A Philosophical Hermeneutical Contrastive Research On Feng Youlan's And Lin Yutang's English Translations Of Chuangtzu

As an important traditional Chinese culture and Taoist classic,Chuangtzu is famous both at home and abroad.Feng Youlan and Lin Yutang translated Chuangtzu into English in 1931 and 1942 successively,both of which had a great influence on Westward spread of Chuangtzu's philosophy.By comparing their English translations,it can be seen that they have great differences in the content selected for translating,the way and content of paratext,and the re-expressing of the core concepts of Chuangtzu.Yet,not enough attention has been paid to the study of these two translations in the academic world,and the contrastive study of them is even rarer.Based on the theory of philosophical hermeneutics,this thesis makes a contrastive study of Feng Youlan's and Lin Yutang's translations of Chuangtzu respectively from the perspectives of translator's initial horizon.It is found in the study that the differences between Feng's and Lin's two translations mainly result from their different initial horizons and horizon gaps.Lin Yutang tends to emphasize the literary value of Chuangtzu,so his translation focuses more on the dissemination of the literary features of the original work,sometimes even values too much the literature while devaluing the philosophy to �intentionally misunderstand� the original text.On the contrary,as a philosopher,Feng Youlan takes devoting the correct interpretation of the original philosophical connotation as the initial work when translating.His translation is full of translator's notes,where a great number of quotations from Kuo Hsiang are cited and reviewed.His translation interprets the original philosophical connotations in detail,but it lacks the fluency and readability to some extent.Based on analysis,the author concludes that the two translators have different horizons due to the different influence of their families,cultural and academic backgrounds,they then form different horizon gaps.Therefore,they select different translation purposes and interpretation tendencies in their translation processes.The two English translations of Chuangtzu is finally formed under the manipulation of these factors,and then affect the dissemination of Chuangtzu's philosophy in the English world.