Patrons Or Collaborators To The Translator?Patronage Behind The Localization Of Chinese Manhuas

The emergence of new media brings about new culture sub-sectors.Against China's macro initiative of "Chinese culture going global",the exportation of Chinese comics is playing a considerable role during this move,which then spawns the emergence of agencies dealing in the localization of Chinese comics.However,despite its momentum,this field attracted little attention of scholars.Thanks to the opportunity of engaging in the translation of a Chinese comics work,the author is able to conduct a study on the activities of a manhua localization agency in accordance with Lefevere's conception of patronage in his theory of rewriting.Upon a review on the entire process of this project,a comparison between the preliminary translation and the revised version,as well as an interview with the proofreader,the author concludes that the form of patronage does exist in this project,who intervened in the translation indeed,yet the influence exerted by the patrons was extremely limited,who even helped mitigate some distortions to the original texts.Moreover,the patrons were affected by various restraints too,whose role in this project was more like a collaborator rather than "patronage" to the translator.