学文网世界文学名著《安徒生童话》传入我国已经80多年了。早在1919年，周作人就在《新青年》杂志当年1月号上译载了安徒生著名的童话《卖火柴的小女孩》；1942年，北京新潮社出版了林兰、张近芬合译的《旅伴》：在这之后，又先后出版过茅盾、郑振铎、赵景深、顾均正、陈敬容等多人翻译的安徒生童话中的不同篇目。不过，上述这些译文都是从英文或日文转译的，而我国著名翻译家叶君健自50年代初开始陆续从丹麦文直接翻译《安徒生童话》单篇，并于1955年合起来出版了选集并于1983年出版了全集。
建国以来在各种《安徒生童话》译本中，可以说影响最大、评价最高、版本、版次和印数最多的当属叶君健的译本。这个译本以其高质量的译文，不仅在中国受到广泛的好评与欢迎，而且在丹麦也备受称赞，叶君健还因为翻译这部作品荣获丹麦女王玛加丽特二世授予的“丹麦国旗勋章”。因为安徒生也曾荣获过这个勋章，所以这样一来，安徒生与叶君健就成为作者与译者因同样的作品获得同样勋章的唯一先例，并在世界文坛留下了一桩佳话。
关于叶君健荣获勋章的由来，他在1992年2月3日给我的信中曾简要做了介绍。信别提到丹麦许多家报纸对叶君健的中译本给予了极高的评价，认为在《安徒生童话》80多种文字的译本中，中译本“是水平最高的译本”，因为“只有中国的译本把安徒生当做一个伟大作家和诗人来介绍给读者，保持了作者的诗情、幽默感和生动活泼的形象化语言”。译林出版社在出版叶君健的《安徒生童话选集》之前，作为出版者，我再次细读了他的译本，深感丹麦媒体的评论非常准确中肯。我深切感到叶译本与众不同之处，就在于他把安徒生融人于童话中的“诗情”完美地译出来了，这是非常难能可贵的。
叶君健在给我的信中还说：“世界任何国家的安徒生译者，都没有获得过丹麦的奖励。我在丹麦访问时，丹麦文化部长也这样说。”叶君健何以会获得如此殊荣呢?
这得先从《安徒生童话》的艺术特色谈起。安徒生所写的童话，不像以往的许多童话多是民间故事整理出来的，安徒生写童话之前已经是个作家，他是根据自己的社会实践及对生活的感受进行了童话的创作，他的童话不仅写给孩子看，也给大人看。在安徒生童话中，作者怀着满腔热情表达对人间的爱、对人的尊严及人类进步的赞颂，在他的笔下即使是反面人物也往往蠢得可爱，虚荣得可爱，使人们在滑稽中悟出善与恶、美与丑，这种体现在歌颂中的“诗情”和内在美，用叶君健的话来说那是安徒生童话的“灵魂”。
再从叶君健的译本看，他也真正领会到这个“灵魂”。记得1983年春叶君健应邀南下苏州出席首届全国英语翻译征文比赛的评委会，晚上聊天中我问他：“世界文学名著那么多，您怎么想起花那么多的精力去译安徒生童话?”他说：“安徒生父母是鞋匠和洗衣工，从小家境贫寒没受过正规教育，但他对文学有一颗赤诚和执著的心；我也是出身寒门，走上文学道路也经历了艰难坎坷的历程，类似的身世，使我在读安徒生作品时，仿佛能较容易地体察出他观察社会及生活的那种感受。当然，真正吸引我的还是那些童话的艺术感染力。安徒生童话既有美丽的幻想，更有深邃的内涵；他运用童话的形式，同情穷人，颂扬劳动，并不失夸张地揭露上层社会的丑恶及陋习，使人们在苦笑之中产生联想。如1844年发表的《丑小鸭》，深含寓意地昭示人们：受到歧视、讪笑、的丑小鸭，原来是最美、最善良的天鹅，安徒生童话中总是洋溢着一种浪漫主义的诗情！正是这种幻想童话、道德讽刺、诗歌语言三者结合的诗情，激起了我的共鸣及喜爱，促使我下决心去研究和翻译。”这一席话，当年听来并不怎么在意，如今回想起来，恰好为叶君健所以能成功翻译《安徒生童话》做了很好的注释。
叶君健在翻译中强调译者对原著的“再解释”，他没有局限于把安徒生当作只是讲故事的人，而是把他当作一位诗人、哲学家，并在“再解释”中解读出蕴含在童话中的“诗情”，又凭借他对安徒生思想及艺术的系统研究以及自己扎实的中外文功底，终于能在中译本中再现了原著的这种“诗情”。叶君健曾说过：“我一进入安徒生童话人物的生活和感情中去，我的感情也就立时活跃起来。”
（选自李景端著《与名家零距离》）
Translator and Anderson's Fairy Tales
By Li Jingduan
It was more than 80 years ago that the famous fairy tales by Hans Christian Anderson (1805-1875) were first translated into Chinese. The first tale was The Little Match Girl translated by Zhou Zuoren and published in 1911. Many more were translated by prominent writers and translators and published in the following decades. However, all these were rendered into Chinese either from English or from Japanese. It was not until the early 1950s that Ye Junjian (1914-1999), a preeminent writer and translator, translated Anderson's fairy tales directly from Danish. In 1955, Ye published his first selection of the Danish author's fairy tales. In 1983 a complete collection of Anderson's fairy tales, all translated directly from Danish by Ye over decades, was published in China.
Of all the Chinese translations of Anderson's fairy tales, Ye's works have been most popular and influential and have seen most reprints. His high-quality translations are not only well received in China but also highly appreciated in Denmark. In 1988, Ye was awarded the Order of the Dannebrog by the Danish Queen, making him the only translator in the world who shared the honor with the author for the same masterpieces.
Some Danish critics commented that Ye's translations were the best of the translations of Anderson's fairy tales in more than 80 languages the world over. Ye was the only translator of Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tales that ever won the Order of the Dannebrog.
Why was Ye so exceptionally credited?
I chatted with Ye one night in the spring of 1983 when he worked as a juror for a nationwide English translation contest. I asked him why he had chosen Anderson's fairy tales of all the world literary masterpieces. He explained that he felt close to Anderson partly because they both had a similar poverty-stricken family background. Anderson's father was a shoemaker and his mother a garment washer. Though without proper school education, Anderson loved literature and pursued it with heart and soul. Ye also came from a poor family and experienced difficulties in pursuing his dream of writing and translating. The similar family background and life experience enabled Ye to understand Anderson with relative ease. What really attracted the young Chinese was the artistic charm and inspiration in the Danish author's works. These tales express both beautiful dreams and profound morals. They sympathize with the poor, sing of work, and satire the defects and scandals of the upper classes. These tales radiated a romantic spirit in the eyes of Ye. Inspired by the dreams, moral satire and the poetic language of Anderson's fairy tales, Ye devoted himself to translating Anderson's works in a unique style.
Ye's translation focused on the reinterpretation of the original works. He never thought of the author merely as a storyteller. In Ye's eyes, the master was a poet and a philosopher, so he endeavored to release the poetic charm in the fairy tales through reinterpretation. Based on his profound knowledge and understanding of the Danish author's art and thought as well as his own profound linguistic expertise, Ye successfully and vividly recreated Anderson's original poetic charm in the Chinese versions.
(Translated by David)
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