On ne voit bien qu'avec le cœur, Comparing Chinese versions

On ne voit bien qu'avec le cœur. I've got 48 Chinese translations of this simple but profound sentence. (Excludes adaptations and the shameless plagiarism of Liú 2004. There are also older translations I haven't been able to get hold of.)

Only 24 of the Chinese versions appear to be translated from the original French. 23 take a 'shortcut' by translating from the English version of Katherine Woods ('It is only with the heart that one can see rightly'), and one is a bit uncertain.

Since there are so many translations, there is quite a bit of variation. For convenience, we will divide this into matters of grammatical structure and matters of expression. A few exceptional grammatical structures are treated separately.

1. GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE

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This sentence is quite simple grammatically, but illustrates how superficial similarity may hide a rather different grammatical system. Of particular interest is the translation of the pivotal ne ... que 'only' structure.

On the surface, the basic sentence pattern is not so different from the French or English original:

BASIC SENTENCE
on 'one'	avec le cœur 'with the heart'	voit 'sees'	[les choses] ['things']
人 rén 'person'	用心 yòng xīn 'with heart'	看 kàn 'look, see'	[事情] [shìqing] ['things']

But there is already an interesting difference from French and English: 'with the heart' comes before the verb 'to see' in Chinese.

Double verb

In fact, Chinese grammarians don't regard 用 yòng as a 'preposition' at all; they regard it as a verb -- the verb 'to use'. 'With the heart' in Chinese literally means 'use the heart'. (While virtually all the translators use 用 yòng to mean 'with', there's one translator who uses 依靠 yīkào 'to rely on' instead. This creates a more formal effect.)

So unlike French and English, the Chinese sentence has two verbs. The first is 用 yòng 'to use', the second is 看 kàn 'to see':

DOUBLE-VERB SENTENCE
on 'one'	emploie 'uses'	le cœur 'the heart'	voit 'sees'	[les choses] ['things']
人 rén 'person'	用 yòng 'use'	心 xīn 'heart'	看 kàn 'look, see'	[事情] [shìqing] ['things']

(While conventionally treated as a verb, 用 yòng strongly resembles a class of words known as jieci (介詞 / 介词 jiècí). These are derived from verbs but behave a lot like English prepositions. See popup )

用 yòng's verbal nature gives rise to an extra twist in the Chinese. It's common in speech to insert the verb 去 qù 'to go' or a similar verb before the main verb of the sentence:

BASIC PATTERN WITH 去 qù
on 'one'	emploie le cœur 'uses the heart'	aller 'go'	voir 'see'	[les choses] ['things']
人 rén 'person'	用心 yòng xīn 'use heart'	去 qù 'go'	看 kàn 'look, see'	[事情] [shìqing] ['things']

去 qù adds a dimension of purpose. The sentence can be interpreted as meaning: "A person uses the heart in order to go and see [things]." About a third of translators insert 去 qù or a similar word. More

Subject and object

Chinese lacks a pronoun corresponding to on or 'one', which means that an alternative way of expressing this must be found. Unlike English or French, however, it's often acceptable to omit the subject in Chinese prose, and here a majority of Chinese translators do leave the subject blank. But a few (particularly these translating from the English) use expressions meaning 'people'. More (Note: Some translators use an alternative grammatical structure where le coeur / 'the heart' is made into the subject of the sentence. This is treated at Exceptional Patterns below.)

Whether for linguistic or cultural reasons, about a quarter of translators also prefer to spell out the object of the sentence, generally with an expression meaning 'things' or 'essential things'. More

Ne .. que

It is the ne ... que construction that causes the biggest departure from the English and French originals.

In the French original, the grammatical focus of ne ... que is avec le cœur:

ne ... qu'avec le cœur

Similarly for the English:

'only with the heart',
'it is only with the heart that...'

This restricts the means of achieving clear vision to the heart.

Chinese does this quite differently. To express the concept of having only one choice in order to attain an objective, Chinese recasts the sentence like this:

RENDERING 'ONLY'
A		B
	employer le cœur (va voir) 'use the heart (to go and look)'		peut voir bien 'can see clearly'
只有 zhǐ yǒu 'only (if)'	用心 (去看) yòng xīn qù kàn 'use heart (go look)'	才 cái 'only then'	能看得清楚 néng kàn-de-qīngchu 'can see clearly'

What that grabs us by the nose is how ne ... que ('only') comes out as a double-barrelled construction :

只有 ... 才
zhǐ yǒu ... cái
('only (if) ... only then')

This has the singular effect of splitting the sentence into two parts:

Clause A (the focus) presents the necessary precondition: "只有用心 zhǐ yǒu yòng xīn 'only (if) use the heart'".

Clause B then presents the result: "才能看得清楚 cái néng kàn-de-qīngchu 'only then can see clearly'".

Notice that even if Clause A contains 去看 qù kàn 'go see' (see above), Clause B repeats the verb, i.e., 看清楚 kàn-qīngchu 'see clearly'.

The word 才 cái 'only then' is essential here. Even if 只有 zhǐ yǒu ('only (if)') is left out, the 才 cái in Clause B is enough to show that it's conditional on Clause A. 才 cái cannot be left out.

