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“Rethinking Knowledge Through Early English Translations of Zhu Xi’s Study of Li 理”
Professor I-Hsin Chen’s new essay “Rethinking Knowledge Through Early English Translations of Zhu Xi’s Study of Li 理” (透過朱熹理學的早期英譯重思知識) (2021) has appeared in Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies. Her essay is a part of the Special Issue on Translating Knowledges: Within and Beyond Asia, edited by Yifan Zhu and Kyung Hye Kim. Please check out her essay through the link: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369801X.2020.1863843.
 
This essay analyzes the English translations of Zhu Xi’s (1130–1200) study of li by James Legge (1815–1897), Thomas McClatchie (1812–1885) and Joseph Percy Bruce (1861–1934), who were British missionaries in China and important early translators of Zhu’s works. The essay uses the perspectives provided by Arthur Schopenhauer, George Steiner and Robert J. C. Young to highlight the necessity of translation for understanding worldly realities, while demonstrating Zhu’s role as the translator and transformer of his li system. With this contextual background, the essay discusses how the different translations of li by Legge, McClatchie and Bruce propel modern and contemporary readers to rethink knowledge and appreciate the central role of translation in cross-cultural knowledge creation.
 
本文分析理雅各、麥立芝與卜道成這三位19至20世紀初的英國來華傳教士對朱熹理學的英譯。運用哲學家叔本華及史坦納和楊格等評論家提出的觀點，本文強調翻譯對理解世間現實的必要性，並展示朱熹如何翻譯與轉化其理學體系。據此脈絡背景，本文探討理雅各、麥立芝與卜道成對理學的不同翻譯如何鼓舞現當代讀者重思知識，並欣賞翻譯在跨文化知識開創中的關鍵作用。