Chapter 13 Todtnau Mountain Postscript Cai Hongjun (4)

Shanghai Wanyu Culture and Art Co., Ltd. was the last one to sign the contract among the above institutions.Mr. Jin Hao, the general manager, has a master's degree in German from Shanghai International Studies University. He once studied under Professor Yu Kuangfu and has translated and edited many German books.Wanyu Culture regards literature publishing planning, especially foreign literature publishing planning, as a very important work direction.In cooperation with the Institute of Foreign Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, they are planning to hold a "World Literature Forum" with the theme of "Multiple Cultures-Exchange and Coexistence". At that time, famous writers at home and abroad, including Oe Kenzaburo and Mo Yan, will be invited to participate in the meeting and compiled his works into a book.They have signed copyright contracts for more than 20 books by 11 foreign authors, including Oe Kenzaburo, Vladimir Makanin, Tom Stoppard, Su Susan Sontag (Susan Sontag), Amos Oz (Amos Oz), Toni Morrison (Toni Morrison) and other world-class writers, authorized South Sea Publishing Company to publish.Mr. Jin Hao expressed his great interest in the letter after he learned that the cultural company also had the opportunity to participate in representing the copyright of the works of the new Kono Award winners.In recent years, cultural companies have participated in the domestic publishing industry in the links of book topic selection planning, copyright book introduction, translation and promotion, and distribution, and have achieved great results. As a copyright agent, I also , trying to persuade German publishing houses to cooperate with cultural companies.Prior to this, Shanghai Wanyu had signed several copyright contracts with us, and the contracts were executed very well. Mr. Jin Hao knew German and published, and there was also a relationship between "alumni" and "students". Therefore, We also did some work on the German publishing house, and obtained permission from the German side to authorize Shanghai Wanyu.On the selection, Mr. Jin Hao and I communicated on the phone, and soon decided to authorize Jelinek's debut novel "We Are Lure Birds, Baby!" ", philosophical prose drama and drama collection "Was geschah, nachdem Nora ihren Mann verlassen hatte oder Stutzen der Gesellschaften" (Was geschah, nachdem Nora ihren Mann verlassen hatte oder Stutzen der Gesellschaften).Mr. Jin Hao attaches great importance to drama collections. He believes that Shanghai, the most modern city in China, is the most likely place to put Jelinek's plays on stage, and he said that after the book comes out, he will actively contact and arrange performances matters.He also entrusted me with full authority to arrange translators, and strive to complete the translation of the three books at the same time.I am very pleased to invite Mr. Diao Chengjun, a senior translator, to translate "We are Lure Birds, Baby!" ", although Mr. Diao Chengjun and I have never met, but in the past few years, because of the translation of several books by the German writer Grass, we have talked on the phone many times, and we are already familiar with each other's voices. Mr. Diao Chengjun is the translator of Grass The Chinese translator with the most works, the quality of this book translated by him is undoubtedly high.The translator, Mr. Shen Xiliang, graduated from the German Department of Nanjing University. He loves philosophy very much.In my personal opinion, among all the works of Jelinek translated into Chinese, it is the most difficult to translate. Mr. Shen Xiliang worked hard, consulted a lot of philosophical materials, and tried his best.

"In den Alpen" (In den Alpen) and "After Nora Left Her Husband" were the two books that I found the most difficult at the beginning of arranging the copyright. The former selected and translated six prose plays, and the latter collected six a traditional script.After Changjiang Literature and Art Publishing House and Shanghai Wanyu Culture and Art Co., Ltd. agreed to purchase the copyright, I happily informed the German publishing house.Who knows, the German publishing house replied to me with regret: Jelinek himself disagreed with the proposal of the two drama selections I proposed, and requested to separate them according to the selection of the original German editions of Rowolt Press and Berlin Press. Published separately.I was dumbfounded. Indeed, the German publishing house had said beforehand: "For combined publishing of scripts, the author's permission is required." Moreover, I also reiterated this requirement in the publication plan originally sent to the Chinese publishing house.However, I myself forgot about this stubble later."Death and the Maiden" by Shanghai Translation Agency consists of five parts. In the German version, they appear in three drama collections respectively. Six prose dramas including "Death in the Alps" are selected from three German editions. Six traditional plays including "After Nora Left Her Husband" are also from two German editions of drama collections, and in these German editions, there are two more than 100,000 words that can be written independently long play.Not reconciled, I racked my brains to write a letter to the author, and conveyed it through Ms. Sabine Oswald, the copyright editor of Berlin Press, Germany. I stated the enthusiasm of China Publishing House for publishing her works. The characteristics of the book, introduced the reasons for the separate publication of long dramas and the combination of short dramas into collections, and also emphasized that the drama collections of the three Chinese institutions were selected from different German editions that intersect with each other, and the copyright ownership is difficult to coordinate. I hope she can consider China's national conditions agree with my project selection plan. On November 18, I received a letter from Ms. Oswald: "You can arrange the authorization according to the script selection you proposed, which also includes a script from Scheder Press. Ms. Jelinek wrote back to me, She thinks this selection is appropriate." I felt relieved and completed all the contracts on the same day and sent them to the German side for review.It was also at this time that I learned that the copyright of the script "Clouds: Hometown" belongs to Scheder Publishing House, which publishes Grass' works. Fortunately, I am also the sole agent of this publisher, and it was immediately implemented with a phone call.This "accident" was an important reason why Jelinek's Chinese copyright arrangement was not "settled" until November 19.

It can be said that the translation of the six traditional scripts was arranged very smoothly, and several translators had already been agreed in advance.The four translators, Ding Na, Li Ou, Yang Li, and Xu Jinghua, are classmates in the 77th grade of the German major at Peking University. They have all lived in Germany and Austria for many years, and the top three have also obtained a doctorate in German literature.Ms. Yang Li wrote in the article "Deciphering the Heavenly Book Essay" published in "European Monthly Magazine": "We specially took advantage of the Spring Festival to meet in Munich to discuss our understanding of the works, appreciate the pun meaning of Jelinek's language, and admire the exquisite and appropriate expressions of certain words. In the joy of purely academic discussion, this is an unforgettable joy, a kind of spiritual detachment, and it seems to have realized the dream of college days, a kind of mature dream. On this evening of the first day of the new year, we discussed so much Intense, so devoted, I didn't care about tasting the Spring Festival dinner carefully cooked by other friends, but just focused on the analysis of Jelinek's works... During the translation process, I consulted a large number of historical materials and Western literary theory and philosophical literature. Because Jelinek's works use a lot of space to describe the inner activities of the characters, and the thinking jumps a lot, and sometimes it seems to deliberately confuse the readers in order to achieve the purpose of making people think deeply. In order to ensure the accuracy of translation and understanding, I spent a lot of time Check with the relevant personnel on its language and historical background... After the translation work is over, I feel that I have experienced an emotional, intellectual, linguistic and fantasy baptism. I have learned a lot, revisited a lot, I understand a lot. This is not just a translation for me, but also a review of drama theory, a review of the history of Western philosophy, and the realization of a beautiful fantasy in my youth."