Isn't He Adorable? : Thoughts on the Value of Translation

(photo by Makoto Kaku)

This afternoon I watched an NHK documentary on Donald Keene, a famous Japanologist who translated and analyzed a corpus of Japanese literature from ancient times to modern times.

He talked about how as a European literature major from Columbia university, he stumbled on Arthur Wiley's translation of "The Tale of Genji" at a  Times Square bookstore.

In his interview he described  "The Tale of Genji" as an escape to the uncertainties of reality.  The book was written simply for the sake of beauty and a beautiful society.  The moment defined the beginning of his career in Japanese literature.

I realized that his success stems from illuminating a part of the human experience that was unknown to the West. He had no competition because no one wanted to go to the wreckage of post-war Japan.

I'm REALLY jealous that he was able to live the life of a mind.   In many ways the life of a literary translator requires the mentality of an artist.  A computer could never translate literary text because translation isn't an algorithm that automatically converts one symbol to another. The first and foremost must communicate the feelings of the human condition.

I'm confused about how to express the relevance of the humanities.  Unlike Keene's career where communication and publication was heavily scrutinized, contemporary society has the opposite problem in that we are barraged with too much unfiltered information that it drowns out authoritative voices like Donald Keene.   The most popular person on the internet has the most credentials, not the person with the most comprehensive line of thought.

Personally I'm conflicted between getting a PhD versus finding an alternative path to study China.  I would have access to resources and connections to professional expertise on the humanities, but this resource is locked behind an ivory tower or digital subscription paywalls.  The alternative  is exploring the humanities without authoritative resources shaped by the internet.  How should this look like?

At least Donald Keene doesn't have to keep justifying the value of his work to the rest of society.  After the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, Keene renounced his US citizenship and moved to Japan.  I've never met Keene, but it's safe to say that he's one of the few rare people in the world that lived a passionate life.