陆犯焉识

[cncorrect]

The mailbox here is a metaphor. It was a fact that the address was a string of numbers. Wanyu wrote it on an envelope, and before it was delivered the content of the mail was read by many people. The mailbox was imagined, not a physical object.

Quotation marks are used for metaphors in Chinese sometimes, such as '信箱'. I don't think you should also use the quotation marks in English.

Wanyu wrote not only the number address but also every characters in the letter in beautiful brush strokes.

I am a native Chinese speaker. Is there anything I can help you? I applied to be your QQ friend. Can you accept it?

[Fred0]

Thank you- this is helpful. I do not see in the original text that the letter was opened and read by the many pairs of eyes. It is not evident in the short passage I quoted, but the text goes on to express how Laoji was even offendeed at the thought of other eyes gazing on his wife's beautiful handwriting. At least that is the way that I read it. Am I missing something? Of course it's reasonable, now that you mention it, to assume that letters to a prisoner would be opened and read.

 

I was not aware that quotation marks may be used in that way in Chinese. I always understood them in the sense of "so-called," or "as they say." But, to know that they can just inticate  a metaphorical use of a word or phrase  is helpful.

[cncorrect]

I read it again in the context today. I think the '信箱' is a mailbox number on the envelope. The '信箱' was so-called by Wanyu in the letter. The mechanism of the censorship was like what was going on for the '前面' and '后面' side for the metaphoric mailbox.

'信箱前面一串数码。' Please pay attention to the period of the sentence.  So the meaning of what follows is relatively independent. Then you should understand that the letter was opened and read by the many pairs of eyes.

[Fred0]

OK, I think I finally see, in the sentence that begins 他不在乎自己的信给看过再到婉喻手里，although the author goes on to talk about his handwritng, she says that he doesn't care who reads his return letter to Wanyu before she finally receives it. So the author must also expect the reader to assume that the entire contents of Wanyu's letter has been carefully read by the many pairs of eyes. Is there any other specific wording in the preceeding text that would indicate that the letter is being opened and read, or is this something that any Chinese reader would assume?

 

Also, what in the text makes you say that the mailbox metaphor was used in Wanyu's letter. Is it the quotation marks?  Thankks.

[cncorrect]

“婉喻每一个秀丽的毛笔字都是给信箱后面一双双眼睛仔细地看过，才到达老几手中的。”From this sentence, we can know the letter was opened and read. It is evident, not assumed, because ‘每一个字都被看过’. You may think it was the mailbox number that was ‘看过’. No, there is a period before the sentence. Moreover, in Chinese, ‘信被看过’ means the letter was opened and read. 

 

I didn’t say that ‘the mailbox metaphor was used in Wanyu's letter.’ I originally thought Wanyu mentioned how the mailbox worked in her letter. But I was wrong. She didn’t need to explain. Laoji knew it.

 

The quotation mark is used for the word ‘信箱’ for two reasons. First, officials told Laoji that he would receive the letters through the mailbox. The quotation mark is used to quote the officials’ word. Second, the author uses a metaphor here. He wants to illustrate how the censorship system worked. So you can find the ‘前面’ and ‘后面’ in the sentence.

 

That’s my understanding. Does it make sense?
 

[Fred0]

Ok, now I see what you are saying about the period. I was reading too literally. I was not understanding 看到 or 信箱  it as a Chinese reader would. Thanks for the corrections.

[Fred0]

Laoji has just made his escape from the prison farm on horseback.

 

老几骑着光荣退伍的青灰马一路逃去。

Laoji, astride the honorably discharged blue-grey horse made his escape.

他不是从饥荒里逃生去的。这年饥荒已经过去，饿死人的事从1962年就开始减少。

He wasn’t escaping with his life from the famine. The famine was already past. The issue of people dying of hunger had begun to lessen by 1962.

连着两年，青稞收成都很好，领导们也放够了亩产卫星，不再把几十亩地的土豆埋在一亩地里，让犯人们表演土豆大丰收给国家和省里的上级们看了。

For the last two years the barley harvest had been very good. The authorities also set off enough area to produce a satellite. They no longer assigned many tens of mu of land to bury potatoes in one mu of land. allowing the prisoners to show a bountiful harvest of potatoes for the national and provincal authorities to see.

因为饥荒，上交的粮食被上级减低，犯人的口粮定量每月增长了四斤。

The prisoners’ ration of food handed over by the higher authorities, which, because of the famine had decreased, was now increasing by four catties per month.

从田里偷回的青稞在大墙内烘炒，青稞粒在饭盒里噼噼啪啪放小鞭的声音，再也诱惑不出那么多没出息的涎水。

The  pipa pipa sound, like a little whip, made by the grains of barley, stolen from the fields and brough back inside the big wall to cook, in the prisoners’ lunch pails, no longer enticed the useless flow of saliva.

