| Literature translation around the May 4th Movement has long attracted the attention of the domestic academia. There are many monographs and papers on it, including some enlightening works. But up till now, few people have conducted the researches into the literature translation during this peculiar period of time from the perspective of the latest "polysystem theory". This thesis is believed to be among the first investigations devoted to ideology, translation norms, translated literary repertoire and canonicity of the literature translation around the May 4th Movement (1898-1927) in the light of polysystem theory.Assisted by Lefevere's idea about ideology and Toury's theory of translation norms, this thesis takes advantage of polysystem theory as the fundamental theory frame. Polysystem theory views a variety of semiotic phenomena as systems. Translated literary system is regarded as an element of cultural polysystem in this theory. Its behavior modes are sometimes affected by what position it occupies in cultural polysystem. When it is in the center, it will take part in creating "primary type", and break the traditional norms in the target-oriented culture. When it is in the position of periphery, it will be applicable to the conservative "secondary type". This changes of modes, and the positions and functions of translated literature are all determined by ideology and translation norms, in another word, ideology restricts translation norms, and in turn, they altogether control canonicity of translated literature.Translated literature around the May 4th Movement experienced a special process in the history of Chinese literature. It moved from the periphery to the center of Chinese literature. This thesis describes the development and characteristics of literature translation at that time: the genres of translated literature were improved; literary consciousness was developed; translation methods developed from adapted translation to complete translation, and hence caused the debate on free translation and literal translation; translated literatureinfluenced Chinese new literature on a large scale. Moreover, the thesis mentions the. historical background of literature translation, some representatives of the translators and their theories during this period.The core of this thesis is the description of literature translation around the May 4th Movement from the perspective of polysystem theory. During the former period of time (1898-1919), translated literature was on the periphery of the Chinese literary polysystem. The purpose of literature translation was to draw on the ideas and civilizations from the foreign countries. "Enlightening" and "entertaining" became the criteria for the selection of literary works to be translated. The translations were restricted by the target-oriented norms, and the phenomena of disorder in literature translation were rather common. So the ideology and translation norms resulted in the conservative literary repertoire and the static canonicity before the May 4th Movement. That is, some translated literary works were regarded as canons at the level of texts, but their models had not been employed by Chinese literary creation. During the latter period (1919~1927), with various ideas and thoughts pouring and streaming into China, "innovative" and "realistic" literary works turned to be the mainstream and became the criteria of selection. Translators managed to pursue the adequacy of the source texts, which led to the innovative literary repertoire and the dynamic canonicity after the May 4th Movement. Translated literature eventually moved into the center of Chinese literary polysystem.Besides, the author gives some ideas about the deficiencies of polysystem theory. First, Even-Zohar tends to propose universals based on very little evidence. Then, his methodology limits the scope of his investigation. Finally, it seems that polysystem theory pays little attention to the effects of the translators' subjectivity.
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