Clinton's biography gets Chinafied

[FS]

I couldn't find a good account of this online, and the original piece from the Times requires me to register with their site, so I'll just translate from my newspaper - any mistakes are probably mine.

China makes 'loose' translation of Clinton's book

BEIJING - Anyone planning to read the memoires of ex-president Bill Clinton in Mandarin, can expect a few remarkable revalations. According to the 'translators', Clinton writes that he is a great admirer of the former Chinese leader Mao Tse Tung. Clinton praises the inexhaustible wisdom of the Great Helmsman(?) in the Mandarin version of his book, whose well-known expressions he constantly citates. Mao's successors are showered with compliments too. Especially the 'scientific theories' of Deng Xiaoping (Dutch spelling of his name) were supposed to have been an important inspiration to the ex-president. "China is a mysterious and unique place", the Chinese 'translators' make Clinton write. "I can only marvel at the grand inventions of the Chinese."

"My name is Great Watermelon"

Critical notes about China from the original version of Clinton's biography have been left out for good measure. For example, the translation makes no mention of Clinton's criticism of China's human rights situation.
Also, the passage where he tells of the torture of one of his college professors in a Chinese prison is not in the Mandarin edition. In contrast, there is also no reference to the American bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrado.
The translators of My Life have adjusted the biography to the Chinese taste. On his first meeting with his wife Hillary: "She was as beautiful as a princess. I told her my name was Great Watermelon." Women will swoon over the idea that the affair with Monica Lewinsky 'did not' harm the marriage.
The translators have succeeded in adding whole new parts to the biography, while making the book only half as big.
The real version of Clinton's book is also available in China, for roughly $28 at specialized book stores. The translated version costs about $4, but can be bought from most street vendors in Beijing for about $1.50.
Clinton isn't the first celebrity to be the victim of the Chinese art of translation. In the past, Chinese book pirates 'decorated' the memoires of soccer star David Beckham with ancient Chinese proverbs to make the book more attractive to the Chinese market. The translation of the fifth Harry Potter book was even in Chinese bookstores before author J.K. Rowling had finished the original.