, every provincial capital in China wants one.

丹尼尔来到贵州省会贵阳，向该市新建的漂亮的艺术中心推销英语指示牌。自从2008年北京奥运会前法国建筑师保罗?安德烈(Paul Andreu)在北京一个人工湖上建造了一座钛金属和玻璃混合结构的、充满梦幻色彩的文化中心以来，中国每个省会城市都希望拥有一座类似的建筑。

On a trip to China in 2005, Hwang, whose previous works include the award-winning 1988 play M Butterfly, visited just such an arts centre in Shanghai. It featured sleek German design and the best Italian marble, but also the badly translated signage that is ubiquitous in China. The rest room for the disabled had a sign reading: "Deformed Man's Toilet."

2005年，当黄哲伦来到中国时，他就在上海参观了一个这样的艺术中心。黄哲伦之前的作品包括1988年上演的获奖剧作《蝴蝶君》(M Butterfly)。这个艺术中心运用德国的时尚设计，采用来自意大利上好的大理石，但标牌的翻译很烂，而这在中国是普遍的现象。残疾人洗手间的标牌是这样写的：“畸形人厕所。”

As the comedy unfolds, however, one realises that language is among the least of the problems. The misperceptions are more fundamental. When Daniel pitches for a contract to the cultural minister of the province, the translator describes his home town, Cleveland, as close to Chicago, and the minister takes the conversation in unexpected directions. He loves Chicago, he says, especially its steakhouses. Daniel's sales pitch is thrown off course, but he replies that the steak chain Smith & Wollensky is his second home. "A steak restaurant, where he sometimes lives," explains the translator.

然而，随着这部喜剧的展开，人们意识到，语言是最不重要的问题之一。误解是更根本性的问题。当丹尼尔力求与该省文化局长达成一份协议时，翻译描述了他的家乡克利夫兰，离芝加哥很近，于是文化局长把谈话带到了意料之外的方向。他说，他喜欢芝加哥，特别是那里的牛排餐厅。丹尼尔的销售说辞被带离了轨道，但他回答，连锁牛排餐厅Smith & Wollensky是他的第二个家。翻译解释说：“有时他会住在这家牛排餐厅。”

Poor translation cuts both ways as Daniel discovers when the minister's assistant looks at the website for his company, Ohio Signage, and ridicules the poor Chinese on the website, which Daniel had asked a languages student to write.

蹩脚的翻译对双方都有影响。这位局长的助手在浏览丹尼尔的公司Ohio Signage的网站时，就对网站上糟糕的中文大加嘲笑，而丹尼尔是让一个学语言的学生来写这段文字的。

When American writer Deborah Fallows, author of Dreaming in Chinese, about the difficulties of learning Mandarin, gave a reading in Beijing last year, a young Chinese woman in the audience protested vociferously at the indignities of learning English grammar if it is your second language.

当《梦游中文》(Dreaming in Chinese)一书的作者、美国作家黛博拉．法罗斯(Deborah Fallows)去年在北京宣传她的新书时，针对书中对于作为第二语言学习英语语法的蔑视，听众中有一位年轻中国女子提出强烈抗议。该书讲述的是学习中文普通话的困难。