Necessity Of Hybridity In Translated Literary Works

Maqiao Cidian is a dictionary fictional account narrated by the Chinese writer Han Shaogong as an Educated Youth. It was named as one of the"Top 100 Works of Twentieth-Century Chinese Fiction"by Asia Weekly in 1999. The English version A Dictionary of Maqiao, translated by Julia Lovell the prestigious British translator of modern Chinese literature, came out in 2003 with other language versions followed subsequently. The dictionary is honored with high reviews in Western literature circle. This thesis, based upon hybridity theory of translation as well as other contemporary translation theories, makes a discussion of hybridity in A Dictionary of Maqiao, analyzing the expression of hybridity in the translated text, and exploring the factors influencing the hybridity of translated literary works.Hybridity means the hybrid nature of translated literary text in literary translation, the"out of place'/'strange'/'unusual'features, the hybrid utterance and discourse, consciousness and beliefs showed in the hybrid text, the product of translation. First, the thesis gives an introduction of hybridity theory in translation such as its origin, the definition of hybridity, two types of hybridity, and hybrid text as the indispensable product of literary translation. On such a basis, it describes in detail the features of the hybrid phenomenon in the translated text of A Dictionary of Maqiao from the perspective of language, culture and literature, attempting to prove that in the process of literary translation, the translation strategy adopted is either domestication nor foreignization respectively, but rather hybridization which combines the above two translation strategies. At last, the thesis discusses what factors are influencing the translation strategy of Julia Lovell which in turn results in the necessity and inevitability of hybridity in the translated literary work. Based on the above discussion, the thesis concludes that in intercultural communication context, literary translation has become a battlefield where different cultures clash, consult and communicate, and it inevitably results in hybridity of translated literary texts.This thesis observes the rule of translation activity from the aspect of hybridity, and thus develops the research on hybridity theory of literary translation. It further discusses the interrelationship between literature and hybridity based on previous studies on the original text and the target text, and provides a new evidence for the argument"all translated texts in literary translation are hybrid texts", while enriching the text-centered research of the literary translation studies.