Burton Watson教授  （陕西省翻译协会培训部主任 王艺摄）

10月24日下午，在陕西省翻译协会培训中心，文学翻译委员会的成员举行了与美国著名汉学家，翻译家，曾任美国哥伦比亚大学，斯坦福大学中国文学教授的Burton Watson教授（伯顿·沃森，有人也译为华兹生）的见面会。由于对诗歌感兴趣，我曾经读过他翻译的许多中国古典名著，这次有幸得以面见这位已过耄耋之年的大家，让我实在高兴。我录下了他在见面会上的简短发言。在其六十多年的职业翻译中，Burton Watson 翻译出版了大量的中国历史、哲学、宗教和诗歌典籍，其中包括有《诗经》《寒山诗选》《苏东坡诗选》《论语》《杜甫诗选》《陆游诗选》《史记》《庄子》《佛经》《莲花经》等中国古典名著。为推动中国文化在英语世界和西方的传播做出了重要贡献，是把中国古典文化介绍到西方的先驱之一。我在见面会上发自内心的说，我们在座的都应向他学习，为让中国文化和文学走向世界而努力，做中西文化交流的桥梁。
                               与Burton Watson教授在一起

网上对Burton Watson的英文介绍如下：

Burton Watson (born 1925) is an accomplished translator of Chinese and Japanese literature and poetry. He has received awards including the Gold Medal Award of the Translation Center at Columbia University in 1979, the PEN Translation Prize in 1981 for his translation with Hiroaki Sato of From the Country of Eight Islands: An Anthology of Japanese Poetry, and again in 1995 for Selected Poems of Su Tung-p'o.

Watson was born in New Rochelle, New York. He dropped out of high school at age 17 to join the Navy in 1943 and was stationed on repair vessels in the South Pacific. His first experiences in Japan came of weekly shore leaves when he was stationed on a ship at Yokosuka Harbor in 1945. Subsequently, he majored in Chinese and Japanese studies at Columbia University. In 1951 he returned to Kyoto, this time as a Ford Foundation Overseas Fellow. In 1956 he completed a dissertation on Sima Qian, earning a Ph.D. from Columbia University. He worked as an English teacher at Doshisha University in Kyoto, as a research assistant to Yoshikawa Kōjirō, who was Professor of Chinese Language and Literature at Kyoto University and as a member of Ruth Fuller Sasaki's team translating Buddhist texts into English. He has also taught at Stanford and Columbia as a professor of Chinese. He moved to Japan in 1973, where he remains to this day, and has devoted much of his time to translation.

He and colleague Professor Donald Keene frequently attend and participate in the seminars of William Theodore de Bary given to students at Columbia University.

                                                   向Burton Watson教授介绍我的译作

                                                很高兴为大家介绍Burton Watson教授

录两首Burton Watson教授翻译的诗歌以飨大家：

           鹿柴              Deer Fence

                              （唐）王维  
                 空山不见人          Empty hills, no one in sight,
                 但闻人语响          Only the sound of someone talking;
                 返景入深林          Late sunlight enters the deep wood,
                 复照青苔上                   Shining over the green moss again.
                                             — Burton Watson，1971

                        《诗经·郑风·子衿》

                     青青子衿，    Blue, blue your collar,

                     悠悠我心。    Sad, sad my heart.

                     纵我不往，    Though I do not go to you,

                     子宁不嗣音?   Why don't you send word?

                     青青子佩，   Blue, blue your belt-stone,

                     悠悠我思。     Sad, sad my thoughts.

                     纵我不往，    Though I do not go to you,

                     子宁不来?       Why don't you come?

                     挑兮达兮，    Restless, heedless,

                     在城阙兮。    I walk the gate tower.

                     一日不见，    One day not seeing you

                     如三月兮!    Is three months long.

                         与Burton Watson教授一行合影留念