A Study On English Translations Of Lienü Zhuan From A Narratological Perspective

Liu Xiang's Lienü zhuan or Categorized Biographies of Women is the earliest miscellaneous history in China and the earliest narrative work recording the words and deeds of Chinese women.The research hot spots are narrative structure and perspective in CNKI.There are only two translation versions of Lienü zhuan.One is by Albert Richard O'Hara(1945),and the other is from Anne Behnke Kinney(2014).However,at present,it is hard to find any related research on the two translations from the narratological perspective.Thus based on the mature paradigm of narratological research on the English translation,this thesis is to bridge the gap and provide a meaningful narratological perspective on the English translations of Lienü zhuan by quantitative and qualitative research.The specific research aspects,research methods,and research results are as follow.There are four specific research perspectives.They are narrative structure,narrative perspective,paratext,and narrative voice.The research methods are as follow.The narrative structure will be studied by text analysis with the original text as a reference.The narrative perspective will be researched by text analysis.The different narrative perspectives will be counted,and characters be concluded.In paratext,the number of translators' notes and references will be numbered and the characters of these two perspectives will be focused by text analysis.In translators' discursive presence in narrative voice,following the research paradigm of stylistic narratology,taking “passive voice” – one stylistic character of the translation texts as a point-cut,the narrative voice manipulation will be observed through the corpora made by the different passive voice applications.In this,two narrative voice characters will be researched.First,for the degree of narrative voice manipulation,it will be shown by the quantity of different passive voice employment.Second,for the aspects of narrative voice manipulation,they are to be implicated by the patient and verb preferences in passive voice.The research results are as follow.Narrative structure:the two translations are similar in deep structure but different in surface structure:a)minor preface,b)the component of“???”,which are caused by their master copies.Narrative perspective:Kinney tends to employ“internal focalization”to add attractiveness.O'Hara prefers“zero narrative perspective”to reach an objective tone.This divergence is led by distinct translation aims.Paratext:translators'notes and references of the two translations are both different.In translators'notes,O'Hara has fewer notes than Kinney,which is led by translation background.Besides,O'Hara translates some annotations from its master copy but Kinney does not,which is caused by the translator's identity and translation background.In references,Kinney has more references than O'Hara in both gross and variety,which is due to the translator's identities and translation background.In translator's discursive present in narrative voice,this part will be expounded from two aspects:the extent and planes of translator's manipulation.In manipulation extent,Kinney is manipulated deeper than O'Hara.In manipulation planes,Kinney's is more abundant than O'Hara.Besides,the two translations both suggest that the original text narrates males'story with the shell of female biography.These dissimilarities and uniformity are their translation norms.In conclusion,this research makes up the gap in the translations of Lienü zhuan from a narratological perspective.The research result shows that with the influence of translators' identity,translation aim,translation norms and translation background,the translation of Kinney has more comprehensive reference materials,a more reader-inclining style,and richer narrative functions.