A Study On Displaced Compensation In Literary Translation

It is generally agreed that translatability has its limits.Due to the heterogeneity that separates two given languages in the context of rendering,particularly in the activity of literary translation between Chinese and English languages,stylistic features and aesthetic elements in the source text are inevitably to get lost more or less in the target text.Suppose the translator allows those linguistic features to erode away,the literary force of the source text shall be in for a remarkable diminution.It holds true that in order to secure naturalness and fluency in the target text,s/he has to make compromises in this regard even at the cost of partial loss in poetic value generated from those features.However,if the loss reaches up to such a fair amount,it would in turn reduce the readability of the target text that the receptor language readers hold dear.Where there is loss,there is compensation.Fine translators see the need to forsake the mainstream equivalence principle on occasion,and instead transfer those subtle linguistic features in the source text onto some place else in the target text that is not corresponding to the original place.This is the phenomenon in translation which some scholar would refer to as "displaced compensation".This technique,it can be perceived,is considerably of service in the process of translation.However,at home and abroad,the notion of displaced compensation has not been treated in detail nor with rigorous investigations;it is often found dispersed among the related literature,tagged on to other major translation issues,or simply out of the translator's personal translating experience.Aside from its under-exploration,displaced compensation is disproportionately illustrated,either through the same old examples or simply by none at all,except with passing remarks of its feasibility as a translation technique.In view of this,the present study brings into focus the scattered discussions in relation to this phenomenon across published monographs and academic papers,and its nature,categories,principles are sketched out in a theoretical fashion.The present study holds that displaced compensation which mainly involves linguistic compensation and aesthetic compensation is by nature employed to ensure the conservation of literariness balance in the rendering of literary works,and it observes the principles of necessity,fidelity,and proximity.In addition,the framework is consolidated by a trio of theoretical supports,viz.the(source text)author—translator—(target text)reader coordinates:firstly,the technique of displaced compensation is aimed at holistic "correspondence" in which the gap between the source and target texts is bridged as far as the stylistic force and aesthetic value are concerned;secondly,the technique is characterized by the transfer of a certain linguistic feature,which highlights the translator's subjectivity,and therefore s/he has a crucial role to play in prompting their initiatives;further,an excessive loss of stylistic features and aesthetic elements will proportionally compromise the readability of the target text and weaken its literary force,and so displaced compensation is invoked for the sake of readers,reception.on this basis,the present thesis instantiates the framework with samples collected from literaiy translations between Chinese and English,and in the meantime Markedness Theory is adopted to record and track down the entire displacement process.It is hoped that this ontological study with instantiations shall bring this translation issue to the fore so that more in-depth researches about it can be carried out in academia.