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Natasha Heller called to my attention the fact that there are several Chinese covers of the Oscar-winning song "Let It Go", from the blockbuster Disney computer-animated film "Frozen".

The title (also the refrain) of the song is variously rendered as:

1. Mainland Mandarin

suí tā ba 隨它吧 (lit., "follow / let /allow — it — FINAL PARTICLE indicating suggestion, command, or request")

subtitles:  a. pinyin romanization with tones but each syllable separate (not joined as words); b. Chinese characters; c. English translation of the Chinese

2. Taiwan Mandarin

fàng kāi shǒu 放開手 (lit., "release /set free — open — hand")

subtitles:  a. English translation of the Chinese; b. Chinese characters

3. Taiwanese

ràng tā qù 讓它去 (lit., "let — it — go") (for reasons that will be explained below, I have given the pronunciation in Modern Standard Mandarin [MSM], not Taiwanese)

subtitles:  Chinese only, but this version freely interweaves English into the Chinese, and even gives an explicit Chinese definition of "Let it go":  "the meaning of 'Let it go' is 'ràng tā qù 讓它去'".

Nathasha originally wrote to me to ask my opinion about which of the three translation I thought captured the spirit and feeling of the English original best.  Before turning to that question, I want to focus on the Taiwanese version, because it raises some very interesting issues about writing systems in China.
As soon as I saw the Taiwanese title, ràng tā qù 讓它去, I said to myself, "That doesn't sound very Taiwanesey to me!"  Doubting that this version really was authentic Taiwanese, I started listening to it, and it wasn't very long before I realized that everywhere the subtitles wrote ràng tā qù 讓它去, the singer actually sang something quite different.  Namely, it sounded to me like "ho yi ki" or something of that sort.  Knowing full well that you can't get "ho yi ki" out of ràng tā qù 讓它去, I embarked on an investigation to find out where the actual title and refrain came from, since they clearly weren't directly from ràng tā qù 讓它去.

I soon determined that what the singer was actually saying was indeed hoo7 yi khì 吙伊去, but was forced by circumstances and custom to write ràng tā qù 讓它去.  Before I'm finished with this, it will become apparent how beastly difficult it is to write anything but Literary Sinitic (LS) and MSM with characters.

The first character, huō 吙, usually means "exhale" or serves as an exclamation of surprise in MSM and in LS.  In Taiwanese, however, it is used to transcribe the sound of a Chinese morpheme, hoo7, meaning "let; cause; allow".

The second character, yi 伊, is not often used in MSM, but when it is (borrowed from other topolects and from LS), it means "he, she".

The third character, khì 去, still means "go" as in MSM.

I also noticed a lot of other places in the song where what he sings doesn't match the characters that are written.  This is because there's a discrepancy between written and spoken Taiwanese that results from the fact that there has never been a standardized system for writing Taiwanese with Chinese characters.

"No character for the most frequent morpheme in Taiwanese"

"Our Taiwan"

If anyone ever tries to tell you that Taiwanese, Cantonese, Shanghainese, and dozens of other Sinitic topolects are "all the same when written down", you can politely inform them that they simply don't know the grammar, lexicon, and syntax of these different languages.  As has been pointed out again and again on Language Log, especially with regard to Cantonese, normally what gets written down is Mandarin, not Cantonese, Shanghainese, Taiwanese, and so forth.  In other words, native speakers of Cantonese, Shanghainese, Taiwanese, etc. must learn a second language, Mandarin, if they are to become literate according to the standards of educational authorities.

As a Taiwanese speaking colleague, who cannot read and write Taiwanese put it:

…[S]ince most people in Taiwan (even those who speak Taiwanese as a native language) never learned how to transcribe it either in romanization or in characters, they tend to transcribe it using Mandarin by meaning instead of by sound. I think that's why they use 讓它去 instead of 吙伊去. I think this is the result of the language education policy in Taiwan; at school we never learned POJ [VHM:  Church Romanization] or the standard way to transcribe Taiwanese using characters.

And, from a Taiwanese speaking graduate student:

I think that is one of the issues about transcribing Taiwanese into the Chinese script now. Sometimes it will be written with the Chinese characters of the same meaning; sometimes, it will be transcribed with the Chinese scripts with the same sound. It is not consistent even in the same song.

From yet another Taiwanese speaking graduate student:

…[A]s you know, Taiwanese has no written language yet.

In general, there is a poorness of fit between the Chinese characters and all spoken Sinitic languages, even local versions of Mandarin.  The forte of Chinese characters is for book language, not the vernaculars and colloquial languages.

I'll just give one more example of the contortions one has to go through to write even the simplest Taiwanese in characters.  I remember from my first days in Taiwan (1970-72) that people were fond of calling my baby son "kasúi" ("pretty; beautiful").  I was never certain how to write that expression in characters, but later I found that the "súi" part was written with the character shuǐ 水, which means "water"!  Of course, writing this Taiwanese morpheme with the character 水 doesn't mean that it has anything whatsoever to do with water.  It's merely being used to convey the sound of the Taiwanese morpheme.

I noticed, in watching the video, that when Elsa asks if she's pretty, she uses this morpheme and a Taiwanese interrogative (bo), but the subtitle — supposedly in Taiwanese — actually has "piàoliang ma 漂亮嗎", which is MSM.

