The Importance Of Translator’s Initiative

Red Star Over China is a documentary reportage written by the American journalist Edgar Snow,which is known as “the first work to faithfully describe the Red Areas of China.” Its widespread circulation during the Anti-Japanese War played an important role in the Communist Party of China’ s winning domestic and international support.In China,this valuable work has different Chinese translation versions in different periods.As the first official Chinese translation of this work in China,the Fu She version of Red Star over China has attracted much attention and attracts many scholars to study from different angles.This thesis chooses the Fu She version of Red Star over China as the research object.And from the perspective of Tymoczko’s activism translation theory,the research borrows the concepts of "resistance" and "intervention" in the theory to explore the resistance target of this version and the engagement made by the translators’ group during the translation and publication of it,as well as the result of the translators’ actions—the historical impact of the translation.By adopting the literature method,text analysis method and theoretical speculation method in qualitative research,this article made a comprehensive analysis of the Chinese translation of the Fu She version and reached the following conclusions:The target of “resistance” in the Fu She version of Red Star over China is the stubborn Kuomintang represented by Chiang Kai-shek and Japanese invaders.Various forms of“engagement”made by the translators’group include:Translating the name“Red Star over China”of the original work to“the Journey to the West”(西行漫记);The section about the German Li Teh from the Communist International was untranslated in the Fu She version;The patriotic organization Fu She was set up secretly in order to publish this translated version.The historical impact of the translation: Promoting the transformation of literary translation and making the translation of reportage literature a mainstream in Shanghai;Attracting a large number of aspiring young people to join the Red Army,thus making great contributions to the victory of the Anti-Japanese War.