(1) Hungarian poet Sándor Petőfi wrote a poem on life, love, and liberty. The common English translation goes something like:
“Liberty and love
These two I must have.
For my love I’ll sacrifice
My life.
For liberty I’ll sacrifice
My love.”
This was translated (somewhat loosely) by Yin Fu into the standard Chinese version
生命诚可贵，爱情价更高。若为自由故，两者皆可抛。
“Life is indeed precious,
And love is priced yet higher
But were it for liberty’s sake
I’d sacrifice both the prior.”
This verse is so popular that I’d wager by sheer number more Chinese than Hungarians today know the poem, though many may not know its origin.
Here in the show Sun Wen quotes and then riffs on Yin Fu’s version, which is an anachronism since it cannot have emerged earlier than the 1920s.
Chinese Shows Translated 