郁达夫的《故都的秋》三种英译文(王椒升、张培基和张梦井

《故都的秋》

秋天，无论在什么地方的秋天，总是好的;可是啊，北国的秋，却特别地来得清，来得静，来得悲凉。我的不远千里，要从杭州赶上青岛，更要从青岛赶上北平来的理由，也不过想饱尝一尝这‚秋‛，这故都的秋味。

江南，秋当然也是有的，但草木凋得慢，空气来得润，天的颜显得淡，并且又时常多雨而少风;一个人夹在苏州上海杭州，或厦门香港广州的市民中间，混混沌沌地过去，只能感到一点点清凉，秋的味，秋的，秋的意境与姿态，总看不饱，尝不透，赏玩不到十足。秋并不是名花，也并不是美酒，那一种半开、半醉的状态，在领略秋的过程上，是不合适的。

不逢北国之秋，已将近十余年了。在南方每年到了秋天，总要想起陶然亭的芦花，钓鱼台的柳影，西山的虫唱，玉泉的夜月，潭柘寺的钟声。在北平即使不出门去吧，就是在皇城人海之中，租人家一椽破屋来住着，早晨起来，泡一碗浓茶，向院子一坐，你也能看得到很高很高的碧绿的天，听得到青天下驯鸽的飞声。从槐树叶底，朝东细数着一丝一丝漏下来的日光，或在破壁腰中，静对着像喇叭似的牵牛花(朝荣)的蓝朵，自然而然地也能够感觉到十分的秋意。说到了牵牛花，我以为以蓝或白者为佳，紫黑次之，淡红最下。最好，还要在牵牛花底，教长着几根疏疏落落的尖细且长的秋草，使作陪衬。

北国的槐树，也是一种能便人联想起秋来的点辍。像花而又不是花的那一种落蕊，早晨起来，会铺得满地。脚踏上去，声音也没有，气味也没有，只能感出一点点极微细极柔软的触觉。扫街的在树影下一阵扫后，灰土上留下来的一条条

扫帚的丝纹，看起来既觉得细腻，又觉得清闲，潜意识下并且还觉得有点儿落寞，古人所说的梧桐一叶而天下知秋的遥想，大约也就在这些深沉的地方。

秋蝉的衰弱的残声，更是北国的特产，因为北平处处全长着树，屋子又低，所以无论在什么地方，都听得见它们的啼唱。在南方是非要上郊外或山上去才听得到的。这秋蝉的嘶叫，在北方可和蟋蟀耗子一样，简直像是家家户户都养在家里的家虫。

还有秋雨哩，北方的秋雨，也似乎比南方的下得奇，下得有味，下得更像样。

在灰沉沉的天底下，忽而来一阵凉风，便息列索落地下起雨来了。一层雨过，云渐渐地卷向了西去，天又晴了，太阳又露出脸来了，着着很厚的青布单衣或夹袄的都市闲人，咬着烟管，在雨后的斜桥影里，上桥头树底下去一立，遇见熟人，便会用了缓慢悠闲的声调，微叹着互答着地说：

‚唉，天可真凉了-----‛(这了字念得很高，拖得很长。)

‚可不是吗?一层秋雨一层凉了!‛

北方人念阵字，总老像是层字，平平仄仄起来，这念错的歧韵，倒来得正好。

北方的果树，到秋天，也是一种奇景。第一是枣子树，屋角，墙头，茅房边上，灶房门口，它都会一株株地长大起来。像橄榄又像鸽蛋似的这枣子颗儿，在小椭圆形的细叶中间，显出淡绿微黄的颜的时候，正是秋的全盛时期，等枣树叶落，枣子红完，西北风就要起来了，北方便是沙尘灰土的世界，只有这枣子、

