Chinese Poet Feng Tang Translates Tagore with Vulgar Sexual Innuendos

Beijing, Dec 24 (IANS) A Chinese poet has translated lines from Indian Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore's lyrical poems with vulgar sexual innuendos.

Feng Tang, translated "Stray Birds" a collection of Tagore's lyrical poems known for their simplicity and sublime beauty, the China Daily reported.

The translation that has turned into an instant ridicule is: "The world puts off its mask of vastness to its lover. It becomes small as one song, as one kiss of the eternal," Tagore's original said which Feng translated to: "The wide world unzipped its crotch to its lover. Long as a tongue kiss, small as a line of a poem."

The previous Chinese version, published in the 1920s, was brushed aside by Feng as being "too flat".

Feng also adopted some strange tactics, such as highlighting a word or two by putting them in separate lines of their own words that are part of a flowing sentence in the original text.