On The Translation And Cannonization Of Pound’s Cathay

Ezra Pound, one of the most influential poets of the20thcentury, makessignificant contributions to English poetry not only as a poet but also as a translator.In1915, he published Cathay based on Fenollosa’s notes, a series of translations of19classical Chinese poems, which has been widely and warmly welcomed in theWestern world, receiving a great deal of compliments. Though negative commentsalso existed, Cathay became a scripture, greatly promoting the development ofEnglish poetry. This thesis tries to use the descriptive method to explore and study thecultural reasons behind the translation strategies of Pound and Cathay’s canonization.According to The Rewriting Theory, put forward by Andre Lefevere, ideology,poetics and patronage obviously affect the texts a certain translator would choose totranslate, the translation strategies and the reception of a translation. Considering thesocial background when Cathay was published, on the basis of careful research ofFenollosa’s notes and the poems in Cathay, this thesis intends to prove that ideology,poetics and patronage have been playing an active role in Cathay’s publication andcanonization. As for ideology, the World War One directly influenced Pound when hechose the poems to be translated from the Fenollosa’s notes, which resonated with theEnglish people who suffered a lot from the war. The19poems in Cathay are all aboutthe sufferings of the war, departing and far away from home, the previous memoriesand disillusionment. This is an innovation of the themes of English poetry. SomeEnglish poets led by Pound have long been dissatisfied with the stiff literary form andthe subject matter dominated by the late Victorian poetics, so initiated the Imagismand Vorticism to advocate the proper use of images, concise languages and musicalbeats to present objects and express emotions. The ancient Chinese poems and thenew poetics coincidently have something in common, so Pound developed this newpoetics by translating, thus promote the development of new poetry. He paid attentionto the concise expression of images and innovations on the lyrics, themes, rhythmsand rhetoric when translating Cathay, infusing new flood to English literature. Patronages like Fenollosa and his wife, critics, publishers and academic institutionsare all indispensible factors for Cathay’s publication and canonization.In a word, whether from compilation of Fenollosa’s manuscripts or fromcanonization process of Cathay, the effects of ideology, poetics and patronage inPound’s era are enormous. This understanding may be conducive to a more scientificand objective evaluation of Cathay and to a deeper insight into Pound and histranslations as a whole. Besides, this research can provide a reference for those whowant his work to be canonized in a foreign culture and offer a new perspective fortranslation studies.