2019-12-22
Dear Phenomenology Colleagues, I am glad to announce to you about the news of the just completed 8-volume translated Husserl’s works done by me in China. (See the list at the end of the letter.) Without being associated with any phenomenology organizations please permit me to declare the news in such a non-regular way.
In consideration of making you more relevantly understand the special background and particular meaning of the related publishing matter I’d like to say something concerned below.
As an independent (self-taught) philosopher I spent a few years at the Beijing National Library before the Cultural Revolution (1966). Strongly attracted by the contemporary Austrian-German logical-psychological positivism I started finding and reading Husserl’s text since early 1960’s. By the end of the Cultural Revolution I unexpectedly entered the Institute of Philosophy, CASS as a formal researcher starting my regular research life in China. Taking the rare chance I finished my first scholarly article about “a brief introduction to Husserl’s personality and philosophy”, which was published in 1980. Despite a short introductory piece put in an anthology about contemporary western philosophers (the first publication of this topic since 1949, also co-edited by me), this article aroused wider intellectual curiosity among young students and scholars 銆怬ne of the reasons could be the theoretical presentation was completely different from Hegelianism, the other was because of all young students reentering universities during late 1970’s and early 1980’s came out of the past decade in which the normal educational/academic activities and scholarly publications had completely stopped nation-widely锛沵y case was exceptional that I kept at home over almost 20 years concentrating on self-study about various traditional and modern subjects銆; gradually Husserl’s studies became more and more interesting to the new generation of Chinese scholars in many fields, including traditional Chinese philosophy and literature, so the interested scholars in China are not limited to the newly formed phenomenological circle. In addition, the special theoretical curiosity aroused in China was also because of the academic fact that Husserl’s own texts had never appeared in the mainland of China before; while there indeed appeared a few fragmentary translated texts by Heidegger and Sartre, which were published merely as inside reference material before the Cultural Revolution.
During the period of my scholarly visits at a few philosophy departments (Princeton, Columbia and Munich) and my wider scholarly visits and communications (including different philosophers like Ricoeur, Landgrebe, Spiegelberg, Natanson, Rorty, Tymieniecka, and others. ) abroad between 1982-1984 , the main plan of mine in near future was to translate one of Husserl’s masterpieces for Chinese academia to realize my independently cherished dream to make Chinese intellectuals know Husserl. By carefully balancing and my discussions with some western experts, I eventually chose Ideen I , which has been taken by me as one of the greatest philosophy books in last century. I was then ambitious to make the grand presentation of the great book become an intellectual/theoretical stimulant leading to an instructive enlightenment to Chinese humanities circles that had been either weaker in modern theoretical reasoning or used mainly to the natural-scientific way of thinking in modern history. Finally the translation was finished in 1987 and eventually appeared in Taipei (1982) and Beijing (1993) in turn.
Since the late 1980’s I started my next period for researches on west campuses as independent visiting scholar in relations to different projects supported by some German/French foundations over 10 years. After co-organizing the 9th IASS Congress in Nanjing China 2012 and finishing several books about traditional Chinese ethics and academic ideology as well as several translations of works of Barthes (at the same time of middle of 1980’s when I was preparing the job aboutIdeen I I also published a translated selection about Barthes’ literary theory), Ricouer , Metz, Eco, Moran and Rorty, I made a bold decision to launch this big translation series of Husserl’s works that was also supported by the leading Chinese publisher; my strategy was especially focused on his logical-psychological epistemological themes. After my long independent research experiences I tend to state a related suggestion of mine here that, owing to the special historical contexts, far from being able to expertize in original phenomenology scholarship at the moment, we Chinese phenomenology scholars should be firstly sincerely enough to learn from the original texts as such via richly accumulated knowledge of current western experts; while secondly, in consideration of the entire update intellectual/theoretical horizon formed in terms of the revolutionary epistemological progress of human sciences, we also need to pay a sufficient attention to the interdisciplinary/cross-cultural-directed interpretation issue concerning the original phenomenology texts. That means, deeper specialization in original texts and multiply wider hermeneutic strategies should become the double goal of our future efforts. More importantly, at least to myself, the profound ethical-theoretical implication of Husserl’s texts would also become one of solid foundations for formulating our new type of ethical science in future. It is just this epistemological potential implied in Husserl’s thinking that makes his theory segregated essentially from Heidegger’s, I’m afraid.
Let’s wish for more productive development of Husserl’s phenomenology in future,
Li Youzheng (www.semioticsli.com) Former vice-President of IASS Associated senior research fellow, the Center of Studies of World Civilizations, CASS Main interests: Logical-psychological phenomenology, historical hermeneutics, structural semiotics and comparative humanist ethics ** ** ** List of the translated selection of 8 Husserl’s classics:
A Selection of Translated Edmund Husserl’s 8 Classic Volumes in Chinese by Youzheng Li (as the selection editor, writer of general introduction to the Chinese Edition, translator and writer of prefaces/research notes for 8 volumes in Chinese editions) 銆怋ased on the German editions, in comparative check-up with English, French editions銆 Chinese Renmin University Press, Beijing (2012 - 2019)
1. Formale und Transzendentale Logik 2. Allgemeine Einführung in die Reine Phänomenologie (Ideen I) 銆恡he first Chinese edition published by the Laurel Publisher, Taipei 1992, by the Commercial Press, Beijing 1993銆 3. Phänomenologische Untersuchungen zur Konstitution (Ideen II) 4. Die Phänomenologie und die Fundamente der Wissenschaften (Ideen III) 5. Phänomenologische Psychologie 6. Erfahrung und Urteil 7. Logische Untersuchungen(V,VI) 8. Die Bernauer Manuskripte über das Zeitbewusstsein
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