An Eco-translatological Study On Howard Goldblatt’s Translation Of Shengsi Pilao

The novel Shengsi pilao is one of the magnum opuses of Mo Yan, the first Chinese winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature at present. Since its publication in2006, the novel has been widely noted in the academic field. However, the English version Life and Death are Wearing Me Out which was translated by the famous American translator Howard Goldblatt hasn’t gained much attention since its publication in2008. As the foremost translator for modern and contemporary Chinese literature in the West, Goldblatt’s translation works and translation philosophies deserve more studies so as to provide some valuable experience and reference for other translators. Therefore, Goldblatt’s translation version of Shengsi pilao is selected as the research object of this thesis. The study is conducted from the perspective of eco-translatology which is proposed by Chinese Professor Hu Gengshen. This theory is an ecological approach to translation study. According to this theory, translating process comprises the stages of selective adaptation and adaptive selection. As a brand-new translation theory, eco-translatology has received extensive concern and surely has a promising prospect. In this thesis, the theory will be applied to the study of Goldblatt’s translation work Life and Death are Wearing Me Out.Based on eco-translatology, the study first analyzes the translational eco-environment from the aspects of the author, differences between source and target languages, differences between source and target cultures and the target readers respectively. Then Goldblatt’s adaptation and selection in translating process are explored. In the first stage, as a typically important element in translational eco-environment, the source text selects the translator. Therefore, the study firstly probes into the reasons why Goldblatt is selected as "the translator" from the aspects of his bilingual and bicultural competence and personal interests. As for the stage of adaptive selection, Goldblatt’s selection of different translation strategies and methods are illustrated from the linguistic, cultural and communicative dimensions.Through this study, the author finds that Goldblatt adopts both the foreignization and domestication strategies and the former is more frequently used in his translation of Shengsi pilao. Meanwhile, Goldblatt selects various methods to adapt to different elements of the translational eco-environment, which in return realizes the multi-dimensional transformation of the source text. In addition, this study demonstrates that translational eco-environment plays a vital role in translation activity. With the illustration of Goldblatt’s selections of translation strategies and methods, the study also further proves that the translator occupies an essential place in translating process.The significance of this study is that it provides more evidence for demonstrating the feasibility of eco-translatology in expounding the translation activity. What’s more, the study also presents some of Goldblatt’s valuable experience in translating Chinese literature for other translators so that more Chinese works can be translated in high quality and then spread around the world in the future.