better to light the candle than to curse the darkness - 1907

[Garson O'Toole]

> On Tue, Oct 20, 2009 at 3:15 AM, Garson O'Toole
>> "Yet is it far better to light the candle than to curse the darkness."
>> Citation: "The Supreme Conquest: and Other Sermons Preached in
>> America" by William Lonsdale Watkinson, Fleming H. Revell Company, New
>> York, page 218, 1907.
>>
>> The book is downloadable from Google Books and the document appears to
>> be correctly dated.
>>
>> Page 418 of YBQ gives a 1940 citation and suggests it "may indeed have
>> been a Chinese saying". ADS-L archives have a post in 2004 with
>> citations in the 1940s. Encarta Book of Quotations says it is a
>> "Chinese Proverb".
>
> I found the Chinese proverb. Â It is:
> In Chinese characters: 与其诅咒黑暗，不如点燃蜡烛。
> In pinyin: yǔqí zǔzhòu hēi'à n, bùrú diǎnrán là zhú.
>
> On Chinese sites, I see it attributed mostly to Anna Louise Strong,
> but that appears to be because she used in in her "Letters from
> China".
>
> I also found a version attributed to Che Guevara that says "It is
> better to burn yourself than curse the darkness." Â This also has a
> Chinese version.
>
> It seems likely that it started in the US and was brought to China by Strong.
>
> See the last entry here:
>
> http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Proverbs_commonly_attributed_to_be_Chinese
>
> --
> Randy Alexander
> Jilin City, China
> Blogs:
> Manchu studies: http://www.bjshengr.com/manchu
> Chinese characters: http://www.bjshengr.com/yuwen

Many thanks for your response. It is interesting that Anna Louise
Strong may have brought the quote to China. I spent some time
attempting to trace another saying that may or may not be Chinese:
"May you live in interesting times".

The citations that I found from Frederic R. Coudert in 1939 and Hughe
Knatchbull-Hugessen in 1949 I placed in Wikipedia. Both references
point to the British Embassy in China as a key locus of creation or
propagation. (YBQ already had a citation from 1939. This was before I
purchased YBQ.)

Have you looked into this saying?
Garson O'Toole

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