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张悉妮：《童言无忌三国志中英文对译本》第一回英文本
《童言无忌三国志中英文对译本》第一回英文本已出笼——英文助理请进！
最近，北京出版社邀我出《童言无忌三国志中英文对译本》，我正式邀请了我的好朋友当我的英文助理，其中包括——李莱茵[中]、诸葛尚[中]、枫丹高路[美]、王极乐鸟 [奥克兰]、铁血冯习[奥]、黑旋风[新加坡]、姜维[美]、月天心[美]……还有一些朋友，请你们自己加在上面，帮助我对译我的《童言无忌三国志》，现在我已逐一发出邀请！
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现在，我的第一位英文助理已完成了一篇译文，请各位欣赏、评析：
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chapter 1: clamorous, after you sing i will get on stage, all make cloth for others
---prelude
the house with an old mulberry tree must have a king
liu bei’s uncle
when liu bei was five, he sit under the old mulberry tree in the garden to play the emperor, he tell his friends to knee in front of him to be his ministers. he also says: “i am the emperor; you all have to knee in front of me.” at the end, he got spanked by his mom.
liu bei’s mother is a non-educated single mom, she is afraid liu bei become a rebel when he grow up.
when i was little, i like to play the emperor also; i use the sheet as the emperor’s robe, and use the bed as my territory. i consider the king size bed is big enough to be a country. i use all my toys to be the ministers including my white teddy bear. however, my mom just laughing when she sees that and patted gently on my big head and say: “silly baby, you head was too big caused me had a hard time in labor.” i was think afterwards, the reason my mom didn’t spank me is mainly because she is not a single mom or maybe she has a good husband. so i decided to be like mom, when i grow up i will find a good husband too and never spank my kids -- to be a good mom.
i heard it is against the law if you spank kids in united states, you will go to jail and give up the kid’s custody. this is no joke, you can’t even do guasha(1) , but that is some one else’s business.
but liu bei is not afraid of spanked by him mom, still do what ever he wants.
finally, his uncle saw his ambition to be a emperor and his uncle think he has the look of the emperor, not a normal kid. his uncle tells his mom to educate him that starts liu bei’s study life. it seems like that if you want to be like liu bei, and don’t have dad, at least need a uncle who be able to tell good from bad. there has to be a decent man in a family. but liu bei doesn’t like to study, he always stare blankly in class. his teacher is lu zhi who is very straightforward and good-natured. he later becomes the general of assault. lu zhi is a very strict teacher, but he is careless sometime. one time, lu zhi tells liu bei to read the book but he falls to sleep. so liu bei stealthily takes out a zhongzhi form his desk and start eating. then lu zhi wake up, the only thing liu bei can do is stay there and giggle.
this thing reminds me when i was staring blankly in kindergarten; the swiss candy my mom bought me got confiscated by the teacher. i was hopping that the teacher will give the candy back next period but who knows the teacher gave the candy to her son. at that time i was thinking: the teacher must be a single mom and must be very poor.
they say that all the kids who has the potential to be a emperor don’t like to study when they are young. most of them like to fight with other people. when cao meng de was little, he likes to drink a lot. one time he was drunk and got beat up by his dad. then his dad gave him a wallet and kick him out the house. cao cao was very happy and took the money left the house. he thinks: “now i am free and has money”. his dad was so mad and yelled: “i don’t have you as a son! you don’t even think about walking into this house!” but his dad is just a simple and honest farmer; he never sees the trick of his unruly son. cao cao went out and spent all his money and got drunk. cao cao craw back into the house and fall on the floor. his dad was furious and yelled at him: “i told you not to come back.” cao cao look at his dad and say: “you only told me not to walk into the house, so i craw back in the house.” his dad can only shake his head and has nothing to say. cao cao is very smart and cunning. poor dad!
no wonder when zhang fei was laughing so hard after he heard cao cao’s story. he says to caocao: “man you are smart, hahaha…” guan yu turn around and say: “ you are such a goof ball! you can’t tell the good from the bad?” zhang fei is not convinced: “brother, you don’t know humor, i think that is pretty funny, what’s wrong with me lauging?”
out of all the leader in the three kingdom era, only sun quan is decent guy. he come from a royal family, the second son of the tiger of the jian dong – sun jian. he is the most honest and most refined emperor in the three kingdom era. his brother, sun ce, taught him etiquette, martial arts but his brother died when he was 26. sun quan took over the throne when he was 19. he didn’t die until he is 72, a total of 52 years of emperor life. sun quan can be called as a true emperor, very good destiny. but he is not the first emperor of wu, otherwise he will be a bad egg too. but bad egg never has good ending. even all cao cao’s sons are all smart and gifted but they still lost their kingdom to his dad’s strategist, si ma yi’s son. liu bei’s son, a dou, end up “here is happy, i don’t miss shu!” now days people call him a champion of idiot.
