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Many available translations are wooden and dull because of their literal correctitude, their miserable attempt to preserve the letter of the text while squeezing out its spirit. The consequence is that their work becomes half-meaningless to Western readers. Here we shall endeavour to avoid such versions and to mold our interpretations in easier and more expressive if literally laxer forms. What is overlooked by those who make such absolutely literal but not literary translations of Oriental texts is that their versions often convey no definite idea to the mind of the reader but only empty phrases.

-- Notebooks Category 15: The Orient > Chapter 1 : Meetings of East and West > # 160