Ideological Manipulation Of Translator's Subjectivity

Guided by Even-Zohar's Polysytem Theory and Lefevere's Rewriting Theory, this thesis attempts to research on the ideological manipulation of translator's subjectivity during the translation process. In the different literature system, the socio-cultural factors, especially the ideology and poetics will exert great influence on the translator's choice of source text and translation strategies. Gone with the Wind, one of the famous American novels written by Margaret Mitchell is used as the source text, while the Chinese version translated by Mr. Fu Donghua is used as the target language text. The movie Gone with the Wind made a hit when it was first introduced to China in Shanghai in 1940. Immediately after the miraculous success of the movie, Mr. Fu Donghua, a famous translator and writer of that time, was invited to translate the novel and made it known to more Chinese people. Later on, the novel has been retranslated for many times. Of all the versions, Fu's version is the most influential, and it has also aroused heated discussions in the translation circle.In contemporary translation studies, more and more scholars stress the importance of translator's subjectivity. Since the translator displays his subjective creativity in reading and translation the original text, he is regarded as the subject of translation. Translator's subjectivity can be defined as the subjective activity of the translator reflected in the translating process in order to achieve certain translation purpose. The translator's subjectivity does exist and plays roles in the translating process.According to AndréLefevere'rewriting theory, translation is the most obviously recognizable form of rewriting and manipulates works of literature to various ideology and poetics in a given society in a given way. Apart from the involvement of the translator's ideology, translation concept, and translation purpose in rewriting of original text, the social-cultural factors constrain the translator's subjectivity in the translating process. Translator's ideology and the dominant poetics are two basic elements determining the translator's subjectivity manifested in the translating process. Ideology manipulates the translator's choice of source text and translation strategies, and prescribes the way of expression related to language. This thesis focuses on the case study of Fu Donghua's version in the light of the rewriting theory and polysystem theory. The author makes effort to discuss the control factors which constrain the translator's subjectivity in the translating.Through text analysis, the author first deals with the translation strategies employed in the version and then discuss some specific issues, including the translation of proper names, cultural practices and readers'expectation on the translator and publisher. This analysis leads to the following conclusion. Translator makes effort to display his subjective creativity in translation. But the translator is constrained by the social-cultural system in which he is living (especially the ideologies and prevailing poetics) and then translator tents to produce translations, echoing the requirement of the dominant ideology and the general poetic tendency as a whole.