An Analysis Of Gitanjali Translated By Bing Xin Based On Reception Theory

In1913, Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature by thepoem collection Gitanjali. He became the first Asian scholar who won the NobelPrize. In China, Bing Xin’s Chinese version has been widely regarded as anauthoritative one. Her translation was highly appreciated and broadly accepted by thereaders. This essay analyzes Bing Xin’s translation of Gitanjali from the perspectiveof the reception aesthetics theory. This essay’s point of penetration is Bing Xin’sconsideration for readers.The reception aesthetics is a literary criticism theory. It was originated inGerman’s Constance University in the late1960s. The philosophical foundations ofthis theory are phenomenology and hermeneutics. This theory shifted the focus ofliterary criticism from the author and the text to the reader. This essay tries to applythe reception theory into the study of Bing Xin’s translation of Gitanjali. The paperfirstly combines the translation with the key terms of reception theory like“indeterminacy” and “fusion of horizon”. Then by listing examples, this essayanalyzes how Bing Xin skillfully fused the horizons of the author, the translator andthe reader, and how Bing Xin reproduced the “gap”. The last part of the essayemphasizes the translation strategy and skills Bing Xin used in realization of herconsideration for the readers.Through analyzing, the author find out that Bing Xin has balanced her use ofdomestication and foreignization in her translation. This balance guarantees both theliterary grace and the exotic flavor in the Chinese version. Also, the mysticism andreligious elements in the poems endows the poems with sustained vitality. In choosingwords and organizing sentences, Bing Xin used a lot of translation skills. She used antithesis and assonance corresponds to the English version. For the differences inphrasing of the two different languages, she adjusted the sentence structures. Bing Xinalso used Chinese traditional reduplication and four-character words a lot. Besidesthese skills above, she reasonably used creative treason in both word translation andimage translation. Bing Xin paid great attention to her readers. Her strong sense ofresponsibility and her master of translation skills deserve us to learn.This paper is an analysis of Gitanjali translated by Bing Xin from the perspectiveof reception theory. The author hopes this paper can provide a new reference for thestudy of other translated Chinese works. The reception aesthetics theory is a goodreference for many aspects，including the translator’s choice of a text and thetranslation methods, the publisher’s choice of books to publish, the readers’ choice forreading materials, and the scholars’ research for translating cases. Moreover, the studyof this paper can inspire the translators to balance the translating strategies andmethods rather than stick on one and ignore the others.The author expects there wouldbe scholars to study the reception theory in a broader way. They could dig into famoustranslators’ works to find more translation skills by using this theory. In this way,translation scholars can get more inspiration and progress.