be cautious when choosing a translation
Yestarday I started reading The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde in Chinese translation. At first I chose to read Shanghai Translation Publishing House, which is reputable in China. And the very first paragraph of this book goes like this:
画室里弥漫着浓郁的玫瑰花香，每当夏天的微风在花园的树丛中流动，从开着的门外还会飘进来紫丁香的芬芳或嫩红色山楂花的幽香。
The whole paragragh is acceptable, or in other words, it totally makes sense in Chinese. But as soon as I found this other translation, I deleted the former one from my bookshelf right away,
画室里弥漫着浓浓的玫瑰花香，夏日的轻风拂过园中的树木，开着的门便送来了馥郁的紫丁香味，或是满枝粉红色花的荆棘的清香。
It's not that the former one is a bad translation, but I see what authentic Chinese is more likely to be in the latter one. Syntactically, the former one looks more like English, while in the latter translation, the translator creates a more natural and poetic flow by using parataxis in Chinese. Though, even native Chinese speakers nowadays talk like the former one, without even noticing. But still, it's hard for me to accept reading Chinese that is not real to me.
Likewise, I assume that a similar scenario happens to English translation (and any other languages) too. But this is kind of sad because I cannot distinguish what's good English translation from what is bad. When I want to learn English by reading works that were not written in English initially, I can't decide which English translation to read.
Anyway, always be careful when reading in translation.
Thanks for reading! 😊