Marshall R. Pihl s Translation of Ch ang (Song) in "Sim Ch ong ka"

P’ansori is a genre of Korean music that deals with epic storytelling and that dates from the eighteenth century. It was designated a National Intangible Cultural Property in 1964 and inscribed on UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2008. Despite its stature as a national cultural symbol, however, p’ansori has not been a major research topic in translation studies. Against this background, the present study analyzes ch’ang (song) in Marshall R. Pihl’s “The Song of Shim Ch’ŏng” (Sim Ch’ŏng ka) – one of the few English translations of a full p’ansori work – and shows how p’ansori can be enriched in translation. Specifically, I analyze the prosodic and stylistic features of ch’ang passages in the following areas: segmenting hemistichs for balanced rhythm, making vague phrases more singable, adjusting idiomatic expressions, establishing formal correspondence between the original and translated texts, trimming previous translations, incorporating a master singer’s version, and providing visual clues. This study concludes with a brief discussion of findings, limitations, and implications.