武汉理工大学硕士学位论文

writer into full play. The translator exchanges view with the author and the source text, makes full use of his aesthetic ability and imagination to concretize the indeterminacies and blankness in the ST. When coming to the stage of presentation, the translator has to reproduce not only the meaning but also the aesthetic information and the flavor of the original. Second, the translator’s subjectivity manifests in the translator’s consciousness of the TL (target language) culture and readers. Since every translation activity proceeds from a certain cultural purpose. According to his awareness of the needs in the TC, the translator may take translation to strengthen certain ideology or literary view, or subvert the existing cultural or literary form for reform purpose. The translator’s consciousness of the TL culture is also embodied in his consciousness of the “intended readers”. In order to make the translation accepted in the TC so as to achieve his translation ends, the translator has to concern about the readers’ horizon of expectation and adopt corresponding translation strategies. Third, the translator’s subjectivity manifests in the intertextual relationship between the target text (TT) and the ST, the TT and the target literature. The translated work is actually an “afterlife” of the ST with independent value. So the TT isn’t subordinate to the ST, but an intertext of the ST. As the TT enters into the target culture, it will be part of the target culture and will form an intertexual relation with the target culture. Fourth, the translator’s subjectivity manifests in the inter-subjectivity of translation. The translator and the author coexist in the translation process; they conduct a dialogue on translation and finish the translation task together. So the translator is not subordinate to the author but deserve an equal status to him. Besides, the translator’s cultural purpose that contained in the TT including the preface and postscript of the TT needs to be understood and accepted by readers in the TC.

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武汉理工大学硕士学位论文

Through the exploration of the translator’s subjectivity, two suggestions are put forward in the last chapter, i.e. to unite the translator’s consciousness of creativity and self-restraint, and to further understand the translation criteria and principles, hoping to promote the translation practice and translation studies in the future.

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武汉理工大学硕士学位论文

Chapter I Visibility of the Translator’s Subject Status

1.1 The Marginalized Cultural Status of the Translator

Translators are important participants in the construction of a national culture, and have contributed a great deal to the development and dissemination of human culture. However, they have failed to obtain the position that they deserve as subject of translation. We can see their “marginalized status” from the following metaphors, such as “mouthpiece”, “matchmaker” “craftsman”, “servant with two masters”, “traitor” “fettered dancer”, “translating machine”. The various descriptions of translators just reflect the images of translators in people’s minds, which manifest the nature and difficulties of translation on one hand, and reflect the public’s comments on the value of translation and translator on the other hand.

Since the marginalized cultural status of the translator was formed over a long time in cultural development and traditional translation studies. Here we can explore this problem in accordance with the Polysystem theory, in the hope of shedding light on the reasons that resulted in the marginalized status of the translator in Chinese cultural context.

In the global cultural polysystem, Chinese culture has a long distinct history, and enjoys powerful position most of the time, that is, Chinese culture influenced other cultures more than it was influenced in turn. Therefore, it was difficult for foreign cultures to participate in the “Primary mode” construction of Chinese culture. (Zhang Nanfeng, 2001). The powerful position of Chinese culture led to a strong self-centered cultural concept. Three translation climaxes have appeared in the history of China, i.e. large-scale translation of Buddhist works in the ancient times; translation of works of natural sciences, social sciences and humanities in early modern times, and translation of works

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武汉理工大学硕士学位论文

of literature and science and technology in contemporary times. As we all know, these three translation activities have had far-reaching influence on the development of Chinese culture. However, these three cultural introductions on a large scale all were conducted under the dominion of self-centered Chinese culture. “Cultural filtering and appropriation” (Zha Mingjian, 2003) were made when foreign cultures were introduced to China.

Although translational culture has greatly enriched Chinese culture, by contributing to the construction of subjective culture, with an extremely strong sense of self-centeredness, it has been difficult for people to consider translation as an indispensable part of the subjective culture development. Importance attached to the translator’s contribution to the Chinese culture and his role as a creator has been far from adequate.

In addition, the subject of translation was obscured by traditional views of translation. Various descriptions of translators mentioned above, also mirrored the traditional views of the translator, which regarded translation as transformation between languages, and believed that the study of translation was to explore how to perform translation and how to achieve excellent translation (Xie Tianzheng, 2002). Since translation was considered to be a transfer between languages, translator was regarded accordingly as “skilled worker”, “translating craftsman”, “translating machine” or even “cultural tool”. So the translation studies on translators including translation criticism are confined to comment on their techniques as well as gains and losses at language level, rather than evaluate their contributions to the culture and literature from cultural and literary perspectives.

There are many kinds of ideal translation criteria in traditional translation studies. Apart from the criteria of “faithfulness, expressiveness, elegance”, the most influential criteria is “transmigration”，which requires that the translated text should produce the same effect as the original text when read. The

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