Why Britain Is Spending £1.5Million To Translate Shakespeare Into Chinese

Maybe that old cliché is a truism after all: If you can't beat them, join them. Now, all curious eyes are turning East to taste what could well be described as the Chinese mojo, making America sit up and also look East. Theirs is a development evangelism that is spreading everywhere. China is moving so fast ahead of the rest of the world. We didn't know them well enough beyond their rice, tea and herbs, but China today is an amazing success story.

It has become strategic for businesses and countries to learn how they did it and simply tag along. If it takes learning Chinese to quicken the pace of our development, we would not mind saying 'ne hao' for a greeting.

The people of Britain are prepared to go beyond learning the Chinese language; they are going to translate the complete works of Shakespeare into Chinese. The Conservative government of David Cameron recently approved a £1.5Million grant to the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) to render the 'thees' and 'thous' of Shakespeare's plays in Mandarin. In addition, the RSC would receive £300,000to tour China to experience the fast, rich eastern culture of the Chinese. The plan, as announced by Culture Secretary SajidJavid, would also see 14 Chinese plays translated into the English language, to promote the exchange of learning and “cultural links.”

It is a “brilliant” way of promoting learning between the West and the East, says Secretary Javid. He also addsthat “culture and heritage is what makes the UK great, and by making them accessible to new audiences abroad, it will also help drive more visitors to our shores.” Gregory Doran, the artistic director of the RSC, believes that “we foster deeper understanding between cultures by sharing and telling each other our stories. China has a rich dramatic heritage that mirrors the epic scale, complexity and universality of Shakespeare's work and a national curriculum which requires young people to study his plays.”

I am imagining watching Othello or Hamlet in Mandarin in a theatre in Zhangzhou or Beijing? It would be nice if the characters are given Chinese names, so that we would have Desdemona come out as Li Mon or Shu Huan for Hamlet. As a student of the theatre and other performing arts, I follow Shakespeare with a passion. The first tourist attraction I visited in England was Stratford upon Avon, William Shakespeare's birthplace. I walked on the same road the Bard used centuries ago and also saw the house he lived in. In England, Shakespeare is not just the name of the finest playwright in the world; Shakespeare is a culture and almost a religion. They live him daily.

The arts in Ghana is respected and appreciated today than when Professor Martin Owusu of the School of Performing Arts wrote the Story Ananse Told. While we remain bibliophobes with a poor reading culture, we seem to be writing and reading more these days, even though the best plays seem to have been already written. Uncle Ebo Whyte is a refreshing sensation that has come to enliven theatre in Ghana. Like theatre lovers in England and New York, theatre enthusiasts in Ghana are learning to buy tickets ahead of time to see their favorite plays. The media promotion of theatrical performances has also been helpful, but we still have a long way to go to get anywhere close the worst example in Piccadilly Circus or Stratford. I hear it is better in Nigeria.

Shakespeare would succeed in China, we are almost certain. Maybe we could also pay the School of Performing Arts at University of Ghana or Rovermanto render a Twi version of Kofi Shakespeare. We might start the whole national language debate again, and argue over which local language is most representative of the Ghanaian. I just threw this up for discussion and I got a few intriguing responses from my immediate family. Why not Nii Shakespeare or Efo Shakespeare? Must it always be Twi, somebody might want to know? The theatre lover in Navrongo may want to see Shakespeare in Kasin, especially if Roverman takes the play to the KasenaNankana district.

If the Roverman people produce a Twi Shakespeare, they risk losing all their 'elite' audience, according to a self-styled film critic. People would put them in the Kumawood bracket, and that would reduce their 'artistic quality' in the eyes of the audience, alluding to the current 'rift' between Ghallywood and Kumawood movies. There is a silent classification between Ghanaian moviegoers, where those who watch films produced in Twi (Kumawood) are those who do not have the critical eye to appreciate verisimilitude, script quality, and other elements of good theatre or great films. The Ghallywood audience is the advance degree-holding professional who knows the effect of voice texture and characterization in play analysis and interpretation.

By the way, do we love Shakespeare in Ghana? It was not one of the favourite subjects for many students, most of whom found the 'thees' and 'thous' of 16th Century English too difficult. Even at university, not many of us appreciated and made good use of the rich imagery in Shakespearean tragedies. Where it was a core subject, we found it a boring chore, and when we chose to study it as an elective, we wished we had settled for something that lent itself to easy literary critique.

The British are proud of their Shakespeare, and are prepared to invest in him centuries after his death. Because the world has failed to produce another Shakespeare, we have sought to retell his stories in other formats and mediums. We cannot reinvent him, but we can 'mime' his quality in other great writers. Moliere was France's answer to Shakespeare while Sophocles may be Greeks'. Nigeria came closest in Woye Soyinka, who shares the same initials (WS) with William Shakespeare. Ghana's Shakespeare?Maybe staging Romeo and Juliet in Twi would give us a Kumawood Shakespeare.

KwesiTawiah-Benjamin
[email protected]