Some Lacanian Suggestions to Translate Contemporary Chinese Poetry

by Claudia Pozzana

The structure of Chinese compels the translator of Chinese poetry to develop specific strategies in order to deal with the lack of language inflections, which in the best authors also involves the ellipses of personal pronouns and subjects. And of course all poets stretch “communicative language” to its limits, which is an added complication. Lacan’s emphasis on the logic of the signifier, the value of phonetic shifts and homophones highlights both the poet’s resistance to the “disquecourcourant” on language and the virulence of the “verbal parasite” with which every poet engages a continuous struggle.