柿子、葡萄，成熟到八九分的七八月之交，是北国的清秋的佳日，是一年之中最好也没有的Golden Days。

有些批评家说，中国的文人学士，尤其是诗人，都带着很浓厚的颓废的彩，所以中国的诗文里，赞颂秋的文字的特别的多。但外国的诗人，又何尝不然?我虽则外国诗文念的不多，也不想开出帐来，做一篇秋的诗歌散文钞，但你若去一翻英德法意等诗人的集子，或各国的诗文的Anthology来，总能够看到许多并于秋的歌颂和悲啼。各著名的大诗人的长篇田园诗或四季诗里，也总以关于秋的部分。写得最出而最有味。足见有感觉的动物，有情趣的人类，对于秋，总是一样地特别能引起深沉，幽远、严厉、萧索的感触来的。不单是诗人，就是被关闭在牢狱里的囚犯，到了秋天，我想也一定能感到一种不能自己的深情，秋之于人，何尝有国别，更何尝有人种阶级的区别呢?不过在中国，文字里有一个‚秋士‛的成语，读本里又有着很普遍的欧阳子的《秋声》与苏东坡的《赤壁赋》等，就觉得中国的文人，与秋和关系特别深了，可是这秋的深味，尤其是中国的秋的深味，非要在北方，才感受得到底。

南国之秋，当然也是有它的特异的地方的，比如甘四桥的明月，钱塘江的秋潮，普陀山的凉雾，荔枝湾的残荷等等，可是彩不浓，回味不永。比起北国的秋来，正像是黄河之与白干，稀饭之与馍馍，鲈鱼之与大蟹，黄犬之与骆驼。

秋天，这北国的秋天，若留得住的话，我愿把寿命的三分之二折去，换得一个三分之一的零头。

Autumn in the Old Capital

Autumn is always pleasant no matter where it is. But autumn in the

North is especially clear,especially serene, especially pathetic in its

coolness. It was for no other purpose than to savour this ‚autumn‛ to

the full, the taste of autumn in the old capital, that I went to the trouble

of journeying a thousand li, from Hangzhou to Qingdao, and thence to

Beiping.

There is autumn also south of the Yangtze, of course. But there the

grass and trees take more time to wither, the air is moist and the sky is

pale. There is frequent rain and less wind. One who dwells among the

citizens of Suzhou, Shanghai or Hangzhou, of Xiamen, Hong Kong or

Guangzhou, spends his days listlessly, with but a vague feeling of

coolness. As to the taste and colour of autumn, its particular

significance and moods, it is impossible to have one’s fill of seeing,

tasting or enjoying. Autumn is not a famous flower, nor a delicious wine.

It is inappropriate while enjoying the pleasures of autumn to expect

something in a state of half-open or half-tipsy.

It is almost ten-odd years since I last had occasion to see autumn in

the North. In the South,the return of each autumn would bring

memories of the Pavilion of Happiness nestling among red flowers, the

Fishing Terrace canopied by the shadows of willows, the chirp of insects

in the Western Hills, the glamour of moonlight over the Jade Springs, the

chime of bells in the Tanzhesi Temple. Here in Beiping, suppose you are

living amidst the city’s teeming millions in a ramshackle house that you

have rented. On rising one early morning and seating yourself in the

courtyard with a cup of strong tea before you, without even venturing

out of doors you can see an azure sky high above, and hear homing

pigeons whirring past under it. Facing the east, you count the rays of

sunlight filtering through the leaves of scholar-trees. From a gap in some

dilapidated wall, you brood silently over the blue trumpet-like petals of

morning-glories. And a sense of the fullness of autumn will come upon

you ng of morning-glories, the blue or white flowers

seem to me best, those of dark-purple next and the pink ones last. And

at the bottom of the morning-glories, to crown all, let there be a

sprinkling of sparse, sharp-pointed long blades of autumn grass, to set

off the flowers with.

The scholar-trees in North China are also an attraction that calls to

mind the advent of autumn. You get up in the early morning, to find the

ground carpeted all over with their fallen petals, which still have

something of the look of flowers, though actually not flowers any longer.

Tread on them, and you are conscious only of a very slight and soft

sense of touch,with neither sound nor smell. The lines left on the dusty

soil by scavengers in their round of sweeping under the shadows of

trees give an impression of exquisiteness as well as serenity,so that

subconsciously you still feel a suggestion of loneliness. It was probably

something as profound as this that inspired the phantasy of the ancients

that the fall of a single leaf from the parasol-tree intimates to all the

world the arrival of autumn.

