Disparate Audience Reaction--From The Two Versions Of The Happy Prince

Since Zhou Zuoren's An Le Prince was published in 1909, Wilde Oscar and his fairy tales have entered China, but his new literature with old Chinese language got little attention. As a rising star, the advent of Ba Jin's version is still rather popular and reprinted. As Zhou Zuoren's An Le Prince is assembled in the extraterritorial collection of short stories, therefore, we should also analyze it. This article begins with two different audience reactions they have, by analyzing the translation skills and the different conception of the translators, combined with their respective social and cultural background, probing into the reason of the different reader response.This article first introduces the overall situation of the famous British writer Wilde Oscar's fairy tales The Happy Prince and Other Tales. Wilde Oscar's fairy tales came to China and caused a series of reactions, the fantasy stories attracted children, and its profound sense of social criticism has attracted numerous scholars and critics' attention. Despite the existence of some negative criticism, its enduring literary value will never be blotted out. Translation is the best way of literary communication, which not only results in the domestic version, but also some relative comments. Zhou Zuoren is the first to introduce it to China, and as early as 1909, he put it in the extraterritorial collection of stories. However, the extraterritorial collection of stories not arouses the concern of readers at that time, so this precious fairy tale along with it into obscurity. In 1922, Mu Mutian translated five fairy tales of Wilde Oscar and published in collections, it was very popular temporarily. But because later Mu Mutian's "disappearing" in the literary history later, his translation is now lost. In 1947, Ba Jin tried again translated Wilde Oscar's Fairy Tales (9), although out of "trial Translation" and "learning", Ba Jin's translation was a great success with its unique traits of user-friendly and smooth.In view of Zhou Zuoren and Ba Jin's translation and the different repercussions caused, this article continues to explore the reasons of the differences. First, generally describes their respective social and cultural background, including their era, some major historical events and social transformation. Second, from the reader's response, analyzes the characteristics of their respective translation and the relationship with readers. Then back to the original and the original author, the thesis compares the two translators on the interpretation and understanding of Wilde Oscar. From their point of view, Zhou Zuoren and Ba Jin have different knowledge and understanding in their "first sight" on the Wilde Oscar.Different translation concept decides different translation practice, thus it analyzes Zhou Zuoren and Ba Jin's different translation concepts. This is not just limited to the translation techniques such as literal and liberal, but the translation of their respective real feelings and experiences which summed up from the practice.The innovation of this paper:Through analysis of the translations and contrast of reader response:one is to highlight the role of the readers, as recipients, they actively participate in reconstruction of the text, which must be fully considered in the translation of their acceptability. On the other hand, Ba Jin's translation is definitely successful, but the pioneering and unique literary value of Zhou Zuoren's should not be ignored. Even though it only displays the value in the future generations, we should evaluate it objectively taking the temporal social and cultural background into consideration.