Eighth Post!

[hoisinsauce]

It's one thing if mankind is hunted to extinction by ChatGPT, but I really do object to being executed by Bing.

(https://secretfanspace.dreamwidth.org/2511.html?thread=3169743#cmt3169743 )

Welcome back! Fandom chat, misc creativity, internet weirdness, books, films, anything! Tell meme about it so we can get to the next post title!

(start a comment thread by replying to this post)

Comments

Re: Poetry - Longing for Home (乡愁) by Yu Guangzhong (余光中)

[(Anonymous)]

The title of this poem is more commonly translated as 'nostalgia,' but that didn't sit quite well with me. 乡 means 'hometown' in this context, so it's more 'homesickness' - but that's also a long and ugly word, so 'longing' it was.

I really like the repetition in this poem. Aside from the 'this side / other side' repetition, each section follows this pattern:

乡愁 / 是 / 一枚 / 小小 / 的 / 邮票
homesickness / is / one (measure word) / tiny tiny (repeated for emphasis) / adj. connector / postage stamp

English doesn't really have measure words, but Chinese does. You use different measure words depending on the shape and use of what you're measuring, so it almost makes it easier to visualize each item. The postage stamp is small and flat (枚). The boat ticket is thin and paper-like (张). The gravestone is square (方). The strait is like a bend in a river (湾).