On Lin Shu's Translation From The Perspective Of Polysystem Theory

Lin Shu, was one of the most influential and prolific translators, whose translations was warmly welcomed by the readers then, and produced a tremendous social and cultural impact. Meanwhile, he received a lot of censures because of his"unfaithful"translations.This thesis attempts to help us have a better understanding of the fiction translations devoted by Lin Shu, with the aid of Even-Zohar's Polysystem theory. This unique translation phenomenon cannot be explained with the traditional translation theory, which is preoccupied with the evaluation of the target text based on its degree of faithfulness to the source text. The thesis intends to give a reasonable explanation for the social reception of Lin's translations from the perspective of Polysystem theory.The paper will explore the historical background of Lin Shu, his choices of original texts as well as his translation strategies and conclude that this"unfaithful"translation is due to the socio-economic polysystem at that time,in addition,it has far reaching significance to the development of literature and society then.The whole paper is divided into five parts:The introduction briefs the aim, theme and structure of the thesis.Chapter two is literature review. On the one hand, it makes a survey of Lin Shu's translating career, and carries retrospection on the studies of Lin Shu in chronological sequences; on the other hand, it briefly talks about the previous researches on the Polysystem theory at home and abroad.Chapter three focuses on the introduction of Polysystem theory and some of its concepts, such as, canonized and non-canonized strata, primary and secondary types and so on.Chapter four gives an analysis of Lin Shu's time, Lin Shu's choices of original texts and some of his translation strategies from the perspective of Polysystem theory, which is the most innovating part in the study.The last chapter comes to a safe conclusion that no matter which choices are adopted by translators, they are the offspring of the target social-cultural background that the translators live in.