Proverbs and adages, nuggets of proverbial wisdom, appear throughout the play. In the opera’s final scene Sixth Daughter, Fifth Daughter’s younger sister, is persuaded to marry Biggie Lin in spite of his unbecoming appearance when Daisy, her maidservant, quotes a time-honored adage:
六娘：（白）這……爹，伊生成彼呢歹。
Sixth Daughter: I…Daddy! He’s so ugly!
春花：（白）儂講醜醜尪吃袂空，嫁水尪是十暗九暗空。
Daisy: Remember the old saw, m’lady: “Marry a homely hubby and you’ll never go hungry!”
黃九郎：（白）是啦，六娘，汝看林家財勢兩全，汝若嫁予伊，一生可享不盡兮 富貴。
Huang Jiulong: That’s right! Sixth Daughter, the Lin’s are a wealthy and powerful family.
Wed their son and you’ll enjoy a life of luxury! (Scene Thirteen)
Some Taiwanese proverbs translate readily into English but others require explanation. In Scene Eight Spring informs Chen San that, despite appearances to the contrary, Fifth Daughter is truly in love with him. Chen San, however, is skeptical:
陳三：（白）若按呢，伊為何出言相欺，又將我趕出房呢？
Chen San: Then why’d she kick me out of her room?
益春：（白）這……這叫做枵鬼假細膩、愛食假志氣。
Spring: Well…you know what they say: “A starving ghost feigns daintiness.”
(Scene Eight)
The aphorism Iau-kuí ké sè-jī, ài tsia̍h ké sè-jî (枵鬼假細膩、愛食假志氣) may be translated as “A starving ghost pretends she’s not hungry but she really wants to eat.” Here Fifth Daughter affects a show of decorum lest she reveal her true feelings for Chen San. For economy and assonance, or internal rhyme, I rendered the line as “a starving ghost feigns daintiness” (the last half of the maxim is usually unstated) and added a footnote to ensure comprehension.
The script also showcases a number of colorful Taiwanese colloquialisms. In the opera’s final scene the eloping lovers have been apprehended. Standing trial before Governor Lin, Biggie Lin’s father, Chen San protests to his brother that his “crime” was motivated by love, not lust. But Biggie insists that Chen kidnapped his fiancée, prefacing his remarks with a phrase translated directly from the Taiwanese: “your mother’s eighteen years old and your grandmother just celebrated her first birthday (度晬 tōo-tsè11).” As an expression of scornful disbelief the locution is more or less equivalent to the American English “Bullshit!”:
必賢打陳三。Chen Bixian slaps Chen San.
陳必賢：（將水，唱）咿嘎罵聲啊咿 罵聲孽弟不知恥
枉汝自細勤讀五經合四書 滿腹才富學五車 竟犯此最敗壞陳家兮名譽
（……）
11 A traditional celebration held in honor of a child’s first birthday.
Chen Bixian: (sung) Argh! You shameless little jackass, you!
A staunch Confucian from the age of two, Wealth and learning you had in abundance, A man of respect, a man of substance;
But now you’ve thrown it all away – Traded it in for a roll in the hay!
(…)
陳三：（白）大哥，請汝原諒我做出一時荒唐之事，但是我合五娘是真心相愛，
是伊心甘情願隨我回鄉。
Chen San: Brother, please forgive me – I did a crazy thing! But Fifth Daughter and I are in love – true love! She left with me of her own free will.
林大：（白）汝講恁母仔十八歲、恁阿媽度晬，陳運使，伊明知五娘是我兮某，
閣三更半暝強共伊帶走，汝講，伊該不該認罪？
Biggie Lin: Ah, your ma’s eighteen years old and your granny just celebrated her first birthday! He snatched her away in middle of the night – even though he knew me and her were engaged – and now he won’t own up to it! (Scene Thirteen)
Here I deemed the vividness of the Taiwanese expression worth preserving in literal translation.
If the opera were staged in English, however, the shorter, more direct Americanism would no doubt better convey the illocutionary power of the original.
Most controversial with my first readers were certain liberties I took with the source text.
In Scene Nine, Fifth Daughter has agreed to elope with Chen San and allow him keep Spring as concubine. Here she queries her husband-to-be as to how he’ll allocate his time and attentions:
五娘：（都馬調，唱）今郎君在眼前汝怎主裁
Fifth Daughter: (sung) Tell us now, O husband virile, with whom will you spend your nights?
益春：（都馬調，唱）我是小小的女婢無權利
Spring: (sung) I’m just a poor little servant girl, without any conjugal rights.
五娘：（都馬調，唱）那按呢我做大某汝做細姨
Fifth Daughter: (sung) As lawful wife I stake my claim to holidays and weekends!
益春：（都馬調，唱）我若得一點心意都真歡喜
Spring: (sung) As concubine I’ll share with her, but please – no other girlfriends!
陳三：（都馬調，唱）我一定會做得真公平 Chen San: (sung) I’ll be impartial, I will be fair –
My love and affection you’ll equally share. (Scene Nine)
Departures from the original will be obvious to readers of Taiwanese. Fifth Daughter’s anachronistic “weekends” and Spring’s condition of “no other girlfriends” are not in the script – I “improvised” for the sake of the rhyme and interest. Thus, I admit to sacrificing absolute fidelity for sound and invention, here and elsewhere in the script. Such departures are not without precedent, however – traditionally, improvisation was a standard feature of operatic performance. Liao Chiung-chih:
雖然同是內台戲班，只有美都是按劇本演戲的；其餘劇團，按歌仔戲的說法，都 是「做活戲」，也就是排戲先生只講劇情大綱，派好角色後，演員即興發揮，靠 的是演員經驗累積的唱唸功力，也就是俗稱的「腹內」。
Of the opera troupes performing at indoor venues, only Mei Du [a well known troupe of the 1940s-50s] followed scripts; the other troupes would “make living opera,” as it was called in opera circles; that is, the director would outline the plot and assign roles, after which the actors would improvise the performance, relying solely on experience and their singing and acting skills – what they had “in the gut.” (Ji, 1999: 27) [My translation]
In “making living opera” I no way altered plot or characterization. And, of course, readers are always free to disagree with my choices.
Translating Liao Chiung-chih’s Chen San Wu Niang was an experiment, an attempt to recast the original songs and dialogue in language and imagery familiar to modern Western readers without sacrificing the opera’s essential “Taiwanese-ness.” Although the translation is aimed primarily at readers, the script could easily be adapted to the stage or serve as subtitles for a Taiwanese-language production. In the course of translating I learned a great deal about Taiwanese (Hoklo) and English, and gained an even greater appreciation for the Taiwanese opera and Taiwanese culture – I only hope the script is as much fun to read as it was to translate. The manuscript is as yet unpublished but I’ve already begun work on another classic opera, and I hope other translators will take up the challenge as well. In closing, a last bit of Taiwanese folk wisdom:
做戲空，看戲戇。
[Those who make plays are vacuous; those who see plays are fatuous.]
I wonder where “those who translate plays” would fit into that equation?
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