Most translators stick to using 只有 zhǐ yǒu in Clause A, although there is a certain amount of variation. Curiously, one translator incorrectly uses 就 jiù in Clause B. More

In addition, there are two translators who treat this sentence quite differently by placing the focus on the whole predicate ('see with the heart'). This results in quite a different sentence structure. These two translations are covered below.

Finally, as the Chinese sentence is more grammatically complex than the French or English, there is some freedom in placing the subject of the sentence (More ) and the object of the sentence (More ).

2. EXPRESSION

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The verb voir and its adverb bien stand at the core of the sentence. The French is very simple, the English only slightly less so. Most Chinese versions, on the other hand, are somewhat more elaborate than the French. This is partly (although not solely) because some are based on Katherine Woods' version rather than Saint Exupéry's original.

Differences of expression include: the use of a verb other than 看 kàn 'to see'; many different ways of translating bien or 'rightly'; and, as we noted above, the insertion of an object to clarify the meaning.

In addition, there are two different ways of translating le coeur or 'the heart'.

Verb used

Although a majority of translators are happy to use the verb 看 kàn 'to see', there are a few who turn to other, semantically more complex verbs, including 看待 kàndài, 'to look upon, regard, consider, treat' and 體會 / 体会 tǐhuì 'to know, realise from experience, understand'. More

Bien

The exact expression used for bien (or 'rightly') shows a lot of variation among translators. Note: A few translators don't express bien or don't express it as a separate word. These include a few who don't use the verb 看 kàn 'to see', and a few who use a somewhat different sentence pattern.

Grammatically, the great majority of translators use a very common and versatile Chinese construction known as the resultative construction or complement of result (結果補語 / 结果补语 jiéguǒ bǔyǔ) in order to express the semantic content of bien /'rightly'. At its simplest, a resultative has the following structure:

RESULTATIVE STRUCTURE

Verb

Complement of result
(adjective or verb)

看 kàn
'to look, to see'

清楚 qīngchu
'clear'

Together the two parts represent an action (looking) and its result (clarity) -- 'to see clearly'.

Our basic sentence with resultative looks like this:

*WITH A RESULTATIVE FOR BIEN* ('RIGHTLY')**
on 'one'	avec le cœur 'with the heart'	voit 'sees'	bien 'clearly'	les choses 'things'
人 rén 'person'	用心 yòng xīn 'use heart'	看 kàn 'look, see'	清楚 qīngchu 'clearly'	事情 shìqing 'things'

Although 清楚 qīngchu 'clear' is the most popular resultative complement, there is actually quite amazing variety in the choice of expression. This is principally due to Katherine Woods' translation's use of 'rightly' instead of bien. More

Besides resultatives, a few translators use adverbs, although these are surprisingly unpopular. More

The various patterns (verbs, resultatives, adverbs, and objects) used in translating voit bien are summarised in this popup

Le cœur / The heart

One rather unexpected difference in translation is in the way le cœur 'the heart' is translated. Some translators use 心 xīn 'the heart'; others use 心靈 / 心灵 xīnlíng, meaning 'the spirit'. The split is roughly 3:2. What is perhaps even more unexpected is that the difference partly correlates with the source of translation, Saint Exupéry's French or Katherine Woods' English. More

3. EXCEPTIONAL PATTERNS

There are a few translations that depart from the "standard" sentence structure in large and small ways.

'Only the heart can see': Le cœur as subject

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Three translators vary the basic sentence by making 'the heart', originally an instrument, into the subject. That is,

A person sees [things] with the heart

becomes

The heart sees [things].

This gives this rather exceptional basic pattern:

BASIC PATTERN ('HEART' AS SUBJECT)
le cœur 'the heart'	voit 'sees'	[les choses] ['things']
心 xīn 'the heart'	看 kàn 'look, see'	[事情] [shìqing] ['things']

This is a rather larger difference in the Chinese than the French or English. First, the subject 人 rén 'person' disappears completely. Secondly, the double-verb construction (用 yòng ... 看 kàn) also disappears.

Despite this, there isn't really a large difference in the final sentence pattern. The omission of the subject 人 rén is no big deal because, as we saw, a large proportion of Chinese translators omit the subject anyway.

More importantly, the Chinese 只有 ... 才 zhǐ yǒu ... cái ('only if .... only then') construction is highly flexible. The A Clause can hold anything from a single word to a sentence. It quite easily takes a single noun in its stride:

ADDING 'ONLY'
*seulement* 'only'	le cœur 'the heart'	peut voir bien 'can see clearly'
只有 zhǐ yǒu 'only (if)'	心 xīn 'heart'	才能看清楚 cái néng kàn-qīngchu 'can see clearly'

(Notice that 只有 zhǐ yǒu in this case must be rendered in French as seulement 'solely, only'.)

The three translations fitting this pattern are:

唯有心才能看得清楚。
Wéi yǒu xīn cái néng kàn de qīngchu.
'Only the heart can see clearly.'

只有心灵才看得清事物的本质。
Zhǐ yǒu xīnlíng cái kàn-de-qīng shìwù de běnzhì.
'Only the heart can see clearly the essence of matters'.