The chirping of cicadas in autumn, feeble and lingering, is another

specialty of North Beiping, everywhere are trees, and you can

catch their singing anywhere, the houses being usually so low. In the

South this would be an impossibility unless you went out of your way to

get to the suburbs or the hills. In Beiping, the chirp of the autumn cicada

is quite like the chirp of a cricket or the squeak of a mouse—domestic

creatures to be found in every household.

Then there is the autumn rain. Somehow rain in autumn falls in the

North more magically, a sit were, than it does in the South—more

tastefully, more becomingly.

A sudden gust of cool wind across a somber sky, and a patter of

rain begins. When the rain subsides, the sun reappears in a blue sky, and

the clouds drift slowly westward. At the end of the slanting bridge,

silhouetted against its shadows after the rain, stand city idlers under the

trees, pipe in mouth, in their thick unlined dress or lined coat of black

cloth. And if they chance upon an acquaintance, something like the

following dialogue might ensue, in a leisurely drawl punctuated by a

low sigh.

‚Yes, it’s getting cool really…‛, with the last word raised to a high

pitch and long-drawn-out.‚Yes, isn’t it? ‘A spatter of autumn rain, a

spell of cool’ as the saying goes, you know.‛In a Northerner’s accents,

the character for ‚spatter‛ and ‚spell‛ often sounds not unlike the

character for ‚layer‛. Judging by the tonal patterns in classical Chinese

prosody, this mispronunciation seems to come in quite appropriately.

Another phenomenon in the North when a autumn arrives is the

fruit-trees. To begin with,there is the date-tree, which flourishes

anywhere in the corners of houses, against the walls,beside thatched

huts, outside kitchen doors. When the dates grow to the size of olives or

pigeon’s eggs, a light green or yellow set amidst small fine oval leaves,

then autumn will bein all its glory. But the northwest wind will blow as

soon as the trees shed their leaves and the dates have turned red. Then

the whole of the North will become a world of dust and sand and

grayish soil. So it is only when the dates, persimmons and grapes are ripe

to about 80 or 90percent, at the juncture of July and August, that

autumn in the North is at its very best—the Golden Days of the year

beyond compare.

In the opinion of some critics, men of letters and scholars in China,

especially poets, have a strong tinge of decadence. That is why in

Chinese poetry and prose writings in praise of autumn particularly

abound. But then is this not the case also with the poets of other

countries? Little as I have read of foreign poetry and prose, and not

inclined either to make a list of titles for an anthology of poetry and

prose about autumn, I feel sure that if you but take the trouble to leaf

through the works of British, German, French and Italian poets, or the

anthologies of verse and prose of various countries, you are bound to

come across an abundance of encomiums and lamentations about

autumn. And in the long pastoral poems aswell as poems about the

seasons by all celebrated poets, it is those with autumn as their theme

that possess the greatest excellence and appeal. This shows that in all

sensitive animals, and in all emotional human beings alike, autumn is

capable particularly of arousing feelings that are deep and profound,

serious and melancholy. Nor is this the case with poets only. When

autumn comes, to my mind even prisoners in gaols must be stirred by a

poignant emotion they cannot resist. In fact, with all human beings,

what discrimination does autumn ever make as to their nationality, their

race or class? Here in China, however, we have in our literature the

term ‚autumn scholar‛. And in our school textbooks, essays like

Ouyang Xiu’s‚Autumn Sounds‛ and Su Dongpo’s ‚A Visit to the Red

Cliff‛ frequently appear. This cannot but lead us to the conclusion that

men of letters in China are particularly attached to autumn. But this

profound taste of autumn, especially this profound taste of autumn in

China, can be enjoyed fully nowhere else than in the North China.

