"The China Youth daily, which is affiliated to the Communist party's youth league, said Mr Blair was forthcoming with pleasantries and clichés without offering any insight." http://politics.guardian.co.uk/tonyblair/story/0,,2207515,00.html Love him or loathe him, Blair is the best British political orator since Churchill. Either the Chinese are less easily taken in than the rest of the planet, or something was lost in the translation.
Yes....Blair.....talks....really.....well.....and....makes....each....word....more...important....than....the...previous...one.
I know he is popular in Britain (or was), but I always thought he seemed a little insincere. I think I get what the Chinese were saying about cliches. I've not seen a lot of his speeches, but the soundbites on CNN always seemed very cliched - even for a politician. I saw a documentary a few years ago and there was a remarkable guy on it. I believe he is or was an MP and had been around for years. I cannot remember anything he said, but the way he said it carried such conviction in that droll understated way the British have. Tony Benn - I'm not sure if that is a single or a double N. He was certainly as I see it way better an orator than this other Tony.
Cliches are culture-specific so they don't translate well. Some of them are even language-specific. They rely on cadence and unstated but understood words to make their impact and can be awkward in translation. Even pleasantries, while more easily translated, don't always make a good impression. Tone is phonemic in Chinese. There is a huge chasm between speakers of tonal languages (including Thai, Tibetan, Vietnamese and many others) and non-tonal. We use tone to express emotion, and it comes out rather vague since it doesn't have much of a bandwidth. The Chinese have to actually express how they feel in words. Unconsciously we each miss something in the other's speech. The Chinese don't pick up our tonal cues, and we're uncomfortable with the absence of these cues in their speech. This is ultimately what's hardest about learning each other's language. We can learn it "perfectly" so we have the vocabulary of a scholar and are as easy to understand as a native speaker. But we still think Chinese people speak English like robots, and when we speak Chinese they think we sound like we're trying to sing instead of talk. The Chinese like to insist that they're less easily taken in than the rest of the planet, but they fell for communism and that speaks for itself. Tones or no tones. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I think with Tony Blair, it was a matter of the BS not translating very well. As to Tony Benn, a brilliant older politician with left wing views. He wrote the excellent Benn diaries about what (really) happened when he was in Government and in Opposition in Britain over a number of decades.
