Andersen's Fairy Tales In China

The translation of Andersen's fairy tales is not only a great event in Chinese translation history but also a milestone at the early stage of the development of the Chinese children's literature. For as long as about 100 years of circulation in China, these tales have already become the canonized works for Chinese children. Andersen, the great Danish writer, also has become widely known in China.In the long span of years, translations of his books in Chinese came out one after another by different translators, in different styles and based on different translation strategies. As translation is influenced by multiple factors, including time, space, culture and whatsoever, it is worthwhile, even significant, to inquire into the various translations of his tales. The author of this thesis believes that a study on the translations of Andersen's fairy tales in China can be helpful to reveal the nature of translation for children and, therefore, deepen translators' cognition of the influential factors at different times, so that they can do a better job for children in translation.This thesis first introduces the sprout and initial growth of children's literature before the "May Fourth" period and gives a brief review of the translators and their translations of Anderson's fairy tales. Then the paper discusses Andre Lefevere's theory of rewriting and the multiple factors that made the translators rewrite the original. For this purpose, the author has made a thorough survey of the translators' rewriting and manipulation of Andersen's fairy tales respectively of different times from 1913 to 2005, and the manifold factors that caused the rewriting and manipulation of the original, including ideology, poetics, patronage, and extratextual factors in China. In the mean time, the paper is concerned with the selection of translation strategies when the translators are faced with these factors, inclusive of the selection of language registers, domestication and foreignization as regard to cultural transference, literal translation and free translation, etc. Finally, the conclusion is that...