Approaching Classical Chinese Poetry in Early Modern Japan: Intralingual and Interlingual Translation Strategies in Rikunyo’s Remarks on Poetry

Abstract:This article examines Remarks on Poetry from Makuzugahara (Katsugen shiwa 葛原詩話, 1787, 1804), a Japanese reference work for Sinitic poets that comments on unusual vocabulary and subject matter mainly gathered from Tang and Song sources. Written by the Tendai Buddhist priest and celebrated Sinitic poet Rikunyo 六如 (1734–1801), Katsugen shiwa draws on both intralingual and interlingual translational techniques to engage with Sinitic texts and clarify their meaning to a Japanese readership. With intralingual techniques such as substitution, paraphrase, or expansion into more readily intelligible Sinitic, Rikunyo engaged in approaches identical to the Ming and Qing commentators whose annotations he referenced; his interlingual translation approaches included not only standard kundoku but explicit appeals to Japanese vernacular. The article shows in concrete terms how Rikunyo (as well as two other scholars who wrote fierce, point-by-point critiques of Katsugen shiwa) made use of these dual translation strategies.