MDZS Volume 4 Annotations

Stars of Chaos 杀破狼

Vol 2, Notes 1. Pages 21 - 46.

A very kind tumblr user had to educate me that, yes, Priest edited her work after it was published (stolen on to?) on pirate websites, and so, yes, the translators were working off of a different version than I read.

But I LOVE the version I read, so I'm sharing it with you. You get BOTH.

Please excuse my angry "MISSING PARAGRAPH!" hand-written notes, as I did not realize that official edits were made post-pirate-publication.

Below are many possibly-unnecessary cultural notes that I think are just really neat, plus differences between versions. (I love the old one!)

Here we go:

Very cool word, 帅。

Usually, I read or hear it in reference to some guy being very cool. Devilishly handsome. Dashing.

Here, 大帅 is used as "Commander-in-Chief," which is the same thing as "Marshal," which can mean (dictionary.com) "a military officer of the highest rank" as well as the one I'm more familiar with, "chief of a police or fire department in some cities."

I just like how, in Chinese, I can also-interpret that everyone is calling him "Big Handsome."

Yah, Chen QingXu is a Boss. Who introduces herself as, like, a snake-oil peddler.

讷于言 The young soldier was bad at words. Not sparing, not careful; just bad.

悬壶济世 hang pot save world, because so much of Chinese medicine is boiling herbs for patients to drink.

No one is putting powder in leather sachets. It's dried herbs.

I usually agree with the Seven Seas' formatting, but I think it would be more clear if those sentences were broken into the original two separate paragraphs.

Top: Gold Tank = container for violet gold. It took me a second to figure that out.

Bottom: 小兄弟. I love how you can combine the "older brother" 兄 with the "younger brother" 弟, add a "little" 小 in the front, and it becomes, effectively, "Bro," but respectful.

In case you can't read my tiny bad handwriting: there used to be another paragraph here about how Gu Yun wants to see Chen QingXu because his meds are losing effect. The effects of drinking the meds used to last for months, then weeks, and now they only last two days.

And on the facing page, in the illustration, Chang Geng should be ON his horse.

It hits a little different, I think, to say You have to bathe and change your clothes just to walk your horse? And it has to be this exact time and place?

锋芒毕露 "sharp point must expose"

After years spent guarding the Silk Road, Gu Yun's propensity to show off had gradually faded...

OK. I think ten is enough for this post. More to come...

My DanMei Literary Adventure Masterpost

Stars of Chaos - All Notes Links

Stars of Chaos 杀破狼 Vol 1, Notes 5

By Priest. Translated by 7 Seas.

Pages 249 - 281

Cultural and translation notes.

Yah. Gu Yun is being his usual, trying to be cute and naughty and a good dad all at the same time.

As for that word “catch” vs “trap/cheat”: there is no good connotation to the word 骗. 😝

More under the cut.

The first time I read 光棍 I thought it was some obscene joke. Then I saw that it’s just the casual, colloquial way to refer to single men. Hmmmm.

I love 妖 ♥️。

难看 sometimes means ugly, and other times it just means that the person doesn’t look as happy and healthy as usual. Gu Yun is never “unpleasant” to look at!

大师 Dashi is a title. Just a title. Liao Ran is nobody’s “master.”

Nothing about Chang Geng is nauseating! He’s just… a little clingy of late.

I got confused for a moment if “old” meant “in the old days” vs “old people.”

It means “old people” here.

Shen Yi is respectful to Gu Yun the way a best friend and work-partner is respectful — intimate and deep (and full of nagging advice)(and wary of getting punched in the nuts at any moment); not distanced and absolute in the way that Military Chain of Command usually requires.

Nearly everyone calls Gu Yun by his title, 大帅 dàshuài = commanding general, commander-in-chief, “Big General,” Highest Military Leader in the Land. But where everyone else means it sincerely, the Shen Yi in my head always says it half-sarcastically (unless they are in battle. Then it’s sincere). They’ve been best friends since they could read and write. There is no distance between Gu Yun and Shen Yi.

Stars of Chaos - All The Notes List

All The Seven Seas Books Masterlist

A co-worker the other day commented on how he had heard that the Chinese government was trying to crack down on femininity in men in the media, and I went crazy trying to find that awesome video of Wang Yibo wearing Chanel runway looks. Women’s Chanel runway looks. And I was blathering on and on (while still trying to stay professional and not-weird-obsessed) about how Wang Yibo can just DO that, and I can’t imagine anyone being able to stop him, or even slow him down, just because he likes wearing dangly earrings and orange eyeshadow. And women’s jackets.

