This is most likely a copyright violation. I follow these translations and I’ve seen no evidence that the publisher put it in the public domain.
Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
21–30 of 104 posts
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#22This is wonderful. Ursula K. Le Guin is a great thinker and I’d highly recommend her novels. I’ve read Ken Liu’s, who many here probably know at least from translating The Three Body Problem and Death’s End, Tao Te Ching and it was remarkably poetic. Excited to read another person’s interpretation.
Agreed! I really liked Ken Liu's translation of T3BP.
I don't speak any Chinese or Asian-based lingo for
that matter, but am a fan of the culture and rich
history. Some of us that don't know the lingo, have
issues with reading subtitled movies, for example,
can only enjoy the art via audio dubbing. Godzilla
Minus 1 comes to mind, as a good example of a movie
that generated some controversy when translated and
people claimed that it lost something in the translation.
I'm sure they were right, but I thoroughly enjoyed it
and was glad when it was dubbed into other languages.
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#23From the bottom: > This is a rendition, not a translation. I do not know any Chinese. I could approach the text at all only because Paul Carus, in his 1898 translation of the Tao Te Ching, printed the Chinese text with each character followed by a transliteration and a translation. My gratitude to him is unending.
I have a hard copy of that book.
She’s captured the poetry and beauty of the received text very well. (I’ve tried my own hand at a translation and read a few other translations).
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honestly, even if you know Chinese, it's very hard to translate Tao Te Ching into English. Hell, it's hard to translate it into Chinese. Even the first paragraph is controversial. For example this rendition says: > The name you can say > isn’t the real name. However, in a 5th century interpretation[0], it's more akin to: > The fame and wealth the mortals praise are not a natural state. (My extremely simplified paraph…
Interesting. Your comparison reminds me of something from Lacanian psychoanalysis: the idea that people often mistake themselves for the symbolic labels they occupy, their title for instance. Like a doctor who would praise himself for being a doctor, a president a president. From that perspective, both versions of the Tao Te Ching line point to the same thing: what can be named, praised, or socially recognized isn’t…
More generalized, any kind of symbol representing something is not the something. The social labelling is very accessible, true now and true then.
There’s a Zen koan about that (with Zen coming from Chang which came from a meeting of Buddhism and Taoism in China) — about the finger pointing to the moon, and how all but one student looked at the finger.
In a different example, there is the distinction of virtue signaling and virtue (the “Te” in “Tao Te Ching”)
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#25This is most likely a copyright violation. I follow these translations and I’ve seen no evidence that the publisher put it in the public domain.
I'm imagining a hoard of angry Taoists led by the ghost of Le Guin very upset that the wisdom was not paid for in accordance with the inscrutable decisions made by capitalist lawmakers.
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#26From the bottom: > This is a rendition, not a translation. I do not know any Chinese. I could approach the text at all only because Paul Carus, in his 1898 translation of the Tao Te Ching, printed the Chinese text with each character followed by a transliteration and a translation. My gratitude to him is unending.
Honestly, even if you know Chinese, it's very hard to translate Tao Te Ching into English. Hell, it's hard to translate it into Chinese. Even the first paragraph is controversial. For example this rendition says: > The name you can say > isn’t the real name. However, in a 5th century interpretation[0], it's more akin to: > The fame and wealth the mortals praise are not a natural state. (My extremely simplified paraph…
Thank you, this there is the first version I see that feels like it's got solid cultural context. I like Ursula's version and have read her books over the years, but for example when she write "mystery" in there I always felt she was dropping the ball a bit.
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#27I am just noticing how those ideas are present in Wizard of Earthsea.
Eastern thought had quite a moment in the sun in the 60’s and 70’s. All I can say is lead poisoning does terrible things to the mind over time.
Sounds similar to some of the historic criticisms neo-Confucian had about Taoism.
Are you familiar with the Western non-dual traditions?
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#28Ursula's notes really enrich the work. Fantastic ways to render insights in words.
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#29Love this version. I quoted the chapter about Leadership plenty of times at work.
`True leaders are hardly known to their followers.`
Re: Tao Te Ching – Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
#30I am just noticing how those ideas are present in Wizard of Earthsea.
UKLG deliberately wrote Earthsea in the guise of a Western high fantasy, but its philosophical core is the Tao Te Ching. It was set in the archipelagos similar to SW Asia, with similar ethnicity.
The producers who made the movie casted the crew ignoring UKLG though I think contractually, they were supposed to listen to her. I wouldn’t be surprised if they swapped out the philosophical core.