MDZS translation by dragongirlG: ch 100 - wangxian in Guanyin Temple
Happy almost-Valentine’s Day and almost-Lantern Festival 2022! I’m super excited to share my fan translation of MDZS chapter 100, featuring Wei Wuxian’s famous love confession to Lan Wangji. As with chapter 1, I included footnotes with my notes and references, and a preface with my translation goals.
Reblogs and positive feedback are always appreciated!
Happy thirsty Thursday or filthy Friday depending on your region of the world! It’s the end of the month, which means it’s time for another translation challenge! In light of the fandom’s celebration of the manhua’s uncensored bathtub panels, I decided to translate the scene immediately following wangxian’s bathtub breakage. This doesn’t get very explicit—it’s just leading up to that!
Please go check out maotuanxjj’s uncensored panels of this scene here on Twitter and give them some appreciation!
Full credit to my translator friends for strongly encouraging me (read: enthusiastically screaming at me) to use this passage for this month’s challenge. Reblogs and signal boosts are always appreciated!
As always, you are welcome to participate in any translation challenge at any time. You can find a compilation on twitter or at the bottom of the pinned post on tumblr.
Here is a list of the translations into English of 魔道祖师 (Módào Zǔshī) by 墨香铜臭 (Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù). The novel is 113 chapters and 14 extras (13 on JJWXC plus another extra only present in the Taiwanese published version). This list was updated 2022/06/01.
I am not listing MTL or cleaned MTL translations. For the extras I am listing by chapter every translation, but for the novel I’m only providing links to masterposts / websites / folders.
If you are aware of other translations, let me know and I’ll update this post.
December 2021 update: I think at this point everyone in the fandom is aware that an official translation is being published in English. This masterlist keep the links to the once existing fantranslations, for fandom memory.
Chinese
The novel has been locked on JJWXC, so it’s not possible to buy it here.
I have been struggling to write this since December. I still don’t really know where or how to begin, but the recent announcement of 2ha’s English licensing by Seven Seas seems as good a motivator as any at this point.
I guess before I begin, I want to make clear that I am not writing this with the intent or desire to harm—it’s certainly a criticism, but I want it to be a practical one. Please don’t use my words as an excuse to take up arms or make personal attacks. I don’t want to be used as a prop in anyone else’s fights, I don’t wan to talk about it, I just want to say my piece and be done.
So. Without mincing words: I am beyond disappointed in the MXTX English-language editions. The idea that this might be what sets the precedent for future danmei releases is incredibly disheartening. There are several reasons, and I’ll try to explain my main issues as best I can without being unnecessarily harsh. I will be talking about specifics with regards to MDZS, as it’s the one I’m most familiar with.
Quality & Production Timeline:
The overall quality of the work is lackluster and rushed. Several reviews have already discussed issues with the MDZS translation that was published—they are easy to find on Goodreads and elsewhere, but I am not going to link them here because I feel that relitigating details and pinning blame on the translator(s) is very misguided. The licensed translation is full of mistakes (both major and minor), inconsistencies, and confusing wording. To me, this betrays a very serious lack of editorial oversight and quality checking rather than a problem with the raw translation itself. No translator on earth can produce a first draft without mistakes, yes, even very basic ones. Everyone slips up, even in their native tongue, all the time. Having mistakes in an early draft is not at all an indication that a translator lacks skill, and this persistent focus on the faults of the translator(s) feels more like scapegoating than anything. I may not agree with all of the translation choices, but I do not think that mistakes make the translator(s) unqualified.
ALT
