Introduction and Notes for a Complete Translation of the Chuang Tzu

Victor H. Mair, "Introduction and Notes for a Complete Translation of the Chuang Tzu"
Sino-Platonic Papers, 48 (September, 1994)
render into English. To prepare myself for the task, I gathered together scores of
traditional commentaries and modem exegeses. Although I have consulted them closely
and carefully during the course of my research, I seldom refer to them directly in the notes
to the translation. The main reason for this is that I view the Chuang Tzu primarily as a
work of literature rather than as a work of philosophy and wish to present it to the reading
public unencumbered by technical arcana that would distract from the pleasure of
encountering one of the most playful and witty books in the world.
There have been a few previous translations of the Chuang Tzu into English,
French, German, Mandarin, Japanese, and other languages (including several complete
ones) although nothing like the hundreds that have been done for the Tao Te Ching, that
other well-known Taoist classic. Some of these renditions are quite competent, but I
believe that none of them has succeeded in capturing the quintessential spirit of the book.
Both the style and the thought of the Chuang Tnr are extraordinary. If we try to approach
them by conventional means, we will surely fail. Therefore, in making my translation, I
have not been afraid to experiment with new modes of expression to simulate the odd
quality of writing in the Chuang Tzu. If my rendering has any other aim than philological
accuracy, it is to present Chuang Tzu as a preeminent literary stylist and to rescue him from
the clutches of those who would make of him no more than a waffling philosoph or a
maudlin minister of the Taoist faith.
Before proceeding further, I should be kind enough to explain what the name of the
book means and how it should be pronounced. "Chuang" is the surname of the supposed
author of this marvelous work and "Tzu" simply implies "master" in the sense of the leader
of a given school of thought in ancient China. Hence, we may render "Chuang Tzu" as
"Master Chuang." While the pronunciation of the title is not such an easy matter as its
meaning, I would console my poor reader who is afraid to attempt it by saying that
speakers of Sinitic languages themselves have pronounced (and still do pronounce) the two
sinographs used to write it in widely varying ways. For example, a Cantonese would read
them, more or less, as tshuhng tzyy and a resident of the Chinese capital 2,600 years ago
would have pronounced them roughly as tsyang tsyehg or tsryangh rsyehgh. Therefore, it
does not really matter that much how each of us says the title of the book in his or her own
idiolect. For those who are fastidious, however, the "conect" pronunciation in Modem
Standard Mandarin may be approximated as follows. The "Chu" part of Chuang sounds
like the "juu"
of juice or jute, except that the "u" functions as a glide to the succeeding vowel
and thus comes out as a "w";
the "a" must be long, as in Ma and Pa; the "ng" is the same as
in English. Perhaps the best way to approximate Tzu is to lop off the initial part of words