so i believe all the territory is conquered on the horse back. there is no need book knowledge, no need dr degree. bravery plus wisdom plus power is enough. look at little bush and ragan, one is a alcoholic and the other is a actor. clinton is also known as a play boy world wide. if you are brave enough to get on the back of a horse (now days is car, whole lot better than the old time horse) and come out show yourself, that will be enough. even you are not the president; all you have to do is act like one. if you everyone think you are a good actor then you just hit the jack pot. once to be a president, got to fight some one: it doesn’t matter is it is south america, north america, or even iraq. but always remember to leave some thing for the next president to fight.
i heard liu bei’s ancestors liu bang, his horse riding skill and his martial arts is terrible, but he always look down on the people who study. he always compares the scholar’s had to urine pot. he will not allow confucian’s scholar to be a officer. but there is a poor scholar who will not give up, his name is jia sheng. he is a expert in negotiation, liu bang had no choice other than hire him. jia sheng performs exceptionally meritorious services after that. but he is still just a worker; he went to the qi territory and try to convince the qi lord to an alliance, but he failed and cooked alive by the qi lord. liu bang did finally conquered qi but jia sheng has lost his life. from that story you can see the scholars only know to work for other people, they are not like the bosses which has control over their destiny. there is a american writer wrote a book called “poor dad, rich dad”. that book is sold all over the world, very popular. i had a chance to read it; the book is all about cao cao, liu bei, and sun quan. it never mentioned a single american story, so i guess liu bang is the rich dad’s ancestor. i admire the chinese culture even more.
they say in the chinese history, we focus more on the literature and less on the science, the great four invention can’t compare to the emperor’s look. today, they call this “management”, “mba”, or something like that. look at today’s china, all the student at lease needs a “see turtle” to find a high salary job. but there is a exception on chairman mao, he only had a high school education but he defeated the “east sea turtle” jiang kai shek and “west sea turtle” song mei ling. song mei ling is 106 and still alive. her son even died before her. she has witnessed a whole century’s history.
out the topic, my teacher is such a looser; all he thinks about is if he should exchange his soul with the devil. he always tells us the benefit of studying hard; tell us that knowledge will change your destiny. but he never tells us that “there is gold in the book, there is pretty girl in the book.” he is afraid of people say he is greedy and pervert. i thought about what the teacher said and it make some sense. now days the diploma has decreased in value, my teacher use to take drugs to keep him high so he can study, get a degree. now, he is still just poor teacher. haha… cao cao, liu bei will be laughing so hard at him. teachers always be bloated with pride in front of others, be self-abased behind others, lie in front the students, and sigh in despair in front their wives. there is a new sub division by the school, called “the best”. not to say the price of the house, just the monthly service charge will be more than the teacher’s monthly salary. the teacher facing a full class of students who live in “the best” has nothing to day. he went to the bar after school, smoking, drinking, losing sleep, write poem… the next day had a terrible breath. the teacher is also trying to get on the internet, publish some paper. but his computer skill is not as good as the students, his writing skill is not as good as students, his speech is not as smooth as the students. so the only thing he can do is give up. he convinces his wife to be a insurance agent, and he become a after school tutor. some teach will sell some class notes, key chain, or coke cola. some teacher will change their students’ paper, make them worthless. some tell their students to eat crap. sigh, teachers really have a bad day. bad people, i only can suffer. what kind teacher is that!
the paper i wrote is based on my belief:”truth, useful, interesting.” but my teacher has to change and delete the contents, made the paper unreadable.
one time the teacher asks us to rewrite some sentence in book called “the old story on the south side of the city”. one sentence was “standing in front of the school’s gate in a winter’s dawn, wearing a glove with all five fingers outside, eating a warm sweet potato; standing in front of the school in a summer’s dawn, holding a fragrant plantain lily and give to the lovely teacher.” the teacher asks us to change the sweet potato to some other food and the lily to some other flower. one student changes the sweet potato to “pickled lettuce” and the flower to “dog tail grass”. he got two points on the paper. he went to the teacher and complains about the grade:”the only plants in front our school is the dog grass.” i am the only one expressed my true feeling. this is what i wrote: “in a winter’s dawn, i stand in front of school, i am very angry, why the school door is still locked? so cold; in a summer’s dawn, i stand in front of school, i am very angry, why the school door is still locked? so hot; i didn’t have time to eat breakfast, i am so hungry and almost passed out.” i guess the teacher hated my paper, there were two big red x’s when i got it back. i got zero on that paper. i still think you can’t just copy the sentence and change a few things. you have to understand the means of those sentences. of course, if you create new sentence by yourself is even better.
sigh, who made me admire this guy so much. he said: “i am going to something huge that no one did before and there will be no one can do it after me. i am going to bring out one’s true face and show to everyone in the world. this person is me. only i can do this. i know myself the best and i understand other people too. i am different ever since i was born; i believe deeply that you will not find a second person like me. although i am not better than others, at least i am different than other people. the nature created me, and then it broke the mould, is that a good thing? you only can evaluate this after you read my book. ” he is the greatest independent thinker, politician, and educator --- lu suo. but after my teacher read my paper, he said:” this section must be deleted, it is too messy.” another time, i wrote in my paper:” beauty, please stop for a second!” my teacher got very angry and said: “how can beauty stop? it won’t run away! you should say ‘beauty, please wait a second.’” i told the teacher i was quoting from johann wolfgang, but my teacher said:” i don’t care who you quoting, it has to be changed. you have to listen to the teacher.” i think my teacher is trying to brain wash me. everyone has their own thoughts and they will not be the same. it can’t be changed so easily. other wise the world will be upside down.
