I came across this video today, and surprised to find out that the Chinese “tongue twister” text called 施氏食獅史 has such an important history! I always thought it was just a fun text like the English tongue twister phrase She sells seashells by the seashore…
Well it is not! About a hundred years ago, there was a movement to get rid of the written Chinese characters and replace them fully with romanized Chinese because it was deemed the written Chinese characters were too difficult to learn. Luckily Chinese-American linguist Chao Yuen-Ren 趙元任 wrote the text 施氏食獅史 to reject the notion that romanized Chinese can fully replace the written Chinese characters. 施氏食獅史 is a story that has only the sound shi in the whole text but it tells a story only in written Chinese characters, because when reading it out loud or written in romanized form it is incomprehensible, since the text will just be shi shi shi shi shi……. Later he wrote another text with just the ji sound called 季姬擊雞記 to emphasise the importance of the written Chinese characters where romanized Chinese cannot replace.
So below are the two texts, 施氏食獅史 (direct translation is The Story of Mr. Shi Eating Lions, or more commonly translated online as Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den) and 季姬擊雞記 (The Account of Lady Ji Attacking the Chickens).
《施氏食獅史》
石室詩士施氏，嗜獅，誓食十獅。氏時時適市視獅。十時，適十獅適市。是時，適施氏適市。氏視是十獅，恃矢勢，使是十獅逝世。氏拾是十獅屍，適石室。石室濕，氏使侍拭石室。石室拭，氏始試食是十獅。食時，始識是十獅屍，實十石獅屍。試釋是事。
The text written in romanized Chinese will be like this…
Shíshì shī shì shī shì, shì shī, shì shí shí shī. Shì shí shí shì shì shì shī. Shí shí, shì shí shī shì shì. Shì shí, shì shī shì shì shì. Shì shì shì shí shī, shì shǐ shì, shǐ shì shí shī shì shì. Shì shíshì shí shī shī, shì shíshì. Shíshì shī, shì shǐ shì shì shí shì. Shí shì shì, shì shǐ shì shí shì shí shī. Shí shí, shǐ shí shì shí shī shī, shí shí shí shī shī. Shì shì shì shì.
《季姬擊雞記》
季姬寂，集雞，雞即棘雞。棘雞飢嘰，季姬及箕稷濟雞。雞既濟，躋姬笈，季姬忌，急咭雞，雞急，繼圾几，季姬急，即籍箕擊雞，箕疾擊几伎，伎即齏，雞嘰集几基，季姬急極屐擊雞，雞既殛，季姬激，即記《季姬擊雞記》。
The text written in romanized Chinese will be like this…
Jì jī jì, jí jī, jī jí jí jī. Jí jī jī jī, jì jī jí jī jì jì jī. Jī jì jì, jī jī jí, jì jī jì, jí jī jī, jī jí, jì jī jǐ, jì jī jí, jí jí jī jī jī, jī jí jī jǐ jì, jì jí jī, jī jī jí jǐ jī, jì jī jí jí jī jī jī, jī jì jí, jì jī jī, jí jì “jì jī jī jī jì”.
Thank goodness for us that the written Chinese characters were not abolished! It is fair to say that although romanized Chinese is useful in learning the pronunciation of the Chinese characters, they cannot replace the meaning of the Chinese characters. Take for example the traditional character for wheat noodle, 麵 (the currect form) or 麪 (the original written form), has the left radical 麥 which is wheat. The right side 丏 means fine powder, so 麪 means wheat flour originally but also implying something made with wheat flour. Therefore even if you are not familiar with the character 麵 or 麪, you can tell by looking at the left radical that it has something to do with wheat. The simplified Chinese for noodle is 面 which has also lost its meaning since 面 means surface or face in its traditional form. Therefore it was ridiculous that they even considered abolishing the thousand of years history of developing the written Chinese characters for the sake of ease of learning!
Corner Café 
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