I couldn’t find the video again on tumblr, but I had some success on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/hIAOXIf9Alw

Enjoy!

Super-Vocal 声入人心

I have been obsessed with listening, and occasionally watching, song clips from Super Vocal recently.

YouTube

声入人心 单曲纯享

声入人心 单曲纯享

Yes, yes - everyone who likes 周深 Zhou Shen had recommended to watch the whole thing multiple times, but I never had any desire to expand beyond Zhou Shen until recently.

Maybe it was seeing 刘宪华 Henry Lau's expressions as he watched other people sing.

Such a cutie. A polyglot polymath cutie with really nice abs (you all saw the movie Double World, yah?)

Or maybe it was Zheng Yunlong (I still don't think he's fair. Nothing about Zheng Yunlong is fair. Not his height, not his face, not his singing. It's just not fair. Especially when they put him in costume. Any costume. Or do his hair. Any hairstyle. ）

And it's all been incredibly wonderfully ... gay? Since they only have men on the show, all the duets have been between guys. They didn't even bother changing the lyrics to pretend they were singing about girls -- it's just "Oh, 哥 big brother, I miss you" etc. So awesome.

And the men are so wonderfully put together. And talented.

Anyway, I highly recommend it. Everyone was right - Super-Vocal is totally worth listening to / watching. (Maybe someday I'll get to watch the entire thing instead of just listening at work.)

Hi,, I hope I'm not bothering you with this and I'm sorry if my English isn't good, I hope you can understand my questions. I've been thinking about this for a while now and I tried to find information online but I found nothing.

MDZS is the first Chinese Novel I've read and I still haven't finished it yet,,but I've heard about rumors that said that MXTX is in jail, because she sold copies of her books. The rumor isn't true, however it made me wonder something,, I know China's censorship on lgbt related stuff is really heavy and that's why the donghua and drama adaptations of MDZS and other bl works are censored, but I didn't know that authors couldn't sell their novels.

So my question is,, how does MXTX earn money if she isn't allowed to sell her works? She has already finished 3 Danmei novels, and her works are really popular, they even have manhua, donghua or drama adaptations. The adaptations have earned quite a lot of money, but since she's an anonymous writer, does part of it even go to her?

To make the drama, the donghua and the manhua, producers had to ask her permission, I think. So, since the adaptations are doing well, she should get part of the profit, but how does it work? If the Chinese Government really is against lgbt themed works, shouldn't they have done something about her?

I really love her works and I hope that she earns something since she is the one that created all of them. Thanks for considering my question!!

Hi both of you and welcome to the cnovel fandom! Quick intro of the author, MXTX uses a pen name like many webnovel authors, it’s the abbreviation of Mo Xiang Tong Xiu which literally means “Ink Fragrance, Copper [Money] Stench” (墨香铜臭). Fun fact, it’s her mother who coined that name. MXTX wished to pursue a major in literature during university but her mother wanted her to graduate in economy instead while keeping writing on the side, that way she would have the fragrance of ink in one hand and the stench of money in the other.

We also know that she is fairly young, she wrote Scum Villain while she was a university student and she started working on the outline of MDZS in her final year. Tian Guan Ci Fu (Heaven Official’s Blessing) is the third book she completed and a fourth novel is/was in the works, its provisional title is “No rest for the death god” and is supposed to be a supernatural story taking place in a modern setting.

MXTX is one of the most popular webnovel authors on Jinjiang Literature City, the webnovel platform, but her popularity also comes with a great many detractors. You’ve heard some of the malicious rumours circulating in the English-speaking side of the fandom, it’s just a drop in the ocean compared to the outpouring of heated controversies in the Chinese side as the latter can have real-life consequences. There is a different nexus between the creator and the audience and the fandom culture is not the same either, it can be quite deleterious due to the tendency to report any content that one disagrees with.

