The Interpretation Of Pygmalion's Retranslation From The Perspective Of Reception Theory

In the literary translation, it is a common phenomenon that different translators produce very different versions, even the same translator can have different versions of the same original work. However, traditional Chinese translation studies put emphasis on the comparison between the original and translated texts and set criteria for the translated version to be equivalent to the original, expecting to produce an ideal or perfect ultimate translation for a particular literary work. At the same time, this traditional author-centered or text-centered approach neglects the active role played by the translator.Reception theory marks a shift in concern from the author and the work to the text-reader relationship in literary criticism. Its two major representatives are Hans Robert Jauss and Wolfgang Iser of the Constance School and two important precursors relevant to the present study are Hans-Georg Gadamer and Roman Ingarden. The author of this thesis mainly employs "horizon of expectations" and "indeterminacy" proposed by Jauss and Iser, through comparisons among three Chinese versions of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion translated by Lin Yutang and Yang Hsian-yi, and translator-centered in the approach, to discuss some problems in the process of translation such as the reception and interpretation activities of the translator, the relations between the translator and the other creation and reception subjects etc. Thus she tentatively tries to explore the theoretical explanations for the phenomenon of retranslation, as well as its necessity.According to the reception theory, the literary text is transformed into the literary work in the readers' reading process and the potential meaning of the text is realized only after the readers' participation. In the process of translation, the translators, with different pre-understanding or pre-knowledge structures in their minds, will make different interpretations of the same original work. Meanwhile, each translator exerts his effort to try to get a fusion of three horizons, that is, the horizons of expectations of the original author, the translator and the target readers. However, limited by many factors, it is impossible for the translator to achieve such a perfect fusion. Therefore, the phenomenon of retranslation is doomed to happen.Furthermore, a literary work contains both determinate and indeterminate factors, which, on the one hand direct its readers' reading and interpretation, and on the other hand justify their creativity in the reading process. Each translator, with his particular properties or subjectivities, comes to the different concretizations of those spots of indeterminacy, hence the different interpretations of the original text.Like other literary works, the performance-oriented drama text is a combination of both determinate and indeterminate parts. On the basis of the fusion of horizons among source drama text, director and/or actors, the target readers and/or audiences and the translator himself, the translator should make efforts to figure out the determinate parts in the source text, and try to imitate as closely as he can in the target text; meanwhile, the indeterminate parts in the source text invite or demand him to use his imagination, creativity and skill etc, in a word, his subjectivity to probe in and concretize them when he reads the source text as literature. Then indeterminate parts that may hinder the real-time audience's response should be either removed or filled in by the translator in his translated version in order that the target audience group can fully appreciate how the source language audience responds to the source text. As a result, retranslating the drama text is also inevitable.To sum up, with the theoretical interpretation of the phenomenon of retranslation from the perspective of reception theory, as well as the analyses and comparisons among three Chinese versions of Pygmalion, the present study makes a conclusion at last: the reception theory can really be applied to do the interpretation of the phenomenon of retranslation. And retranslation is indeed necessary and inevitable and it can greatly improve the quality of the translated versions as well. But one point should be noticed is that any translated version still has much room to be improved. That is to say, none of the translated versions can be considered as the ultimate one.