Edward Seidensticker

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Edward George Seidensticker (February 11, 1921 – August 26, 2007) was a noted scholar and translator of Japanese literature. He was particularly known for his faithful English version of The Tale of Genji (1976), which is counted among the preferred modern translations.[1] He is also well known for his landmark translations of Yasunari Kawabata, which led to Kawabata's winning the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1968.[2]

Contents

[edit] Translator as a counterfeiter

Seidensticker has been sometimes described as "the best translator of Japanese that has ever lived;" and yet, he admitted that sometimes translation is a nearly impossible task. It becomes not only a matter of words, but also of rhythm. In a 2006 interview, he tried to explain by pointing to a well-known phrase in English -- the line at the end of Shakespeare's Hamlet: "Good night, sweet Prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."

"It is an utterly simple line and I think it is a very, very beautiful line. It contains 15 syllables in English. I have looked at all the main translations into Japanese and they all contain at least three times that number of syllables. It takes longer to say something in Japanese than it does in English, and so the rhythm must be different. I always liken the translator to a counterfeiter … his task is to imitate the original down to the last detail."[3]

The introduction to Seidenstricker's translation of The Master of Go explains: "Go is simple in its fundamentals and infinitely complex in the execution of them;" and the same dynamic applies to good writing and to great translation. On of the characters in Kawabata's master-work observes: "When a law is made, the cunning that finds loopholes goes to work. One cannot deny that there is a certain slyness among younger players, a slyness which, when the rules are written to prevent slyness, makes use of the rules themselves" -- ditto, the sly translation strategy of Seidenstricker at work and at play.[4]

Seidensticker received the National Book Award for Translation in 1971 for his translation of Kawabata's The Sound of the Mountain. He also translated The Decay of the Angel, the last volume of Yukio Mishima's Sea of Fertility tetralogy, and several of Mishima's stories. Seidensticker translated Jun'ichirō Tanizaki's The Makioka Sisters and Some Prefer Nettles and authored important criticism on Tanizaki's place in 20th century Japanese literature. The New York Times obituary allowed the great translator to speak for himself:

During his years in Japan Mr. Seidensticker became friends with many of the writers he translated, though the friendships were sometimes tested during the delicate diplomatic dance that is central to the translator’s art. As Mr. Seidensticker recalled in “Tokyo Central,” some writers required more dancing than others:
“Tanizaki wrote clear, rational sentences,” Mr. Seidensticker wrote. “I do not, certainly, wish to suggest that I disapprove of such sentences; but translating them is not very interesting. There was little I felt inclined to ask Tanizaki about.”
Not so with Kawabata. “Do you not, my esteemed master, find this a rather impenetrable passage?” Mr. Seidensticker recalled asking him, ever so gently, during the translation of “Snow Country.”
“He would dutifully scrutinize the passage, and answer: ‘Yes,’ ” Mr. Seidensticker wrote. “Nothing more.”[5]

The last work he supervised translating into English was You Were Born for a Reason on Japanese Buddhism.[6]

[edit] Japanologist

He also wrote widely on Japan, including a two-volume history of Tokyo, Low City, High City: Tokyo from Edo to the Earthquake (1983); Kafu the Scribbler (1965); and Tokyo Rising: The City Since the Great Earthquake (1990).

Born in Castle Rock, Colorado, he didn't have to travel far in 1942 to study Japanese language at Boulder, where he became one of those "Boulder Boys" like colleague Donald Richie. He studied Japanese literature at Harvard University and the University of Tokyo. He taught at Sophia University in Tokyo, at Stanford University (1962-1966), the University of Michigan (1966-1977), and Columbia (1977-1985) until his retirement in 1985. In his academic career, he taught students, of course; but he is also credited with being a teacher for his peers. From Seidenstricker and others, Richie learned alternative ways of thinking. In an 2004 interview, Richie explained:

"It didn’t occur to me that there were things beside linear, rational, Socratic thought. In the West, it is an insult is to say, "But that’s illogical!' Here, if you want to devastate a person, tell him he’s ronri-teki -– too logical. One of the main ways of communication in Japan is through associative thought. In Japan, something that is too logical is stiff, unnatural, stilted."[7]

Seidenstricker learned how not to be ronri-teki.

He published his autobiographical observations in Tokyo Central: A Memoir in 2001. A biography and bibliography are included in a commemorative festschrift created by those whose lives he affected, New Leaves: Studies and Translations of Japanese Literature in Honor of Edward Seidensticker (1993).

After retirement, he divided his time between Honolulu and Tokyo. His last hospitalization was caused by cranial injuries sustained during a walk along Ueno Park's Shinobazu Pond, very near his home. Following four months in a coma, he died at age 86. He lived and he died in Tokyo, in what he described as "the world's most consistently interesting city."[8]

[edit] Honors

[edit] Selected works

Author

  • __________. (1983). Watakushi no Tokyo.
  • __________. (1977). Genji Days.
  • __________. (1965). Kafu the Scribbler: The Life and Writings of Nagai Kafu, 1879-1959.
  • __________. (1994). Very Few People Come This Way: Lyrical Episodes from the Year of the Rabbit.
  • __________. (1979). This Country Japan.
  • __________. (____). Gossamer Years: The Diary of a Noblewoman of Heian Japan
  • __________. (____). The Izu Dancer & Other Stories
  • __________. (2006). The Snake That Bowed.
  • __________. (1961). Japan.

Translator

  • Kawabata Yasunari. (1956; revision 1989). Snow Country
  • __________. (1969). House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories.
  • __________. (1959). Thousand Cranes
  • __________. (1970). The Sound of the Mountain
  • __________. (1972). The Master of Go.

Broken Blossoms By V.S. Pritchett The Tale of Genji

  • Tanizaki Junichiro. (1955). Some Prefer Nettles.
  • __________. (1957). The Makioka Sisters
  • __________. (____). In Praise of Shadows

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "The tale of Murasaki Shikibu," The Economist (London). December 23, 1999.
  2. ^ Associated Press. "Leading translator of Japanese literature, Edward Seidensticker, dies in Tokyo," International Herald Tribune (Asia Pacific). August 27, 2007.
  3. ^ Cameron, Deborah. "Saying goodnight to Shakespeare's sweet Prince in Japanese could take until the morning," Sydney Morning Herald. June 3, 2006.
  4. ^ Shriver, Lionel. "The wisdom of stones," Telegraph (London). September 3, 2006.
  5. ^ * Fox, Maragit. "Edward Seidensticker, Translator, Is Dead at 86," New York Times. August 31, 2007.
  6. ^ Seidensticker's last work, supevising translation of a book
  7. ^ "Donald Richie Ttells His Fifty-Year 'Tokyo Story,'" Japan Foundation Newsletter (Tokyo). Vol 30, No. 1 (October/November 2004), p. 2.
  8. ^ Parry, Lloyd. "Tokyo: The city that's stranger than fiction," Independent (London) June 25, 2000.
  9. ^ Japan Foundation Award, 1984
  10. ^ Kirkup, James. "Obituary: Fumio Niwa," Independent (London). April 28, 2005.

[edit] References