Censorship in China is... ever-changing and nebulous. How severe it is depends on the medium. Nevertheless, gay literature (同志文学) does exist in China and it is distinct from danmei. I also want to nuance a bit the pervasive idea that anything lgbt is systematically and relentlessly censored in China. The reality is more complex than that and it would be dismissive of the hard-fought gains and visibility that Chinese lgbt activists have obtained these past two decades (some concrete examples: the work of the lgbt centre in Beijing or the pride festival in Shanghai). I don’t know if people are aware of this but lgbt dating apps are thriving in China, the most popular one, Blued, is also the largest lgbt social network worldwide. With that said, the official policy towards homosexuality is the three No’s: “no approval, no disapproval, no promotion”. A stance comparable to the “don’t ask, don’t tell”. It’s not explicit persecution but it manifests in the silencing of public discussion and the limiting media representation of homosexuality. In 2017, the top media regulator issued guidelines banning a number of things, this included obscene and violent content, homosexuality, superstitious pseudoscience (such as reincarnation or spirit possession). On top of that, there is also an ongoing crackdown on online pornography that gets increasingly intense. And that concerns everyone on the internet, it’s astonishing the lengths netizens will go to in order to circumvent the censorship, new slang is developed to refer obliquely to banned words, fanfics are published in image format to prevent text recognition, etc... The censorship might be increasingly prevalent but netizens push back with their resourcefulness. Pushing back is also not without significant risk. Perhaps you have heard of the case of the danmei author that received a severe jail sentence? A few Western media picked up on that and criticised the ruling that was deemed homophobic. Chinese reactions tell a slightly different story, the author's crime was not writing danmei, she was in fact accused of making a profit by illegally producing and disseminating pornographic material. I’m not too keen on the details but it seems she printed the books herself and sold them online. To some Chinese observers, the ruling was not discriminatory because she did break the law. To others, it was absurd because this law dates from an era when internet barely existed and it would have been much more laborious to mass-produce and share porn at that time. There’s a bit of truth in all these points of views. It’s also not disingenuous to say that lgbt content is more likely to be targeted than het content even if the charges are not directly lgbt-related.

Usually contracted authors of webnovel platforms have a more secure status. They get a fee from the purchase of VIP chapters as well as tips from the readers. Other sources of revenue arise when webnovels get popular enough to get the opportunity to be published through official channels or when adaptation rights are sold (I assume that the author receives a share of that deal but perhaps does not get any further financial gain from the adaptation or its merch).

To support the author, I would suggest purchasing TGCF on Jinjiang (guide) or buying the physical versions of her three novels in Chinese (shop, change to English with top-right world icon), the special boxsets of MDZS and TGCF come with tons of goodies!

Hope I could be of service and that my tirade was mildly informative ^^'

I finally found an English-Language explanation of What Happened in the novel 镇魂 Guardian by Priest! It had been hidden in video…and I had refused to watch any reviews until I had finished watching the drama…

So! If you happen to be as confused as I was after reading (loving!)(confused loving!) Zhen Hun, here’s another person to commiserate with about how unfathomable (illogical) the plot of the novel truly is (but we still don’t care. We just want more WeiLan).

https://youtu.be/jfOH0kFvDuQ

jin zixun has such a main character complex that he thinks wei wuxian, the yiling patriarch, declared enemy of the cultivation world cursed him specifically for something that happened like a year ago and when zixun accuses him of doing so wuxian’s like look man first off i don’t care about you enough to hold a grudge i only have a vague idea of who you are and second off it’s awful bold of you to assume i’d let you live if i did

when i watch old movies i’m constantly surprised by how much acting has improved. not that the acting in the classics is bad, it’s just often kind of artificial? it’s acting-y. it’s like stage acting.

it took some decades for the arts of acting and filmmaking to catch up to the potential that was in movies all along; stuff like microexpressions and silences and eyes, oh man people are SO much better at acting with their eyes than they were in the 40′s, or even the 70′s.

the performances we take for granted in adventure movies and comedies now would’ve blown the critics’ socks off in the days of ‘casablanca’.

a word on translation

(just to get this off my chest so I can 问心无愧 going forward)

I’ve been doing a lot of translating for the CQL/The Untamed fandom lately, and while it continues to baffle me that people seem to enjoy the rambling that comes with it, I do want to talk a bit about what goes through my head whenever I translate, just so people know what parameters I’m constantly juggling when I make these choices

this post is partially a disclaimer and partially a PSA, but if you’ve ever had any questions about the reliability of a translation/translator (it’s me. I’m the unreliable translator.), I encourage you read on!

(it does get long, but you already knew that, coming from me)

Keep reading

Terms You Might Want To Know For Your Wuxia/Xianxia Fic

MXTX's danmei are getting increasingly popular, and the fandoms are getting more fic-happy. I've noticed that some writers seem interested in writing their own fics but are concerned of making mistakes with niche honorifics and titles. I've noticed some that have jumped right in, but have made innocent errors that I'd like to correct but fear coming off as rude or presumptuous. And so I've made this list of terms that covers the basics and also some that are a little more niche since they're usually directly translated in cnovels.

DISCLAIMER: This is by no means a comprehensive list of everything one needs to know or would want to know concerning ancient Chinese honorifics and titles, merely what I myself consider useful to keep in mind.

