Rong Xiaoqing on "Squid Games"

[Fred0]

I have been reading the New York Times news briefing for Chinese people living in America. An article by Rong Xiaoqing about the movie "Squid Games"  has two sentences that I am unsure about. I will quote that last two paragraphs of the article and give my translation. Following that I will quote the beginning of the article for anyone who may be interested. 

 

In the first paragraph I quote, is she saying that for the rich Chinese  to comment on the rain with a quotation from a classical poem  when people are fighting to the death on the field shows him to be so dehumanized that it is more terrifying than all the cruelty in previous scenes.

 

In the final sentence of the second paragraph I quote, is she saying that the human heart can contain such contradictory feelings that in spite of hating rich people and being oppressed by the high-pressure working conditions, the Chinese audience can be proud of China being represented by this rich man, i.e. that China is now a rich country, and even though this rich man is blandly watching poor people, presumably like the members of the audience, being massacred?

 

Thanks for taking the time to help me with this. What's the point of reading, if you can't understand the point of the article? Also, I would be appreciative of any other corrections to my translation.

 

如果你不怕剧透的话，可以把下面这段看完。尽管《鱿鱼游戏》中有无数令人毛骨悚然的血腥场面，但最让我不寒而栗的竟是一句古诗。最后一集中，以观看穷人互相残杀为乐的各国超级富豪戴着面具登场，兴致勃勃观看活到最后的两名参赛者进行你死我活的对决。这时突然下起了大雨，其中一位富豪在观景室的玻璃窗后，看着角斗场上手握尖刀，浑身透湿，眼中满是愤怒、悲哀和绝望的两名参赛者，以字正腔圆的中文说了句：“好雨知时节。”这种在风雅中表现出来的人性尽丧，力度强过了所有的残酷。

 

If you are not afraid of a spoiler, you can continue reading the paragraph below to the end. Even though “Squid Games” contains countless scenes so bloody that they make your hair stand on end, the most terrifying moment was unexpectedly a sentence from an ancient poem. In the final episode, as though for fun,  super-wealthy and powerful men from various countries and wearing masks, surge onto the field to watch poor people massacre one another. In high spirits they watch the final two living competitors advance into a fight to the death confrontation. Suddenly a heavy rain starts to pour. One of the super-rich men stands behind behind the glass window of the observation booth, looking out onto the fighting grounds, a dagger grasped in his hand. Completely soaked from head to toe, his gaze is fillled with the two angry, sorrowful, and hopeless competitors, in perfectly ennunciated Chinese, he says,  “The good rain knows its season.” This sentence, so elegantly expressed, manifests a dehumanization so strong that its power surpasses all cruelty.

 

这句唐诗显然令观众意识到这是一位中国富豪代表，中国观众看到这儿，也很容易联想到本国迅速扩大的贫富差距、人们的仇富心态和年轻人在压力之下“躺平”的无奈，恐怕也是百般滋味在心头吧？

 

This sentence from a Tang dynasty poem clearly makes the audience realize that this rich man is a Chinese delgate. A Chinese audience here,   easily feels an alliance to their native country, one which has so quickly increased the gap between the rich and the poor; people with an attitude of hatred for the rich, and young people who are under so much pressure that the “lie flat” movement is their only alternative. I’m afraid that there are a hundred kinds of tastes co-existing in the human heart... is’nt it so?

 

《鱿鱼游戏》离我们的现实生活有多远？

Rong Xiaoqing

《鱿鱼游戏》中的一幕，剧中主角成奇勋走入其中一局游戏的场地。Youngkyu Park/Netflix, via Agence France-Presse - Getty Images

网飞(Netflix)的韩国剧集《鱿鱼游戏》(Squid Game)其实并不是我的菜，正如时报一篇剧评所说，无论从剧情进展、人物设置、还是过多的血腥画面来说，它都并非上乘之作。但我必须承认，它让我看一眼就停不下来。也许正是因为这种魔力，从火爆程度来看，它现在已经完全有资本睥睨群雄。自9月中旬推出以来，这部剧迅速在90多个国家登上网飞剧集排行榜榜首，随后以25天内斩获1.11亿观众的成绩成为网飞有史以来最火新剧。这还没算进在没有网飞的中国通过各种“渠道”看了这部剧的观众，知乎上一则以“如何评价《鱿鱼游戏》？”为题的帖子已经被浏览了超过百万次，微信公众号和微博上人们津津乐道地分析剧情、挖掘彩蛋。连剧中人物身穿的运动服、做游戏时使用的椪糖都火了，生产剧中人同款面具的中国厂商也赚得盆满钵满。

 

负债累累的底层韩国人参加了一个由富豪们发起的叫“鱿鱼游戏”的神秘活动，他们被要求玩六场儿童游戏，输者都会死，活到最后就可以独得巨额奖金。老套的情节与《饥饿游戏》、《大逃杀》之类前辈生存片类似，让它能在同类影视剧中脱颖而出的原因大概不只是这部剧本身，还有“天时”。

底层的挣扎、人性的幽深明灭，这些本是适用于任何时代的话题。但无论是在《大逃杀》登上银幕的2000年，还是首部《饥饿游戏》推出的2012年，这些话题都不像今天这样以狰狞的面目赤裸裸地横亘于整个世界，让即使不想去面对它们的人也很难做到视而不见。

十几二十年前，“内卷”这个词还没有被发明，富裕国家的神话也还没有破灭。如今竞争白热化带来的焦虑随处可见，也增加了人与人之间的敌意。无论是在韩国贫饿而死的脱北者，还是全家蜗居在纽约地下室里被洪水淹死的华裔移民，富国里穷人悲惨的遭遇屡见不鲜，都使《鱿鱼游戏》这种社会底层因看不到出路而孤注一掷，通过恶性竞争来求生的剧情设定显得更加现实。