 

I can’t make any sense of the first part in red. Please explain what this stentence is saying.  The second part in red I am unsure about. Please take a look. Also please correct and/or improve any other parts where you notice mistakes or inadequacies. Thank you.

[Jim]

The term 放卫星 refers to the pressure to exaggerate production during the Great Leap years: https://baike.baidu.com/item/放卫星/1742790 I presume it's related to the space race and the great victory for socialism of getting Sputnik up there before the imperialists, though perhaps a domestic moment, not checked.

Your line says their leaders had already done enough exaggerating so they didn't have to put on a show of a fake bumper harvest again by shifting potatoes from 10 mu of fields into one then pretending to harvest them from there - i.e. an impossible unit yield.

 

The second line in red says higher-ups reduced the amount of grain taken (in a similar way to tax, 上交 is when you pay it on up); since they have more grain left on the prison farm, their monthly ration could be increased.

[cncorrect]

On 12/18/2023 at 3:37 AM, Fred0 said:

I can’t make any sense of the first part in red. Please explain what this stentence is saying.

To understand that, you may need some background information: https://baike.baidu.com/item/放卫星/1742790?fr=ge_ala

 

For the second part in red, I would translate as follows: 

The prisoners’ ration of the grains handed over to the country was decreased by the higher authorities because of the famine. Their food quota was now increasing by four catties per month.

 

But I can tell that your English writing skills are far beyond mine. So I would like to see how you improve the above sentence. 向您学习！

[Fred0]

I should have looked up 放卫星 for myself. I will be more diligent next time.  The trick is to realize that 放 goes with 卫星 to make a saying of some kind. This is a great help. Thank you.

 

Now I understand why she says 表演. It's a performance.

 

领导们也放够了亩产卫星，不再把几十亩地的土豆埋在一亩地里，让犯人们表演土豆大丰收给国家和省里的上级们看了。

The sentence might be written in English:  It (the good harvest) gave the authorities at the prison enought of a "Sputnik launch" that it was no longer necessary to have the prisoners  harvest an acre of potatoes just to re-bury them in one patch, so they could put on a show of a bountiful harvest for the higher ups of the national and provincial government.

[Fred0]

Yanshi and his wife, Wanyu live with his mother-in-law, who is referred to as En Niang (嗯娘). Wanyu has  spoken rudely to En Niang, criticizing her for a perfectly good reason, and En Niang has gone upstairs and taken to her bed. When Yanshi returns home, he goes upstairs to En Niang and she gives him an earfull about her treatment by Wanyu.

 

焉识下了楼，在厨房找到婉喻，对她说，来一下，我有话跟你说。婉喻也受惯了不平等不公道。一到这种时候，她对自己受气包的角色无条件接受，准备丈夫一叫就上楼去陪不是。

 

Yanshi came downstairs and found Wanyu in the kitchen. He said for her to come sit down, that he had something to talk to her about. Wanyu was used to being treated unfairly and unjustly. At these times, when she was being bullied, she embrace a posture of unconditional acceptance. She was prepared had her husband called her to join him upstairs no matter what.

 

My question is: how to read the 不是 in the last sentence. Does it mean something like “no matter what?”

[Jim]

No, it's to apologise for doing something wrong. The 不是 here is the doing a wrong/ being at fault

[cncorrect]

'赔不是' is a word. It means to apologise for doing something wrong. Example sentence:  楚王听了只好赔不是。--《晏子使楚》. Please pay attention that it should be '赔', not ‘陪'. Reference: https://baike.baidu.com/item/赔不是/9321119?fr=ge_ala

[Fred0]

Thanks for both replies.

[Fred0]

 

Lu Yanshi has escaped from the prison camp and has made his way across the desert to the city of Xining. In Shanghai his wife (Feng Wanyu) and grown daughter (Feng Danjue) live together. A wanted poster of Lu Yanshi has been posted at end of their street because the authorities naturally suspect that he might show up there looking for his family. He has be gone 29 years.

 

在我祖父陆焉识走进渐渐热闹的西宁新城区时，我祖母冯婉喻被一声门响惊动了。现在门的响动是她最怕的声音，连最熟悉的开门声都让她心脏犯帕金森。

As my  grandfather, Lu Yanshi was walking into the gradually more bustling new quarter of Xining city, my grandmother Feng Wanyu was startled by a sound at the door. For her now, a noise at the door was her worse fear. Even the most familiar sounds of someone coming in caused her heart to tremble like it had Parkinson’s disease.

