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Translation notes

Some explanations of translation choices and stuff
What does the title mean?

少年 (shao nian) means young man or youth, typically referring to the teenage years.
歌行 (ge xing) is a literary song form, a classical poem that can be set to music and sung. But, if you take the two words separately, it's 'song' and 'journey', like an adventure that is worth singing about in songs and legends. 


So, the title can be translated as Song of Youth or The Ballad of Youth. 

The official translation of the title by the China animation team is Great Journey of Teenagers. And the iQiyi title in English is Youth and Golden Coffin. Ugh. I know. Yet another English title is The Blood of Youth by the TV drama team, which is supposed to mean the spirit and vigour of youth. Well... 'nuff said.

If I were to choose a translation, I'd call it Journey of Youth. Not only does it represent the adventure the characters go through, there's also the meaning of growing up from their experiences. But, since there are so many conflicting English titles, I'll just stick to the Chinese title. 

There seems to be a problem with the timeline?


The author cannot do Math. There are many inconsistencies in the text with regards to the passage of time and the age of the characters when key events occur. Even with the benefit of a calendar based on the Emperor’s reign, it’s still very messy. Where possible, I’ve corrected obvious mistakes but the rest I’ve left as they are so that you can be equally confused.

Why are some names translated and other words not translated?


All names of characters are left untranslated with the surname before the given name, e.g. Tang Lian, surname is Tang and given name is one word, Lian. Some character names are clerical names, i.e., a name adopted by a Buddhist monk, so they are left as one word, e.g. Wuxin. Otherwise, surnames or given names that have more than one word are written without spacing, e.g. Lei Wujie, Sikong Qianluo.

With a few exceptions, the names of the major sects and cities are usually translated unless the location is minor and only appears for a few chapters and the meaning of the name has no context in the dialogue. This decision was made to be consistent with the earlier translations and also for ease of reading. There are way too many characters and sects to keep track of their names in a different language. 

Half the story takes place in jianghu (the martial world). Therefore, many words that are widely used in jianghu as forms of address are kept untranslated in dialogue to preserve the relationship between the characters. Examples are shifu, shixiong, etc.

The other half of the story takes place in the imperial capital and involves the imperial family where another set of commonly used forms of address are kept untranslated in dialogue. Examples are huang-shu, huang-xiong, etc. However, many of the court titles have been translated for ease of reading.

Please refer to the Glossary to learn these terms. 

Shouldn't the court title be Prince of Langya instead of Langya Prince?

Well, it started with the White Prince and Red Prince. Prince of Bai or Prince of White just sounded very cumbersome especially with how often they're referred to in dialogue. Secondly, in Chinese, the title is read as Bai Wang, so it flowed more naturally to me if I translated the way it's read. In the end, I decided to stick to this form for all the nobility titles (Mingde Emperor, Langya Prince, Yong'an Prince, Lanyue Marquis, etc.). Now, I'm used to it and actually prefer it like this. 

Major translation edits?

The translation for 唐门 was changed to Tang Sect. No explanation. 

Xiao Yu's eunuch, 龙邪, was changed to Long Xie because that's how they pronounced his name in the drama series.

What are the units of measurements?

Time

Shichen 時辰 - 2 hours (there are 12 shichen in one day)

Ke 刻 - about 15 minutes (there are 100 ke in one day)

1 incense stick 一炷香 - most writers work on the understanding that it's about 30 minutes (Baidu reference)

1 cup of tea 一盏茶 - about 15 minutes (one ke)

Money

Wen 文 or copper coin 铜板 - coppers (1000 copper coins = one tael of silver)
Liang 兩 - tael (of silver = an ingot)

Note that the conversion for weight (which also affects money) and length has changed over the long history of China and was eventually standardised in modern China. So, use this only as a rough estimate and I've mostly rounded off the numbers for easy comparison. (Wikipedia reference)

Weight

Qian 钱 - 5 grams
Liang 兩 - 50 grams (1 liang = 10 qian, also about the weight of one tael of silver)
Jin 斤 - 500 grams (1 jin = 10 liang or 16 liang)
Jun 钧 - 15 kg (1 jun = 30 jin = 15 kg)
Shi 石 - 60 kg (1 stone = 4 jun = 60 kg)

Length

Cun 寸 - inch (1 inch = 3⅓ cm)
Chi 尺 - foot (1 foot = 10 inches = 33⅓ cm)

Zhang 丈 - zhang (1 zhang = 10 feet = 100 inches = 3⅓ meters)
Li 里 - mile (1 mile = 150 zhang = 500 meters )

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