 

2008年金融危机以来，各国贫富差距的普遍恶化更是为几乎所有观众提供了对这部剧的带入感，无论是在韩国、美国、中国，还是全世界。韩国人在谈到这部剧时，抱怨自己要面对找不到全职工作、看不到上升机会、房子不敢买、孩子生不起的窘境，在中国和世界许多地方也同样如此。所有这些因素都在这场旷世疫情中被成倍地放大，现实已然惨淡，前景更是一片愁云。

[yibeikafei]

Just my two cents:

 

I think you are right about the first paragraph. Although, I cannot help but feel that there is a small nuisance in the meaning that I am missing as well. But I haven't seen the series (unlike the rest of the world) so I can't go much further than mere speculation. I would just like to let you know what I know about the poem, hopefully this will help you put it into the context of the show! It's a Du Fu poem about the grace and beauty of the spring rain. “好雨知时节" implies the rain is praiseworthy because it is timely. I wonder if the rich person is seeing beauty in this scene, even though it sounds very macabre. Perhaps it is the fact that he IS seeing beauty in this macabre scene that drives the author of the article to find this scene so unsettling. Overall, I think putting a beautiful pastoral poem about rain in this kind of setting could indeed be interpreted as a manifestation of dehumanization. 

 

Just a little note on the translation: 
其中一位富豪在观景室的玻璃窗后，看着角斗场上手握尖刀，浑身透湿，眼中满是愤怒、悲哀和绝望的两名参赛者 ...
One of the super-rich men stands behind behind the glass window of the observation booth, looking out onto the fighting grounds, a dagger grasped in his hand.Completely soaked from head to toe, his gaze is filled with the two angry, sorrowful, and hopeless competitors ...

What I understand from this sentence is that it's the competitors who are grasping a dagger in their hands, completely soaked from head to toe and whose gaze is filled with anger, sorrow and hopelessness. Not the rich guy. In other words: 看着 is the action taken by the rich guy. 看着什么呢？ 角斗场上手握尖刀，浑身透湿，眼中满是愤怒、悲哀和绝望的两名参赛者。 Everything here modifies 两名参赛者。Although, again, I haven't seen the show but just reading this paragraph, this is definitely what it says.

 

As for the second paragraph, you asked if the author implied the Chinese audience would be proud of China being represented by this rich man or not. I don't think this is what is happening here. I think the hundred kinds of complex emotions that the audience may go through when watching this scene might refer to working-class Chinese people sympathizing with the competitors and developing even stronger negative feelings towards the Chinese guy. I think the author implies that this scene was perhaps almost like a wake-up call to the Chinese audience. It told them the lives of average working class people are not so much more different from this foreign TV series that they are watching. And the income gap between the rich and the poor is indeed a serious problem in their country as well. This is how I interpreted that bit although nothing I said was a word-by-word translation. 

 

I think perhaps this bit was the reason behind the confusion:
...也很容易联想到本国迅速扩大的贫富差距...
 easily feels an alliance to their native country, one which has so quickly increased the gap between the rich and the poor; 
I don't think "alliance" is the best word to use here. 联想 simply implies "think of, come to mind". Roughly speaking, this bit says that the audience can easily make an association with the current situation of their country, where there is also an ever-increasing gap between the rich and the poor. 

Sorry if this was redundant, I hope it helped, & happy reading!

[Publius]

 

On 10/25/2021 at 11:20 PM, Fred0 said:

最后一集中，以观看穷人互相残杀为乐的各国超级富豪戴着面具登场，兴致勃勃观看活到最后的两名参赛者进行你死我活的对决。

各国超级富豪 is the subject.

 

以观看穷人互相残杀为乐的 is a relative clause modifying the subject.

 

以X为Y = take X as Y. (The super-rich guys who enjoy watching the poor slaughtering each other...)

 

登场 is the predicate. It's originally a term used in the theater when an actor goes onto the stage (Enter Hamlet). The opposite is 退场 (Exit Hamlet).

 

观看活到最后的两名参赛者进行你死我活的对决 is another predicate (nothing unusual in Chinese).

 

The verb is 观看 to watch. To watch what? To watch the two surviving competitors carry out their fight-to-the-death battle.

On 10/25/2021 at 11:20 PM, Fred0 said:

其中一位富豪在观景室的玻璃窗后，看着角斗场上手握尖刀，浑身透湿，眼中满是愤怒、悲哀和绝望的两名参赛者，以字正腔圆的中文说了句：“好雨知时节。”

其中一位富豪 is the subject.

 

看着... is a coverb clause signifying parallel action/accompanying state: "looking at..."

 

The object of this non-finite verb is 两名参赛者.

 

角斗场上手握尖刀，浑身透湿，眼中满是愤怒、悲哀和绝望的 is a long relative clause modifying 两名参赛者.

 

说了句：“好雨知时节。” is the predicate of the whole sentence. One of the rich spectators, looking at the two competitors, says something.

[Publius]

On 10/25/2021 at 11:20 PM, Fred0 said:

中国观众看到这儿，也很容易联想到本国迅速扩大的贫富差距……

I don't see where the "alliance to their native country" comes from. 

联想 simply mean "to remind oneself of something". Here the Chinese viewers are easily reminded of the fast growing wealth gap in their own country, ...

[Fred0]

Thanks to both for your careful and helpful clarifications.