The “Santi” are not real

I had been waiting a long time for Netflix’s new series “3 Body Problem,” an adaptation of what is perhaps the most popular work of fiction in contemporary China, and I wasn’t exactly optimistic about the first episode. My friends and I had planned a marathon viewing, but it was the kind of night where you take a photo after every mistake or bad adaptation decision.

To my surprise, the experience, complete with New Haven’s famous Apizza, was quite enjoyable. The show hit the mark: it was fast-paced, clearly told, and visually appealing enough to keep us engaged, even though most of us had read the books. By midnight, we had watched all eight episodes and had barely touched our drinks.

Except for one moment: seven minutes into episode six, Thomas Wade, the ruthless head of the Planetary Defense Council played by Liam Cunningham, announces the extraplanetary threat facing Earth. Santi are real!” he says.

“They mean Santiren” muttered a friend.

Santi means “three bodies.” This is the name author Liu Cixin gave to a fictional planet in the Alpha Centauri system with three suns orbiting each other in random order, generating endless chaos and extreme weather conditions. In Chinese, add renor “person”, would give you “people of Santi.” Without it, what we have is just a planet, a cosmic phenomenon, or a catchy two-syllable slogan better suited to the pronunciation habits of English-speaking viewers on Earth, but not a sentient alien race in its entirety.

One of Ken Liu’s key inventions when he translated Liu’s “Three-Body” trilogy into English was the word Trisolaris, “the planet with three suns.” Santiren Thus was born Trisolaran, or the people of the planet of three suns. Not long ago, Chinese readers celebrated the eloquence with which this term was translated. Today, I feel as if I should be glad that a translation is no longer necessary. santi “are real” seems to signal the acceptance of a Chinese term by Netflix’s English-speaking audience: the Chinese term santiits original form, is thus made “real” in the English-speaking world. But in a way, the term rings completely hollow after being uprooted from its linguistic context. Instead of giving me a sense of familiarity or even pride, santi It feels more alien and detached than Trisolaran. For once, I find myself enjoying the translation more than the original.

Translation is a difficult and often underestimated job. I am often asked what is the most difficult aspect of translating Chinese science fiction into English. “It’s probably the passages that describe hard science, right?” people ask me.

My answer is still no. Science is the easy part. The translation of modern European scientific terminology into Chinese was done methodologically a century ago as part of the New Culture Movement. It went hand in hand with the development of the modern Chinese language itself. There were no direct equivalents for subjects like “physics” and “chemistry” or terms like “particle” or “quantum” in classical Chinese; everything had to be defined, explained, and named. The Chinese intellectuals who learned and spread Western scientific knowledge through translation essentially reinvented the Chinese language. As a result, almost every scientific term I have had to translate into English already has a specific corresponding word at hand. I simply have to retranslate what had already been translated into Chinese a century ago.

It’s the culture that’s difficult: the myths and philosophies that have existed since ancient times, the hidden nuances in words that can only be deciphered with the help of context, much of which lies between the lines, and the ever-changing zeitgeist of contemporary China.

Speak Laoshifor example. Characters in Liu’s “Three-Body Problem” trilogy often refer to the brilliant astrophysicist Ye Wenjie as Laoshibut not always for the same reason. “Professor” would be the most obvious translation of the word, an almost perfect English equivalent. However, when I address someone as LaoshiIt’s almost always more complex than simply acknowledging that this person taught me something at some point. It’s an honorific that encompasses a range of meanings, from extreme reverence to basic politeness or perhaps simply an acknowledgement that someone is an intellectual. In other cases, it can also be an expression of affection, an indication of a connection as deep as blood: the Confucian classics teach disciples to honor and love their Laoshi in the same way they honor and love their father.

For words like Laoshi Some translators avoid the translation process altogether, inserting Chinese words into the text, leaving the reader to guess what they mean from the context. They are often italicized to emphasize their “foreign” nature, much like I had to italicize all the pinyin in this article to conform to Sixth Tone’s style guide. Other Chinese-to-English translators and Chinese diaspora writers working in English have sought to remove italics from Chinese terminology, to demonstrate that English, a language spoken by people all over the world, should embrace diversity and stop treating loanwords as inherently foreign.

However, in a cultural context where Chinese is still treated as a peripheral language, the line between representation and appropriation will always be blurred. To return to the case of Netflix’s “3 Body Problems”, the decision to keep the word santi A well-intentioned homage to the original Chinese books? Or was it just a way to add a touch of exoticism? The story is now set in Britain with a mostly non-Chinese cast, so why do the invading aliens have Chinese names?

As a translator, I can’t help but look at this question from the perspective of translation. After all, the question “What is the most challenging aspect of translating Chinese science fiction into English?” applies not only to literature, but also to media adaptations.

My response after watching “The Three-Body Problem” on Netflix remains the same: it’s never the science that’s hard to translate. My friends at the viewing party come from very different backgrounds, but they were all able to appreciate the world of the series. Liu’s trilogy is largely constructed from the lexicon and tropes of science fiction, a genre built on modern science as well as rather Eurocentric concerns about capitalism, resource acquisition, and territorial expansion. In fact, positioning Liu Cixin in Chinese literary history is more difficult than comparing him to his Anglophone predecessors such as Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. As a work that speaks fluently the poetic and metaphorical language of Anglophone science fiction, “The Three-Body Problem” trilogy is highly translatable. If we view it as science fiction before we view it as Chinese science fiction, then there is no reason why a Hollywood adaptation would not be a success.

At the same time, the discomfort and dissociation I felt upon hearing the word santi The show’s appearances show that culturally sensitive translation remains more difficult than it seems. Chinese audiences are no longer content to ignore concerns about authenticity, especially when there is still so much to discover, reimagine, and share with the world.

Editor-in-chief: Cai Yineng.

(Header image: A still from the Netflix series “3 Body Problem”. From Douban)