A Contrastive Study Of The Three English Versions Of The Analects

The Analects of Confucius, a great Chinese classic work, embodies the essence of the time-honored and glorious Chinese history, whose influence on Chinese proves to be so profound that it can be comparable to that of Bible in western world. There are a great number of English versions of The Analects of Confucius. Accordingly, the amount of studies of these versions is large as well. Based on a careful reading and meticulous studying of these existing researches into translations of The Analects of Confucius, and furthermore an overall understanding of these previous related literatures, this thesis conducts a contrastive study of the three versions by James Legge, Arthur Waley, and Roger T. Ames and Henry Rosemont.This research is a specific comparison of the three versions from the perspective of translator’s subjectivity in translation to exhibit how the three versions vary from one to another under the tremendous influence that the specific times and conditions have imposed upon each translator, hence the merits and demerits of the three versions.The comparison was made mainly from two levels:first, translation of key terms and second, translation of special sentence patterns and figures of speech. A lot of representative examples are cited here. After a careful comparison of these typical examples, a rough conclusion is drawn that translator’s subjectivity exerts great influence on translated versions. As a famous missionary, James Legge’s version is on the whole faithful to the original despite some word-for-word translations. Arthur Waley was a brilliant literary translator and sinologist. His purpose of translating The Analects of Confucius is to transcend James Legge by avoiding excessive independence on notes and transmit the original meaning of it. He put much emphasis on making his language smooth and beautiful, trying his best to translate ancient Chinese into idiomatic modern English, thus, his translation is both literary and modern. Roger T. Ames and Henry Rosemont studied translation from the aspect of linguistics and philosophy. They adopted the strategy of foreignization in their translation process, using some specific terms and sensing verbs, gerund structures, and proper tenses to illustrate the philosophy thoughts in The Analects of Confucius. In their opinion, translating The Analects of Confucius from the philosophic aspect is a significant task. They hope to spread Confucianism to the western world by making clear Confucius’s words and expressions. Under the influence of translator’s subjectivity, the three versions assumed different features.Based on the qualitative analysis above, there is a major finding that in faithfulness to the original, Legge’s version is the most valuable one; in keeping the original literary style, Waley’s version is definitely the best one; in conveying Confucius’s philosophic thoughts, Roger T. Ames and Henry Rosemont’s version turns out to be quite outstanding. Their reasons lie in the different identities of the three translators and the different social background they live in. This finding is again evidence that translator’s subjectivity exerts great influence on translated versions.