Significances And Limitations Of Polysystem Theory In Explaining Modern Translation History Of China

Even Zohar's polysystem theory opens a descriptive and dynamic way of research for the translation studies, promoting the cultural turn of translation. It has received great attention from the translation circle since it was put forward. While studying the modern translation history of China, the present paper attempts to employ polysystem theory to explain the specific translation phenomena at the time and, on the basis, further explore its significances and limitations.The paper reviews the contents, historical and theoretical backgrounds of the theory respectively, introduces studies of scholars both at home and abroad and draws a panorama of translation activities in Modern China. It can be seen from the research that, polysystem theory first studies translated literature from a dynamic and descriptive perspective and regards it as a system, which can be reflected in the historical and political impact on the choice of source text. Second, three circumstances when translated literature takes a dominant position listed by Even-Zohar successfully explains the translation peak in the twentieth century. Besides, the theory provides enlightenment on explanation of the popularity of unfaithful translation represented by Lin Shu. Meanwhile, polysystem theory also exposes its disadvantages, including the neglect of translator's subjectivity, too absolute dichotomy of central or peripheral position and vague distinction between the three circumstances.Based on the above research, the paper concludes that polysystem theory owns its positive meanings in terms of explaining translation practice and promoting translation studies. But at the same time, it also has its limitations which require further development.