Explicit Manifestation And Motives Of Translator’s Subjectivity

In traditional translation theories, the translator, though the most important element in literary translation, remained invisible."Faithfulness" was regarded as the key criterion of translation and the translator was supposed to recreate the source text objectively without leaving any personal marks in the target text. However, the "cultural turn" in late1970s in the west has widened the scope of translation studies and has put the translator’s status into a very important place in the whole process of translation. Thus translator’s subjectivity gradually became one of the heated topics in translation studies and the translator, once an invisible existence hidden behind the source text, has moved from behind the "curtain" to the forefront.Numerous western translation theories such as Skopos theory, Deconstruction, Hermeneutics, and Rewriting theory have provided a theoretical basis for the research of subjectivity by stressing that the translator is a positive participant in literary translation playing an important role. Many domestic scholars, such as Xu Jun, Yuan Li, Chen Daliang, have conducted researches on this subject from different perspectives.This thesis presents a literature review, including the definition of translator’s subjectivity, discusses the concepts of the translation subject and translator’s subjectivity, and summarizes the status quo of researches on translator’s subjectivity conducted by overseas scholars and domestic scholars. It further points out that the translator’s subjectivity means the subjective initiative which a translator as the subject of translation displays in the translation process to achieve his or her translation purpose with the prerequisite of duly respecting the objects of translation including the original author, the source text and the target reader.Two characteristics--subjective initiative and passivity--of the translator’s subjectivity are analyzed on the basis hermeneutics, Skopos theory and rewriting theory. Moreover, the manifestations of these characteristics will also be illustrated in detail. The translator’s choice of the source text and translation strategies and the understanding of the source text reflect the translator’s subjective initiative and the constraints from source text society, readers and patronage show the passivity of the translator.This thesis chooses two Chinese versions Tess of the D’urbervilles, one translated by Zhang Guruo (published in1935) and the other by Sun Fali (published in1993), as a case study for the purpose of exploring the explicit manifestation and the motives (both internal and external ones) of the translators’subjectivity. Zhang mainly adopts the strategy of Foreignization, conveying the original deep meaning and charm with the precise words and varied sentences while Sun mainly uses the strategy of domestication, presenting the original characters, realistic landscape to readers. The thesis tries to prove that the translator as a narrow subject of translation under the various constraints and limitations, the subjective initiative still plays an active role in the process of translation, which provides empirical analysis for the study of translator’s subjectivity and yield some useful insights into translation practice and translation criticism.