Autumn in the South, needless to say, has charms all its own. For

example, the Twenty-four Bridges with its brilliant moonlight, the Autumn

Bore on the Qiantang River, the Putuo Isles enshrouded in mist, the

Lichee Bay strewn with fading lotuses. Yet none of these are strong

enough in colour, or remain long enough in our recollection. Compared

with autumn in the North, they are but as yellow wine to white spirit, rice

gruel to steamed buns, the perch to the crab, the dog to the camel.

I would that I could give up two-thirds of my life for an autumn

one-third its length, should it be possible to make autumn stay—this

autumn in the North of China.

Autumn in Peiping

Autumn, wherever it is, always has something to recommend itself.

In North China, however,it is particularly limpid, serene and melancholy.

To enjoy its atmosphere to the full in the onetime capital, I have,

therefore, made light of travelling a long distance from Hanghou to

Qingdao, and thence to Peiping.

There is of course autumn in the South too, but over there plants

wither slowly, the air is moist, the sky pallid, and it is more often rainy

than windy. While muddling along all by myself among the urban

dwellers of Suzhou, Shanghai, Xian men, Hong Kong or Guangzhou, I

feel nothing but a little chill in the air, without ever relishing to my heart’s content the flavour,colour, mood and style of the season. Unlike

famous flowers which are most attractive when half opening, good

wine which is most tempting when one is half drunk, autumn, however,

is best appreciated in its entirety.

It is more than a decade since I last saw autumn in North. When I

am in the South, the arrival of each autumn will put me in mind of

Peiping’s Tao Ran Ting with its reed catkins, Diao Yu Tai with its shady

willow trees, Western Hills with their chirping insects, Yu Quan Shan

Mountain on a moonlight evening and Tan Zhe Si with its reverberating

bell. Suppose you put up in a humble rented house inside the bustling

imperial city, you can, on getting up at dawn, sit in your courtyard

sipping a cup of strong tea, leisurely watch the high azure skies and

listen to pigeons circling overhead. Saunter eastward under locust trees

to closely observe streaks of sunlight filtering through their foliage, or

quietly watch the trumpet-shaped blue flowers of morning glories

climbing half way up a dilapidated wall, and an intense feeling of

autumn will of itself well up inside you. As to morning glories, I like their

blue or white flowers best, dark purple ones second best, and pink ones

third best. It will be most desirable to have them setoff by some tall thin

grass planted underneath here and there. Locust trees in the North, as a

decorative embellishment of nature, also associate us with autumn. On

getting up early in the morning, you will find the ground strewn all over

with flower-like pistils fallen from locust trees. Quiet and smell less, they

feel tiny and soft underfoot. After a street cleaner has done the

sweeping under the shade of the trees, you will discover countless lines

left by his broom in the dust, which look so fine and quiet that somehow

a feeling of forlornness will begin to creep up on you. The same depth of

implication is found in the ancient saying that a single fallen leaf from

the wutong tree is more than enough to inform the world of autumn’s

presence.

The sporadic feeble chirping of cicadas is especially characteristic

of autumn in the North. Due to the abundance of trees and the low

altitude of dwellings in Peiping, cicadas are audible in every nook and

cranny of the city. In the South, however, one cannot hear them unless

in suburbs or hills. Because of their ubiquitous shrill noise, these insects in

Peiping seem to be living off every household like crickets or mice.

As for autumn rains in the North, they also seem to differ from those

in the South, being more appealing, more temperate.

A sudden gust of cool wind under the slaty sky, and raindrops will

start pitter-pattering. Soon when the rain is over, the clouds begin

gradually to roll towards the west and the sun comes out in the blue sky.

Some idle townsfolk, wearing lined or unlined clothing made of thick

cloth,will come out pipe in mouth and, loitering under a tree by the end

of a bridge, exchange leisurely conversation with acquaintances with a

slight touch of regret at the passing of time:‚Oh, real nice and cool—‚

‚Sure! Getting cooler with each autumn shower!‛

Fruit trees in the North also make a wonderful sight in autumn. Take

jujube tree for grow everywhere—around the corner of a

house, at the foot of a wall, by the side of a latrine or outside a kitchen

door. It is at the height of autumn that jujubes, shaped like dates or

pigeon eggs, make their appearance in a light yellowish-green

amongst tiny elliptic the time when they have turned ruddy

and the leaves fallen, the north-westerly wind will begin to reign

supreme and make a dusty world of the North. Only at the turn of July

and August when jujubes, persimmons, grapes are 80-90 percent ripe

will the North have the best of autumn—the golden days in a year.