只有心灵才能洞察一切。
Zhǐ yǒu xīnlíng cái néng dòngchá yīqiè.
'Only the spirit can perceive everything.'

Effectively, the only superficial difference from "standard" translations is the lack of the word 用 yòng.

'Can but see with the heart': Putting the focus on the whole predicate

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Two translators apply 'only' to the entire predicate. This leads to a rather large difference from the "standard" pattern. First, the word bien 'well' is not translated at all.

Secondly (and more importantly), 'only' is rendered quite differently. 'Only' is rendered as 只 zhǐ 'only', and there is no split into A and B clauses. The pattern is:

ADDING 只能 zhǐ néng TO THE BASIC SENTENCE
on 'one'	ne peut ... que 'can only'	employer le cœur va voir 'use the heart to go and look'
人 rén 'person'	只能 zhǐ néng 'can only'	用心去看 yòng xīn qù kàn 'use heart go see'

Here the focus of 'only' is the whole predicate, 用心去看 yòng xīn qù kàn (shown in red letters). In other words, 'only' covers the whole sentence, and doesn't focus solely on 'with the heart'. This is equivalent to saying in English 'One can but look with the heart'.

The two translations using this pattern are:

我們只能用心來看。
Wǒmen zhǐ néng yòng xīn lái kàn.
'We can only (come and) look with the heart'.

人只能用心灵去观察，去感受。
Rén zhǐ néng yòng xīnlíng qù guānchá, qù gǎnshòu.
'A person can only use the spirit to (go and) observe and (go and) experience.'

Notice how the second translator actually feels the need for an expanded interpretation using two verbs.

Nominalisation of the verb

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Finally, one translator departs completely from the above patterns by transforming the verb ('to observe') into a noun ('observation'):

'TO SEE' RENDERED AS A NOUN
Modifier		Noun	Only	Adjective (是...的 construction)
凭借 píngjiè 'rely on'	心灵的 xīnlíng de 'the heart' + connector	观察 guānchá 'observation'	才 cái 'only'	是可靠的 shì kěkào de 'is reliable'

The sentence literally means: 'Only observation relying on the heart is reliable'. Not only is the verb transformed into a noun, but the adverb (bien or 'rightly') is transformed into an adjective (可靠 kěkào 'reliable').

Notice how the predicative adjective takes the 是...的 construction. This is something like saying 'it is a reliable one'. This is normal practice for predicative adjectives in Chinese, and is often used where English would just say 'it is reliable'.

4. OTHER

Connecting the two sentences of the fox's secret

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In the original French the two sentences On ne voit bien qu'avec le cœur and L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux stand in magnificent isolation from each other. This isn't, of course, how language works. Each of the two sentences can only be understood in relation to the other:

The first sentence lacks an object; the second has l'essentiel as its subject. It's clear that l'essentiel is the understood object of the first sentence.
The first sentence asserts that only the heart can see clearly. The second sentence affirms this statement in a negative sense, by stating that it is not possible to see with the eyes.

How do translators reflect this connection? Do they simply follow the French, or do they try to link the two sentences together?

1) As we saw above, several translators explicitly bring the subject of the second sentence (l'essentiel) forward to act as the object of the first, thus acknowledging that the two sentences are a unity.

2) Similarly, two translators tie the two sentences together by giving them a common topic, the word 凡事 fánshì 'all things', which is placed at the very start of this sentence.

3) More interestingly, one translator gives the two sentence a common topic while at the same time reversing the order of the two sentences:

一切事物的本质，用肉眼是看不到的，只有用心去看，才能体会到。
Yīqiè shìwù de běnzhì, yòng ròuyǎn shì kàn-bu-dào de, zhǐ yǒu yòng xīn qù kàn, cái néng tǐhuì dào.
'The essence of all things can't see with the naked eyes, only looking with the heart can know.'

The translation now effectively says:

"What is essential is invisible to the eye; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly."

This rearrangement alters neither the meaning nor the impact. Indeed, it could be argued that this version is more impactful:

It first negates the eyes as a means of seeing properly, and then positively identifies the heart as the correct means of perception, moving from negative to positive. In the original, the positive aspect is mentioned first, followed by a negative statement dismissing the eyes.
The object of 'seeing' is given as the topic (l'essentiel: 一切事物的本质 yīqiè shìwù de běnzhì 'the essence of all matters') at the start. This means that the topic is quite clear and there's no need to try to find ways of making the object of the verb clearer.

This translation raises an interesting question: to what extent is it important to retain the original order in a translation? If it's more natural to change the order, why not do so? Despite talk among translation specialists of 'dynamic equivalence' or 'functional equivalence', i.e., creating an equivalent effect in the mind of the reader and not simply transposing the words one by one, there seems to be an ingrained habit among translators of basically following the order and forms of the original.

There are also pages on the French original, the English translations, the Japanese translations, and the Vietnamese translations.

RESULTATIVE STRUCTURE
Verb	Complement of result (adjective or verb)
看 kàn 'to look, to see'	清楚 qīngchu 'clear'