Classical Chinese
I just received a copy of Van Norden's Classical Chinese for Everyone, and I couldn't help but read a bit from Lesson 1. (I do have other textbooks, like Fuller and Rouzer, but those expect some decent knowledge of Chinese. Certainly more than I have at the moment.)
I like the bit-sized lessons in Van Norden. They are perfect for getting a taste of the classical/literary language without getting too deep while I get a foothold on the modern language. Anyway, here are some notes from lesson 1:
The reading from this lesson is a line from the Analects (17.2). There are three main grammar points to distill from this passage:
Stative Verbs:
Very similar to Modern Chinese (hence forth MC), this construction can be summed up as -
N + SV (note the absence of an adverb, which is generally required in MC)
Adverb 相:
Here we find a similar construction to MC -
Adv. + V
And lastly Nominal Sentences:
N1 N2 也
Rather than the use of 是 for this type of construction (like in MC), CC uses the sentence final particle 也. The word order is also different, in MC it would be N1 是 N2
In place of one of the N's we can also find a verbal clause.
Therefore we can analyse our reading as:
子曰：「性相近也，習相遠也。」
sub. V:「N1 VC 也，N1 VC 也」
Master say: "nature1 each-other close, practice(s) each-other far." (this is obviously a very literal translation)
I would offer the following as a more formal translation:
The Master said: "Nature is close2, practices are far from each other."
Notes:
1. "Nature" as in "human nature".
2. This could also be rendered as something like "Human nature is...." or even "The nature(s) of humans are close to each other"
I will also say that, as a past philosophy/religious studies major, I deeply appreciate the philosophical notes littered through out the book.
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