one day the teacher tells us to collect some joke, so i got this one:
a bunch of teachers went to the market and bought 5 pound pork. later they found out that they been ripped off by the butcher, he only gave them 4.5 pound. all the teacher got very mad and went back to argue with the butcher. the chemistry teacher said to the butcher: ”how much ethanol did you drink today? did you read the balance correct? the pork is not volatile organic compound; it won’t evaporate 250 grams in a few minutes.” the butcher looks at the chemistry teacher and said: “i am just a butcher, don’t talk to me in those fancy words. i don’t give a crap.” the government teacher came up and says: “according to materialism theory, you gave us half pound pork less, this is called “existence”, we got some thing to say is called “mentality”. if you didn’t cheat us we won’t come back and argue with you. according to one divides into two theory, you cheat us is a bad spiritual concept. it shows you are a very selfish person. we are giving you some suggestions to help you correct your mistake. it is ok to make a mistake but you got to correct it… the butcher got very mad and said: “who can proof i cheated you?” the literature teacher come up and elegantly says: “i! you are the yellow leaf on the tree, i am the frosty autumn wind; you are a dark spot on the face, i am the clear mirror; you are a sneaky rat, i am a free chase camera. in the holy and solemn court, there is no need mediocre proof. conscience is the mighty judge. the customer is god…” the butcher grabbed literature teacher’s neck and holding a knife in the other hand and yelled: “i cut off you head and see what you have to say.” the math teacher was frightened: “oh no, if you touch the positive charge and negative charge you will be shocked. it is only five ounce pork, no big deal. you are a butcher and we are the teachers, we all work for the public. you are a positive number and we are a negative number, we are all rational number, let’s not do anything irrational.” the butcher through the literature teacher on the ground and say: “get out here, my fist is harder than your tongue.” the english teacher yelled: “oh! i love you! pig! thief...” they all came and help the literature teacher up. on the way back, the english teacher said: “i cursed him in english. what does he know? the knowledge is power.”
hum, so i wander if the butcher’s last life is that zhang fei. poor teachers met a soldier and can’t even reason with him. although i noted on the paper “this joke is not very healthy”, i still got lectured by my teacher: “bull @#$^, this is all bull @#$^, no more jokes for this class.” his mood didn’t get better until they published one of my papers in the magazine called the special section of the education. the part that gives me a migraine is the teacher always thinks the bad paper is the good paper; the good paper is the bad paper. he also wants us to copy the paper he thinks is good. the end results are all the essays go from bad to worse. the teacher will get mad and say: “this is crazy, is this is failure of the education?” this morning my teacher was yelling at us for half of hour. he was so angry that his hair all raised, he was also pounding the table, he must thought he is liu bei, cao cao, or sun quan or some big emperor. but all this i can’t write into my paper, otherwise the teacher will think i am a retard.
“all the students see their teachers as the disaster in their youth, the teachers see the student as a big burden, glad to through it away. both the teachers and the students hope this day come sooner. therefore, there is no friendship between the two. one is absent-minded and the other one refuses to obey. teaching is such a respectable career. in real life, if one wants to educate the other person, he has to be more knowledgeable than others. how can one give these kind of job to some one only think about money?”
we are not the lucky ones. all the developed countries are not using nationwide exams. 那本是官本位制度和计划经济下计划教育的或者极端的国家极权教育的产物，当教育成为产业，为生产所需，相信情况就会根本改变。(翻不过来)。
this does not relate to the three kingdoms much, but it does relate to my writing ideas.
anyway, still the person like liu bei, cao cao, and sun quan is the way to be, they are their own boss. just like the qing dynasty poet, zhao yi said: “there always some one famous in each era, they all have their summit time.” i heard a saying when i was little: “if you want to be a officer, you got to be the one that above all the other officers.” you got to be close to the people, make a party and make the party grow big. through a party even there is no reason, find a few guys to become sworn brothers, but you have to be the boss. have a lot people work for you, make a army and be like robin hood.
the rich dad say: “are you ready to let the kids to face the real word?”
the poor dad say: “all you need is a good degree, you still able to get a nice job and make good money.”
the rebel son of the rich dad say: “but i am weary with this kind of life.”
zhang fai said: “i don’t care; all i need is my big brother.” guan yu also said: “brother, how come we think the same? the sun the reddest, emperor’s uncle liu bei is next to skin, we always be aside of the big brother” that is how the three bosses in three kingdom divides the land to three, that is why chen shou wrote the book, luo guan zhong wrote the novel, zhang xi ni make a joke…
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