A Comparative Study Of Two Versions Of The Peony Pavilion: A Socio-Semiotic Approach

The Peony Pavilion, a classic of Chinese literature, is a masterpiece written by Tang Xianzu, a famous dramatist in the Ming dynasty and known as "the Oriental Shakespeare ". As an opera, The Peony Pavilion is the mark of zenith in Chinese traditional literature from the point view of its theme, dramatic art and language. The Peony Pavilion, reflecting the Chinese philosophy, aesthetics and language art, has great influence upon literature in later periods and upon the Chinese psychology to some extent.As a Chinese traditional opera, The Peony Pavilion has been a focus of attention by the Western cultural circle for more than a century, which is an important bridge in the cultural exchanges between China and the West. The cultural exchange has two forms: one is the performance of Kun Opera in the West, and the other is the translation of The Peony Pavilion. Although the performance has achieved the great success in the West, the translation still has room for improvement compared with the performance.The most influential versions of The Peony Pavilion are by Cyril Birch and by Wang Rongpei with different times and focuses, which illustrate different understanding of the Chinese culture in native translators and foreign ones. This different understanding further influences readers' understanding and appreciation of The Peony Pavilion, and then the cultural exchanges between China and the West.Therefore, this thesis, based on the comparison of the two versions, adopts the socio-semiotic theory with the focus on Nida's equivalence, because the socio-semiotic theory focuses on social and cultural factors and national psychology in translation criticism. This thesis includes five chapters: Chapter One is an introduction of the thesis; Chapter Two is a survey of Tang Xianzu, The Peony Pavilion, and the Kun Opera; Chapter Three is a literature review on socio-semiotics and translation;Chapter Four is a comparative study of two scenes from the opera; Chapter Five is the conclusion, in which the author predicts that another version of the opera will probably appear with changing times and the trend of the cultural exchanges between China and the West.No one single theory can be applied to solve all practical problems and the socio-semiotic approach is no exception. In the limited space of such a thesis, it is impossible to cover all the points in translation studies; therefore further research is much needed in the hope of finding more insightful thoughts.