Titles

Shifu: 'Martial father'; gender-neutral

Shizun: 'Martial father'; more formal than 'shifu'; gender-neutral

Shimu: ‘Martial mother’; wife of your martial teacher

Shiniang: ‘Martial mother’; wife of your martial teacher who is also a martial teacher

Shibo: elder apprentice-brother of your shifu; gender-neutral

Shishu: younger apprentice-brother of your shifu; gender-neutral

Shigu: apprentice-sister of your shifu

Shizhi: your martial nephew/niece

Shimei: younger female apprentice of the same generation as you

Shijie: elder female apprentice of the same generation as you

Shidi: younger male apprentice of the same generation as you

Shixiong: elder male apprentice of the same generation as you

Shige: elder male apprentice of the same generation as you, specifically one who has the same shifu as you or is the son of your shifu

Zhanglao: an elder of your sect

Zhangbei: a senior of your sect

Qianbei: a senior not of your sect

Wanbei: a junior not of your sect

Zongzhu: Address for a clan leader

Zhangmen: address for a sect leader

Daozhang: Daoist priests or simply a cultivator in general; gender-neutral

Daogu: Daoist priestess or a female cultivator; not as commonly used as 'daozhang'

Xiangu: Daoist priestess or a female cultivator; not as commonly used as 'daogu'

Sanren: a wandering cultivator

Xianren: 'Immortal Official'; a title of respect and power like 'General'

Xiuzhe: 'Cultivator', can be shortened to 'Xiu'

Xianjun: 'Immortal Master/Lord'

Xianshi: 'Immortal Master/Teacher'

Dashi: 'Great Teacher', address for monks

Xiansheng: Teacher/Sir; in ancient China, the connotation is very scholastic

Houye: address for a duke

Jueye: address for a noble lord, ei. a duke, marquess, earl, etc.

Wangye: address for king/imperial prince

Daren: address for imperial officials

Furen: Madam; the wife of an imperial official/nobleman OR a married woman granted a rank by the royal family

Nushi: Madam; the counterpart of 'xiansheng', connotation is scholastic

Taitai: Madam; address for an old married woman of the gentry, either wife or mother to head of household

Laoye: Old Lord; Address for an adult man with adult children of the gentry; possibly head of household

Nainai: Madam; Address for a married woman of the gentry, possibly wife of head of household

Ye: Lord; address for an adult man of the gentry, possibly head of household

Shaonainai: Young Madam; address for a woman married to a young man of the gentry

Shaoye: Young Lord; address for a young man or boy of the gentry, generation lower than head of household

Xiaoye: Little Lord; can be a synonym for ‘shaoye’ OR the son of a shaoye if ‘shaoye’ is already being used within the family

Xiaojie: Young Mistress; address for an unmarried woman or young girl of . . . the gentry and only the gentry, I believe. Correct me if you know for certain this is incorrect. (WARNING - It's an archaic term that should really only be used in an archaic setting if being used as a title instead of a suffix, because the modern vernacular has it as a term for a prostitute in mainland China. [Surname]-xiaojie is fine; Xiaojie by itself should be avoided.)

Gongzi: ‘Young Master/Lord/Sir'; ‘Childe’; young man from a household of the noble or gentry class

Guniang: 'Young Master/Lady/Miss'; ‘Maiden’; an unmarried woman or young girl from a household of the noble or gentry class

Laozhang: 'Old battle'; polite address for an unrelated old man of lower status than you

Laobo: polite address for an unrelated old man of a higher status that you

Laotou: 'Old man'; informal but not derogatory, implies fondness/closeness

Laopopo: 'Old woman'; informal but not derogatory, implies fondness/closeness

Please note that all of these listed above can be used as stand-alone titles or as suffixed honorifics.

Strictly Prefix/Suffix

-shi: 'Clan'; the suffix for a married woman, essentially means 'née'. (ex. Say Wei Wuxian was a woman and married into the Lan clan through a standard marriage. She would be called 'Wei-shi' by her husband's contemporaries and elders when not in a formal setting. It implies lack of closeness; used by acquaintances.)

a-: A prefix that shows affection or intimacy.

-er: A suffix that shows affection or intimacy; typically for children or those younger than you

-jun: 'Nobleman'; a suffix for a greatly respected man

-zun: 'Revered One'; a suffix for a greatly respected man

-ji: A suffix for a female friend

-bo: A suffix for an older man of your grandparents' generation

-po: A suffix for an older woman of your grandparents' generation