C-E Poetry Translation From The Perspective Of Reader's Response

It is found that in the process of C-E poetry translation, especially written translation, scholars usually concentrate their attention to the work itself while neglecting the equivalent effect produced upon the receptor, or between this effect and the original effect. They all fail to note the active role the target reader plays in judging a translation.The author maintains that the role of the reader needs to be emphasized, and a careful study on the reader's response to target language text will be beneficial to the translator in his choices of strategies in C-E poetry translation. Based on the principles of reception theory and Nida's functional equivalence theory, the author made a questionnaire about five translation versions of a Chinese poem written by great Chinese poet Tao Yuanming and sent it to the readers whose mother tongue is English with the wish that some valuable suggestions about poetry translation can be concluded from these responded questionnaires. This thesis presents this survey research, discusses the findings and reader's favorable translation strategies proposed by the author and makes conclusion.It mainly consists five chapters. The first chapter is introduction part, and the second chapter of this thesis makes a quick review of C-E poetry translation, translation schools in China and the theoretical background of this thesis. The survey study is presented in Chapter Three. Problems appeared in the survey study are discussed in Chapter Four, which are the relationship between meaning and form and the necessity of adaptation of the strategy of domestication. Two translation strategies proposed by the author based on survey study on Chapter Three are illustrated by examples. They are literal translation with notes and flexible translation based on reader's acceptance.Chapter Five presents the conclusion drawn from the discussion in above chapters and points out limitations of the research and some suggestions for the further study.