这是她听了十多年的开门声了，钥匙上吊了根什么链条，钥匙尖怎样插进锁孔，插得怎样准确，又是怎样一拧，她的意识比这一套实际声响更早地完成了这个过程。

These were the sounds of someone coming in which she had heard for more than ten years: a key dangling from a chain, the point of the key sliding into the keyhole, seating itself snugly,  turning in the keyhole. She was aware of this whole process even before it was fully completed in reality.

但她的心脏还是抖得乱七八糟，比我太祖母冯仪芳端茶杯的手抖得还乱。

But her heart still trembled chaotically in her chest, even more crazily than a teacup trembled in great-grandmother Feng Yifang’s hands.

进来的当然是我小姑冯丹珏。母女俩惊魂未定地对视一眼。冯丹珏样样出色，太出色了，可是就要陪着母亲做老小姐了。在她母亲的时代，她应该已经是个标准的老小姐。

It was naturally my aunt Feng Danjue (her daughter) who came in. Feng Danjue was remarkable in many ways- so many ways- but she was going to stay with her mother and be a spinster. In her mother’s generation, she would already have been consdered an old maid.

就是这些母女间的刹那对视，母亲已经在女儿脸上身上看到了一个老小姐的先兆。

Particlurly in those moments when the mother and daughter looked at one another face to face, the mother would have a premonition, looking at her dougher’s face and body of  her as an old maid. [Am I understanding the sense or implication of 老小姐 correctly here?]

那样的高洁素雅是不近情理的。越是接近做老小姐的目标，她的高洁素雅越是纯粹。

That kind of noble purity, and elegant simplicity was unreasonable. The more she approach the point where she would be an old maid, the more pure became her elegant nobility.

这就给一个个男友增加了难度，越往后越无法破除她那份高洁素雅。

This caused each succeeding boy friend an additional degree of difficulty. The further things proceeded the more there was no way to put aside that stance of nobile aloofness.

并且，似乎因为谁都怕由自己来破坏这份高洁而走开。

Besides, it seemed that because anyone would be afraid to be the one who would break down that elegant nobility, they (the boyfriends) would just go away.

[I am very insecure of my reading of the last two sentences. Please correct any misundersandings.]

 

当然母女俩都明白他们的实意，走开的原因是冯丹珏那位判无期徒刑的父亲。

Of course, the mother and daughter were well aware of the real meaning- the reason they all went away was Danjue’s father’s conviction to an indefinetly extended prison sentence.

 

Questions: Am I right that the last short paragraph contradicts the preceeding analysis of why boyfriends “walk away,” and says that all of that is a rationalization to not have to admit what they actually both know?

 

Why is Dahjue’s  高洁素雅 unreasonable? Does it mean that she is taking an unreasonably righteous stance of loyalty to her mother, who has been deprived of her husbands companionship, so she is rejecting any love relationship for herself? Does 高洁素雅 imply a certain prudishness or aloofness? Is that sentence saying that she is keeping her boyfriends at a distance, and feeling more and more committed to her “purity.” Is virginity implied by 纯粹？

 

Please make any other corrections or comments that you have. Thank you.

[cncorrect]

'高洁素雅' can be interpreted as 'elegant and refined', which is often associated with an aloof demeanor. However, It's unreasonable to expect a spinster, or an unmarried woman, to maintain such an aloof demeanor. '纯粹' could be translated as 'pure' or 'unadulterated', which might suggest an even more distant attitude. Her boyfriends have “walked away” for two reasons: firstly, because of her aloof manner, and secondly, due to her father’s conviction and subsequent indefinite prison sentence. That's my understanding based on my knowledge and culture background. Does this resonate with you?

 

 

[Fred0]

Lu Yanshi has escaped from the prison camp and is making his way south. He stops at a town which has a bus station and is planning to spend the night sleeping in the waiting room. He will share the space with four tramps.

 

到了一个比较像样的县城，他决定住下来。城关有个长途汽车站，有一间满是人粪的候车室。到了天黑，他才明白他不是这里的唯一投宿客，他还有四个流浪汉室友。

 

1. Why is it 满是  rather than 满的？

2. What is the meaning of 人粪？Is the floor of the waiting room full of human feces? Does the term refer to the four tramps?

[Jim]

Yes, it means people have used the room as a toilet. Not an uncommon sight even in my early days here. As for why 满是, you see a similar construction in 全是 where the 是 is "to be" but I'm rubbish at grammar so that's as far as I can explain.

[Fred0]

So intersting! Thank you.

[sanchuan]

The 是 in 满是 is existential, I believe - the same 是 you see in, say, 右边是银行, ie "[somewhere] is X". The adverbial 满 (which is a close synonym of 都 or 全 here) turns it into "everywhere is X".

 

So you can think of 满是人粪的 as a mini existential clause used as an attributive/relative.