On Translator's Subjectivity In Gladys Yang's Translation Of Mimosa

Throughout the history of translation, the translators' status has always been marginalized. Not until the 1970s did subjectivity of translator and translators' subject status start to stand out because of great changes in the western translation studies, for example the rising of descriptive translation studies and the prevalence of cultural turn. Translator, as the subject of translation, is indispensable for every translation action. In the process of literary translation, the translator has always taken a central, most active and most dynamic position. With only mechanical operation and without the full play of translator's subjectivity, there could never be art in translation.Chinese economy has been developing rapidly ever since her opening-up in 1978. The whole world wants to know this oriental country more and more. Consequently, Chinese-English translation is becoming more and more important. However, as a whole, the Chinese-English translation effect isn't that satisfying and its present state is rather embarrassing. With the passing away or retiring of the old generation of scholars, for example Yang Xianyi, Gladys Yang and Qian Zhongshu, added by the Cultural Chauvinism of western experts, Chinese-English translation is suffering from a set-back on the contrary. In order to solve this problem, the key lies on fostering a batch of qualified translators and upgrading the translation quality. This thesis, centering round the topic of translator's subjectivity, aims at drawing some useful inspiration for a successful Chinese-English translation through the systematic analysis of Gladys's translation of Mimosa, written by Zhang Xianliang.This thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter 1 gives a brief description about some basic concepts concerned with translator's subjectivity and moves further to introduce the topic of this thesis. Chapter 2 discusses the role of translator's subjectivity from four aspects: the choice of the source text, the choice of translation unit, the choice of translation style and the choice of translation methods. Chapter 3 discusses the restraints of translator's subjectivity, mainly including: the target text readers, the objective environment and the translator's bi-lingual competence, especially her competence in the foreign language. Chapter 4 mainly discusses three questions: Who is the best choice for a Chinese-English translation? Should the translator's mother tongue be the same as the source language or as the target language? By whom should the translation effect be judged?Chapter 5 concludes that the problem at issue is trying to translate or retranslate our classics and other excellent writings. Every translator, whether native or non-native, has his advantages and disadvantages. He should give his subjectivity full play, make full use of his advantages but avoid his disadvantages. Then qualified translation or real cultural communication might come true and become prosperous.