Dr Paul Bevan (University of Oxford); Dr Ewan Macdonald (University of Oxford); Professor Nicholas Morrow Williams (Arizona State University); Chair: Dr Giulia Falato (University of Oxford)

In turn a teaching tool, a literary and textual practice, or an object of scholarly enquiry, translation has long occupied a privileged position in the field of sinology and China studies. But what does it mean for scholars today to engage with these different modalities of translation and negotiate a double identity as both academics and translators? How do research and translation contribute to enriching each other, or can they perhaps sometimes detract from one another? How can translation contribute to rediscovering forgotten stories, or to giving classic texts fresh voices that reflect the latest scholarship in the field? Please join us as we explore these questions in a conversation with three scholars with recently published translations of Chinese literature from its earliest days (Elegies of Chu, OUP, 2022) to the Republican period (The Adventures of Ma Suzhen, Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).