Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Twenty-Four Dynastic Histories

Three years ago, Xinhua News reported the publication of the Twenty-
Four Dynastic Histories (二十四史) by Hanyu Dacidian Chubanshe
(汉语大词典出版社) in a bilingual parallel-text edition in
classical Chinese and modern Chinese. Two hundred scholars worked for
13 years on the translation of the original 3213 volumes, comprising
more than 40 million Chinese characters. Amazon sells this edition,
entitled 二十四史全译, for 9,408 yuan (900 euros).

I wonder if this is the biggest translation project ever undertaken.

See:

http://tinyurl.com/33yvvn
http://news.jxnews.com.cn/system/2003/12/23/000583537.shtml