Some folks borrow the character tuó 媠 ("pretty") to write the meaning of the Taiwanese morpheme.  So these are the two main strategies for writing Taiwanese (and other topolects) with Chinese characters:  borrowing the characters for  a. their sound, b. their meaning.  Thus, sometimes the characters are being used as semantic equivalents and sometimes as phonetic transcriptions  Naturally, the words of Taiwanese and Mandarin often overlap, in which case the characters can be used directly, both for their sound (though their sounds are not identical) and their meaning, and need not be borrowed for one or the other.

By the way, hoo7 yi khì 吙伊去 is also the Taiwanese translation of the Beatles song "Let it be".

This raises the interesting question of the different nuances between English "Let it be" and "Let it go".

Now, to turn to Natasha's question, which of these three (actually four, counting the real Taiwanese one) Chinese translations of "Let it go" best conveys the sentiment of the English original?  The following are comments by my colleagues and students.

From a professional lecturer on Mandarin who is also a native speaker of Taiwanese:

Thanks for sending the links. I watched the film in the theater and have heard the song in English many times. However, this is the first time I heard it in Chinese and Taiwanese.

The first one (随它吧) is made in Mainland China. The lyrics are closest to the original English lyrics and the phrases are short, easy to remember, and rhyme well. If I am going to perform the song myself, I will pick this version. It sounds more natural to me. However, 随它吧 is actually the translation of "Let it be" rather than "Let it go".

The second one (放开手) is made in Taiwan. The lyrics are more literary and use more long and ornate phrases. While it may read well as a poem, it doesn't sound as natural as a song. It gives me the feeling that the writer is trying too hard, but as a result it sounds awkward. Also, 放开手 is closer to "Let go" rather than "Let it go" in English.

The third one (让它去) is in Taiwanese. It's apparently a mocking song because the lyrics are hilarious and they use a male voice to perform the song. However, the combination of Taiwanese and English in the lyrics actually match perfectly. Because the purpose of this version is to produce humor, the lyrics are least like the original. However, 让它去 is actually the closest translation to "Let it Go" in English, though in Taiwanese 让它去 is pronounced more like "乎伊去"

I would say my favorite is the first one. If I am going to perform in a rather formal occasion, I will use the first version. However, if the performance is mostly to make it fun, I will use the third one.

From a senior lecturer on Mandarin and Taiwanese:

The third one is all Taiwanese, and the lyrics are very different from the original. It's really hilarious. There are a few Taiwanese slang expressions such as "靠北＂khao2 pe7（哭爸-如丧考妣）骂人的话，用词不太文雅，意思是＂不要乱吵＂。however, I feel the lyrics are sooo cute!

I like the second one better, the Chinese lyrics are great.

From a mainland graduate student:

I think the first one is the best of the three. Although I am not familiar with Taiwanese, the third version is really in that language to me. About the translation, I think "随它吧“ is a better translation for "let it go". Also, the second one and third one are too obviously from a translation for me, but the first one doesn't have many marks of translation.

From a Taiwanese graduate student:

I prefer "讓它去", the third version.  It really is in Taiwanese. I was laughing out loud!!
It is "KUSO" ("crappy; shitty; corny"), a notion borrowed from Japan that has spread over all of East Asia. (For "KUSO", see this Wikipedia article.)

This is an good example of KUSO culture in Taiwan.

From a mainland graduate student:

Did you notice that the English subtitles are different? They fit the corresponding Chinese lines well.

The first one is my favorite.

隨它吧 sounds the best, for it reveals the Queen's 大氣灑脫的 ("free and easy; carefree; easygoing") personality. If you use 放手, you mean one person was haunted by something for a long time and tried very hard, and at last chose to let it go, perhaps reluctantly.

From a Taiwanese graduate student:

Comparing these three versions, if I am asked to choose between the two Mandarin versions, I would choose the second one, the Taiwan version translated into Chinese. The reasons are because lyrics written in Taiwan (it is a tendency in Mandarin songs in Taiwan) are prone to use 4-word idioms, such as 暴雨奔騰, 冰雪風霜. In addition, the wording in Taiwan version is also more poetic, more like song lyrics. For example, at 2:39, the Taiwan version goes, 力量強大從地底"直竄雲宵", but the simplified version [VHM:  first one] goes, 我力量從空氣中擴散到地上. In addition, 放開手 in the Taiwan version  seems to have the same rhyme with "let it go." "隨他吧" did not sound that smoothly.

The third version, the Taiwanese one, is more like a vulgar and funny takeoff. Especially the lines in Taiwanese are not the direct translation of the original. It is the creative addition of the writer. Some vulgar uses are emphasized. For example, 天公伯  is like what folk people say 老天爺. "靠北 他們都知道" 靠北 is like Fxxk in English. At 1:20, 啥 T….毀 is interesting. Because it means originally the singer wants to sing 啥小(ㄒ一ㄠ\/), which is like "what the hell." But maybe he notices that it is inappropriate to say 啥小, so he changes suddenly to 啥毀, which is more like "what the heck."

My verdict:  "You pays your money and you takes your choice!"

[Thanks to Henning Kloeter, Melvin Lee, Grace Wu, Fangyi Cheng, Chia-hui Lu, Rebecca Fu, and Sophie Wei]

March 13, 2014 @ 11:22 pm · Filed by Victor Mair under Language and culture, Topolects, Transcription, Translation

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