A Study Of E.E.Cummings' Visual Poetry And Their Visual Chinese Translations

E.E.Cummings is a well-known American twentieth-century poet with a fixed place in the American literary canon.Despite many of his contemporary critics claiming that his visual poetic experiments could not be labeled "true poems,"Cummings' unique and fresh writing style offered his successors a new way of expression and sculpted his entirely unparalleled identity?.Unfortunately,he has not been met with as much enthusiasm in China,and until now there has only been one complete Chinese translation of his selected poems,and only a handful of Chinese scholars actively researching him.Chinese translations of his visual poetry seemingly cannot fully grasp his works' playful and visual qualities,therefore few Chinese scholars are familiar with his writing style.However,because of a certain type of uniquely visual Chinese characters,there is no language better suited to translate a visual work.In this paper,Cummingsvisual poetry and their existing Chinese translations will be analyzed,and then compared with ideograms to consider a new translation method for Cummings' visual works.This paper will first introduce the inspiration of this research,the current academic situation,research materials,and overall research method.The main portion of the essay will be split into three parts.The first part of this essay will contemplate the qualities of what defines a "visual poem," and compare a couple visual poets and their writing styles.From there,the research will determine which of Cummings' poems count as "visual," and how they compare to other "visual poems." While distinguishing "visual poetry" from other types,this paper will also clarify why some visual poems can be considered for the proposed translation model,and why others cannot.The second part will offer a detailed analysis of some of Cummings' more representative visual poems,including how the visual elements and styles influence the poem's overall meaning;the paper will then analyze their corresponding Chinese translations.Though the Chinese translations offer innovative contributions to the Cummings canon,it will become clear that they have not yet fully grasped the visual qualities and effects found in the original text,and so it is worth considering a new way to translate.The third part will analyze the visual elements in Chinese oracle bone and bronze script,while also mentioning a Cummings contemporary poet,Ezra Pound,and his theory about an "ideogrammic" writing method that draws inspiration from the visual qualities in Chinese characters.This essay will compare E.E.Cummings' writing style to visual Chinese characters and suggest a new avenue of thought for more visual Chinese translations,mainly from either an ideogrammic or a calligraphic standpoint.This paper will mainly focus on linguistic,poetic,and aesthetic perspectives to analyze how to introduce Cummings' visual poetry to Chinese readers,and how best to capture the playfulness and delight found in his poems.