建国初期英语文学翻译的多元系统观照研究

Introduction

0.1 Significance of the Study
1949 witnessed the founding of the People’s Republic of China. From then on,translation, like all other causes of China, began to step on the path of vigorousdevelopment. 1966 was also a year of great historic significance. During the followingten years, China was involved in the so-called “Great Cultural Revolution”. As a part ofthe cultural undertakings, translation of China was seriously affected and almost enteredinto a stage of stagnation. The translation history during the seventeen years from 1949to 1966, as a part of Chinese translation history, was less studied compared to theso-called “three translation tides”, which were Buddhist Scriptures translation from theEastern Han Dynasty to Tang and Song Dynasty, science and technology translation inlate Ming and early Qing Dynasty, and political thoughts and literature translation fromThe Opium War to the May Fourth Movement respectively. Though there were notranslation booms during these seventeen years, the literary translation of this specificperiod of time has its own unique characteristics and is worth further studying.This study can be counted as a part of the translation history study. In all kinds ofbooks on China’s general translation history, the translation during these seventeenyears was either not mentioned, or talked about in limited pages. Sun Zhili’s monograph1949-1966: On the Translation of British and American Literatures of the PRC(《1949-1966：我国英美文学翻译概论》) was one of the few books especially focusedon the translation of a foreign literature in China during this specific historical period.Most of these books mainly focused on introducing content of the literary works,writers of the originals and information about the translators. Thus, these books werejust collections of information related to the translation of literary works. On account ofthis, this thesis is going to “rewrite” the translation history of the period of time from1949 to 1966.
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0.2 Objectives of the Study
This thesis aims to study the translation of foreign literature, especially Englishliterature in China from 1949 to 1966. Based on the existing materials on translation ofEnglish literature during this specific period, the thesis tries to answer several questionsby digging a little deeper with the tool of polysystem theory. These questions are:During the seventeen years, what position does translated English literature possesswithin the Chinese literary polysystem; a peripheral or a central one? What is the internal stratification of the translated literature? How the translation norms are relatedto the position of translated literature, and what are those translation norms that governthe translation of foreign literature during this period, English literature in particular?By answering these questions, our knowledge about the English literary translationwill be extended from the limited information such as life stories of the writers oforiginals, the translation process of certain literary works, and life stories of translatorsto the understanding of the overall appearance of the English literary translation and ofthe relations between English literary translation and the political and culturalenvironment it resides in.

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Chapter One Literature Review

1.1 Traces of Translated English Literature from 1949 to 1966Recorded in Chinese Literary History
Many people wouldn’t give a second thought before they say no to the questionwhether translated literature should be placed into the category of national literature.However, whether this “common sense” of people fits the professional idea on thisquestion is yet to be found out.There are generally three compulsory courses on Chinese literary history that aresupposed to be learnt by all college students majored in Chinese Language andLiterature, that is, Ancient Chinese Literary History, Modern Chinese Literary History,and Contemporary Chinese Literary History. The prescribed textbook for ContemporaryChinese Literary History is the second volume of History of Modern Chinese Literature(1917-2010) (《中国现代文学史（1917-2010）》) which is mainly compiled by ZhuDonglin (朱栋霖) and belongs to the Textbook Series for the 21stCentury. In this book,a section called “Translated Novels” covering less than a page in the introduction partacknowledges that translation of foreign novels generated novel writing of that time andit introduced only one of the many translators of the time, Lin Shu (林纾). In the mainbody of the book, there are no more sections for translated literature or the translation offoreign literature. Other books focusing on modern Chinese literature, such as Historyof Chinese Literature Development in the 20thCentury (《20 世纪中国文学发展史》)compiled by Su Guangwen (苏光文) and Hu Guoqiang (胡国强) and Illustrated Bookof Chinese Literature History in the 20thCentury compiled by Tang Wenyi (唐文一) etal., don’t even bother to bring up the topic of translation.
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