Chapter 69 postscript

Putting down the pen, closing the translation and the original work, but there is no sense of relaxation after the task is completed.What we can't get rid of is such a picture: a frail young man, dressed in rags, without food and clothing, travel-stained, exhausted, but still walking firmly in the twilight.Although he doesn't know what's ahead... This boy is the little David familiar to readers, the "I" of this book. When it comes to English literature, one cannot fail to mention Dickens; when one talks about Dickens, one cannot fail to mention Dickens.The book was conceived in 1847, but the author did not start writing it until 1849 and finished it in October 1850.Although Dickens does not want people to take this book as his autobiography, we can still regard this book as an artistically processed representation of his adolescent life.Among the many long works of Dickens, this one is loved by both children and adults.It was the first Dickens work we read when we were children (Mr. Dong Qiusi’s Chinese translation), and we thought it was written by Dickens especially for children.As an adult, I was fortunate enough to be able to translate it, but in translation, I found that it was far heavier and more bitter than what was left in our memory.

The author once said that after finishing this book, he felt that he "had given a part of himself to the world in the shadows" (in the letter to his friend Foster on October 21, 1850). In the preface of the reprint after more than 10 years, He felt the feeling was still fresh.We can read it nearly a century and a half later and feel that he has indeed surrendered some part of himself.Because of this, this novel has touched the hearts of thousands of people, and also made readers give a part of themselves to Dickens. Dickens is not only a literary giant, what he left behind is not only a magnificent treasure in the treasure house of world literature; he is also a friend of hundreds of millions of ordinary people.He used his kindness, sadness, genius, and diligence to leave light and hope for the little people who account for the majority of human beings, making the pain no longer so heavy, and the loneliness no longer so long, because there is at least Dickens in pain and loneliness. The hope and light that the works give you accompany and comfort you, so you hope and work hard...

At the beginning of this century, there was a Chinese translation of Lin Shu's "A Piece of Meat for the Rest of Life", and a Chinese translation of Dong Qiusi's "David Copperfield" in the 1950s, both of which were all the rage. Luoyang paper is expensive, which influenced a generation of young people in China at that time.Today, if our new translation can be accepted by readers in the 1990s, this should be the best reward for our work. In the process of translating this book, we also had the guidance and help of Mr. Kang Manmin, Tang Yinsun, Xu Xiaoguang and Shi Mao, and we would like to express our heartfelt thanks to them.

Translator at Hangfa Apartment in August 1995