A Study Of The Translation Of Tea Men’s Autobiographies In The Tang Dynasty From The "Third Space"

Based on post-colonial theorist Homi.K.Bhabha’s concepts of “cultural differences” and “hybridity” as well as the “third space” theory,this research aims at analyzing the English version of Lu Yu’s autobiography in Victor Mair’s tea book The True History of Tea,trying to see in which aspects and to what a degree the translator could transcend his own cultural identity to distinguish and reflect the “culture differences” in the original text to realize a fair dialogues between different cultures in the third space.The research shows that this autobiography,culture differences are mainly reflected in lexical,rhetorical and discourse aspects.Although this ancient tea classic is highly elliptical,it reveals tea man’s noble spirit and the living experience in the Tang Dynasty.With such a host of culture differences,the translator has employed hybrid translation strategies,such as transliteration with explanatory translation,liberal translation with annotation,literal translation with transliteration and etc.The research finds that the size of the third space is mainly limited by the translator’s Chinese proficiency and culture identity.The hybrid translation strategies could help expand the translator’s third space and construct Chinese Tea culture overseas discourse system.