【正文】 epis odes at 45 minutes each, to six 90 minute epis odes . The quick pacing threw off man y nati ve viewers , wh o are accustomed to a more leisurely daytime s oap s tyle narrative rhythm. (Chines e TV stations would run two or three epis odes every day.) I di d n ot finis h the full length version an d f oun d the truncate d one n ot difficult to f ollow. Wh at39。s lost, I believe, are the interes ting setups and pauses that illuminate the Chinese art of storytelling. Much of the plot is still there. It is the flavor that was sacrificed. The American edition uses the framework of the Empress Dowager in her 江漢大學(xué)畢業(yè)論文 22 senior years reminis cing at the beginning and the end of each episode, hinting at what39。s to e and recapping the key points . This device, not used in the original, is culturally unders tand able but artis tically mediocre. What puzzles me is the two new songs for the opening and end credits . They were written in Englis h, but sung by Chines e with an unf ortable accent. They were obvious ly designed to appeal to an Englis h s peaking base, but do not jibe with the Chines e dialogue. Speaking of the dialogue, the Englis h translation , pick ed apart by some Chines e, is too literal for my tas te. I can i magine a typical American hit by a flurry of royal ranks , address es an d greetings , e ven multiple names an d titles for the same person. The first half hour must be a swamp to wade through, very much like my experience of getting through a Tolstoy tome with its endless inflections of names transliterated into lengthy Chines e. I see the choice of verbatim translation as an effort for conveying exotica. It is fairly petent, with no error that I could detect, but fails to rise above words or capture the essence of the language. A cultural product usually crosses over to a foreign territory first by an emphasis on the monalities . But whether inside or outside China, the temptation to sell it for the differences is jus t too great. S ure, the s umptuous sets an d cos tu mes are a big attraction, bu t the narrati ve techni que has bee－ how s hall I put it?－ a bit anglicize d, which is necess ary for cultural export. Ju dging by the res pons es , this legend, which, contrary to the claim of the Englis h trailer, is totally fictitious , has departed from China but not yet lande d on American s hores . I am a big fan of Ral ph Waldo Emers on39。s ess ay title d Self Reliance. If you39。 ve not yet read it, I strongly encourage you to do so. In this essay, the venerable Emers on talks about eschewing the trappings of society an d fin ding one39。s own path . He urges the reader to fin d rectitu de an d lead a mor al life. He profess es that, only by being self reliant, as oppos ed to relying on the government and being dictated to by society, can one begin leading a decent and purpos eful life. He avers that such a life is the only life worth living. I agree with him. This essay was written during a time of s ocial u pheaval in America, an d it is rather odd that Emers on authore d it, as he was a part of the u pper crust of society at the time. It just so happened that he looked around him, at the indolence and the wantonness of the people in his circle。 he wondered how in the world he came to belong there. Indeed his penning and publis hing this essay caused his exmunication from high society and also caused him a lot of legal trouble. The legal trouble came as a result of the fact that he was speaking out agains t the government. I like to reference such texts from time to time as an example both of the fact that history does repeat itself and that this world is not so big that what applies to one society does not in any way touch another society. On a much smaller scale,Emers on39。s essay affects me very dee ply. Not as an urging to bee self reliant – I39。 m nothing if not that! In his text he expoun ds on the i dea th at one mus t give their life a pur pos e. An d t hat is the true topic of this entry. These las t four ye ars have been s o eas y: te ach for a gran d t ot al of six hours a week , and t he res t of my ti me is mine. S ince I39。 ve been here I h ave been task ed with nothing more challenging than learning my students 39。 names and figuring out what to do with them for the brief time each week that I stand in front of them. I do not consider the challenges of learning to live here part of a purpos eful life. I consider those issues exis tential in nature. One of the proble ms with my life in America was that I felt it had no purpos e. I went to work e very day and even did what I could to make my colleagues39。 work lives easier, but I simply could not digest the fact that that was my sole purpos e in life. With no family to support , I was the sole beneficiary of my employment: the paycheck , the benefits , the incentives and the rewards were mine alone. Not much of a purpos e in being selfserving, is there? While I was a student, I felt I was leading a purpos eful life. Learning new things , broadening my horizons , expanding my life experiences all gave my life a zip and drive that I had not felt since being in survival mode when my kids were small. After graduating college I felt oddly deflated… but by then, China was on my horizon.