Some literary critics say that Chinese literati, especially poets, are

mostly disposed to be decadent, which accounts for predominance of

Chinese works singing the praises of , the same is true of

foreign poets, isn’t it? I haven’t read much of foreign poetry and prose,

nor do I want to enumerate autumn-related poems and essays in

foreign , if you browse through collected works of English,

German, French or Italian poets, or various countries’ anthologies of

poetry or prose, you can always comes across a great many literary

pieces eulogizing or lamenting autumn. Long pastoral poems or songs

about the four seasons by renowned poets are mostly distinguished by

beautiful moving lines on autumn. All that goes to show that all live

creatures and sensitive humans alike are prone to the feeling of depth,

remoteness, severity and bleakness. Not only poets, even convicts in

prison, I suppose, have deep sentiments in autumn in spite of

themselves. Autumn treats all humans alike, regardless of nationality,

race or class. However, judging from Chinese idiom qiushi(autumn

scholar, meaning and aged scholar grieving over frustrations in his life)

and frequents election in textbooks of Ouyang Xiu’s On the Autumn

Sough and Su Dongpo’s On the Red Cliff, Chinese men of letters seem

to be particularly autumn-minded. But, to know the real flavour of

autumn, especially China’s autumn, one has to visit the North.

Autumn in the South also has its unique features, such as the moonlit

Ershisi Bridge in Yangzhou, the flowing sea tide at the Qiantangjiang

River, the mist-shrouded Putuo Mountain and lotuses at the Lizhiwan Bay.

But they all lack strong colour and lingering flavour. Southern autumn is

to Northern autumn what yellow rice wine is to kaoliang wine, congee

to steamed buns, perches to crabs, yellow dogs to camels.

Autumn, I mean Northern autumn, if only it could be made to last

forever! I would be more than willing to keep but one-third of my

life-span and have two-thirds of it bartered for the prolonged stay of the

season!

Autumn in the Old Capital City

Autumn is always beautiful no matter where it is. However, the

autumn in northern China is exceptionally clear, calm and solitary. I

made light of travelling a thousand li from Hangzhou to Qingdao and

from Qingdao to Beijing for no special purpose other than to taste

autumn to the fullest, the autumn in the old capital city.

There is also autumn in the south but the grass there fades rather

slowly and the air is sky seems pale there and it rains quite

often and the wind seldom blows. A man living listlessly among the

civilians of Suzhou, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Xiamen, Hong Kong or

Guangzhou can only have a simple sensation of a bit of coolness. The

sights and flavour of autumn in the south can not make him taste and

enjoy autumn to the fullest. Autumn is nota famous flower, nor is it a

delicious wine. I can not fully appreciate a state when a flower is but

half open or a wine but half intoxicating.

I have not seen autumn in the north for over ten years. In the south,

the return of autumn each year often reminds me of the catkin reeds at

the Fishing Platform, the insects' chirp on the West Hills, the night moon

over the Jade pool Hill, and the bell ringing at the Tanzhe Temple. In

Beijing, suppose you are living amongst the millions of civilians in the

imperial city in a rented dilapidated house, after getting up in the

morning, you can still enjoy the azure sky in the courtyard with a cup of

tea in hand and listen to the domestic pigeons sweeping across the

blue sky. When you carefully count, one by one, the sunbeams filtering

through the foliage of the Chinese scholar-trees in the east or examine

the blue flowers of the Morning Glories on a broken wall, you will

instantly feel the sense of perfect autumn. Talking about morning glories,

I believe the red or white flowers are the best, the violet brown ones are

secondary and the pink ones are the last. And it's better to have some

thin autumn grass growing under the morning glories as a set off.

