Color Images In Tang Poetry And Their Translation

Tang poetry is a brilliant gem as well as the priceless treasure of Chinese culture. It is of vital significance not only in our national literature but also in the world literature. Through the use of color images, the poets presented us many beautiful pictures. All the colors in Tang poetry were put in good use either to depict landscapes or to express the poets’emotion. The artistic expression and appeal of color images reach the zenith in Tang poetry. In the translation circle, there are some research achievements about the translation of Tang poetry, but so far, few people have undertaken scientific research on the translation of color images in Tang poetry. Tang poetry is an aesthetic entity itself, and the translation of Tang poetry involves maintenance of original beauty of the poetry which poses great challenge to the translators.Before the establishment of translation studies, translation theories had been closely connected with aesthetics. The translation aesthetics is a theory concerning the aesthetic object, aesthetic subject and aesthetic reproduction. In poetry translation, the translator is the aesthetic subject of the original poems. The translator is of overriding importance in deciding the aesthetic quality of a translated text. The more a translator can perceive the aesthetic properties of the original text as a unified whole, the better he or she may translate. His or her aesthetic accomplishments, perspectives and competence determine the quality of translations.Based on the theories of translation aesthetics, this thesis chooses color image translation in Tang poetry as the research object and explores the poetry translation on the aesthetic aspect. The thesis classifies color images in Tang poetry into two groups, namely color images with explicit hue and color images with inexplicit hue. Through the comparison of translation versions between Xu Yuanchong and other translators, the thesis argues that Xu adopts different methods in the process of translating poems so as to maintain the original beauty. In addition, the thesis maintains that the perfection and success of Xu’s color image translation are achieved through his flexible translation skills and profound cultural attainments.