Hong Kong, July 15: China is mourning the passing away of one of its greatest scholars and Indologists, who during the 1960s spent five years translating the Ramayana into Chinese.
Ji Xianlin, who was awarded the Padma Bhushan last year for his contribution to cross-cultural understanding, passed away in Beijing on Saturday. He would have turned 98 next month.
In the 1960s, when Mao Zedong’s maniacal Cultural Revolution raged across China, Ji spent five years secretly translating the Ramayana, retaining the poetic format.
The project was considered highly risky, as “intellectuals” were being systematically persecuted.
In his memoirs, published in 1998, he recalls that he considered committing suicide after being tortured during the Cultural Revolution. He survived and worked at a students’ dormitory, and finished his translation, writing secretly on slips of paper.
–Agencies