The Chinese scholar-tree is another thing that reminds us of the

embellishment of the morning you will find the ground

completely covered with the flower stamens. When you step on them,

you just have the slightest sense of touching something very soft with

neither sound nor smell. In the shadows of the trees, the street sweepers

have left traces of their big brooms on the dusty ground. They look both

fine and clean but you will feel a sense of loneliness deep within. the old

saying, "The fall of a Chinese parasol leaf will make the whole world

know the coming of autumn" may lie in this deep concealed place.

The feeble chirp of cicadae in autumn is still a special product of

the north. Trees are found everywhere in Beijing for the many shrubs that

hug the houses are alive with the chirp of cicadae. In the south, it is only

in the suburbs or in the hills that one can hear their chirp. Their chirp in

Beijing is like the chirp of crickets and the squeak of rats fed nearly in

every household.

There is also the autumn rain. The autumn rain in the north appears

much more strange,more flavorous than in the south.

Under a grey sky, a sudden gust of cool wind will rise and the

pitter-patter of rain will be heard. After a shower, the clouds gradually

roll to the west, the sky becomes blue again and the sun appears. After

the rain the city idlers bundle up with thick layers of warmth would go to

the bridge head under the tree in the slanting bridge shadow, pipe in

mouth. When meeting with acquaintances, they would sigh and

exchange remarks in a slow and leisurely way."Ai, it's really becoming

col——d." (This last word lasts a very, very long time.)

"Yes, it is! A smell of autumn rain and a change in the weather."

To the people in the north, "spell" is often pronounced as "smell".

Talking about tonal patterns in classical Chinese poetry, this misread

rhyme is quite appropriate.

The fruit trees in the north are also a strange sight in late autumn.

The first is the date can grow in corners, on walls, by huts, and

right by the kitchen door. they spring up one after another. When the

dates, which look like Chinese olives or a pigeon eggs, show a light

green and soft yellow colour amongst the oval leaves, it is the heyday

period in autumn. After the date trees have shed their leaves and the

dates have become red, the northwest wind starts blowing. The north

will soon become a sandy and dusty world. It is only between the

seventh and eighth month of the lunar year when the dates,

persimmons and grapes are nearly ripe that is the clear autumn in the

north, the Golden Day of the year.

Some critics say that Chinese men of letters, especially poets,

display a thick decadent colour in their writings. Therefore, there are

many poems and articles dedicated to the praise of the autumn

season. But isn't it also so among foreign poets? I haven't read many

poems or literary compositions. Nor do I want to list these writings to

compose a collection of poem sand prose about autumn. However,

should you thumb through the poem collections of Britain,Germany,

France, Italy, or the Anthology of all the countries, you will surely find an

abundance of songs and grievances about the autumn season.

Among the long pastoral poetry or the four season poetry written by

every famous poet, the best and the most flavorous parts are about

autumn. The just proves that sensible animals including man, with their

varied temperaments and interests can possess a sensation about

autumn which can bring about a very deep, secluded and intense

desolate sense. When autumn comes, not just poets even prisoners in

jail feel an uncontrollable deep emotion. To man, how can it been

closed within a boundary and still less of the difference between the

human race and its classes? In Chinese characters there is a phrase,

"Autumn Scholars". In Quyang Zi's textbooks "Autumn Tune: and Su

Dongpo's "Ode to Chibi", we can find that Chinese scholars have a

special and deep relationship with autumn. The deep flavour of autumn

in China can be especially felt in no other area than in the north.

Autumn in south, of course, has its special highlights, such as the

bright moon above the Twenty-four Bridge, the autumn tide in the

Qiantang River, the cool mist on the Putuo Mountain, the residue lotus

by the Lizhi Bend, etc. Mind you, the colours are not deep enough and

the aftertaste is not so long. Compared with autumn in the north, it is just

like millet wine to white spirit, porridge to steamed bread, perch to crab,

and a yellow dog to a in the north, if I could ask it to stay,

I would be only too willing to deduct two-thirds of my life for that

change.