Translation Aesthetics Study On Ba Jin’s Translation Of Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales

Fairy tales are one of the most important subjects of children’s literature. In China, fairytales have been translated from different countries and different languages since May fourthrevolution. And a lot of classical fairy tales have been republished again and again. But thereare two problems in translation of fairy tales. Firstly, although the quantity of fairy tales islarge and broad, the quality of fairy tales is not so good. Secondly, studies on children’sliterature are fewer than the other kind of literature. There are two reasons: firstly, the positionof children’s literature is marginal in the literature system; secondly, translators considerchildren’s literature translations as an easy and simple one. The studies on fairy talestranslation are fewer in China.In China, research on fairy tales translation mainly uses three theories. They are theSkopos theory, Reception theory, and the Reader’s Subjectivity theory. All of these theoriesfocus on the target readers. The original text and target text have been neglected for a longtime. The literary works are splendid for its text. The translation of a literary work should paymore attention on the text not the reader. For translation the most important factors areoriginal text and target text. So when do research on translated version of literature work, it isimportant to use a translation theory which focus on the original text and target text.Translation aesthetics focuses on the aesthetic elements in the original text and target text. Usetranslation aesthetics to study on literary works can hold water.Children are the target readers of fairy tale. It is important to satisfy their needs. Childrenlike musical language and vivid image. They are curious about the real society. Fairy tale is one of the important types of children’s literature. A good fairy tales must fulfill children’srequirement. Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales can fully satisfy their requirement. The republication ofhis fairy tales has proved that Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales are famous among children. OscarWilde is a pioneer in aesthetic theory in his time. His fairy tale fully reflects his aesthetictheory. We can found aesthetic factors in his fairy tales. The musical language is abundant inhis fairy tales. The usage of alliteration, assonance, rhyme, onomatopoeia and parallelstructure makes his fairy tales sound musical and interesting. The vivid image is also a mainfeature of his fairy tales. The moral principle is turn to be a vivid image. The love and hate inreal life are reflected through life experiences of main characters in his fairy tales. Childrenwill be attracted by his fairy tales. After read his fairy tales, they will know what is wrong andwhat is right.Ba Jin is a notable writer in Chinese literature history. He also is a fantastic translator.His translated version of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales has been republished again and again inChina. He has the sense of aesthetics and high accomplishment in Chinese. Ba Jin reproducedthe aesthetic elements through imitated the original text and added aesthetic elements inChinese. The version translated by Ba Jin successfully reflects the aesthetic factor of theoriginal text.Mao Ronggui’s translation aesthetics is systematic. In 2005, Mao Ronggui published hisbook Translation Aesthetics. In his book, he elaborated on the sense of language and sense ofaesthetics, translators’aesthetic psychology and the aesthetic disparity of English and Chinese.He also used plenty of examples to apply these theories on translationThe object of this thesis is Ba Jin’s translated version of Oscar Wilde’s nine fairy tales. Itbelongs to literary works. Oscar Wilde is a notable aesthetic theorist. Ba Jin’s translation fullyreproduced aesthetic elements in the original text. This thesis used the translation aesthetics ofMao Ronggui to analyze Ba Jin’s translation. The first part is an introductory part, itcontained the significance, objective and structure of this thesis. The second part is about fairytales. The characteristics of fairy tales and Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales, and the translation offairy tales and Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales are introduced in this part. The third part is focus onthe study on fairy tales in China and abroad. In part four, a detailed analysis is made ontranslation aesthetics and Mao Ronggui’s theory. Part five is the main part of this thesis. According to Mao Ronggui’s translation aesthetics, the author analyzes the fairy tales by threefactors: the phonological beauty, the beauty in vocabulary, and the beauty in syntax. This partappreciated these three factors in the original text, and then discussed how it is reproduced inBa Jin’s translation. The author also analyzed the image in Oscar Wild’s fairy tales, and thenanalyzed how it translated by Ba Jin. The last part is a conclusion to the discussion putforward in this thesis. Through the analysis of Ba Jin’s translation of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales,we find that the aesthetic elements which exist in Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales are reproduced inBa Jin’s translation.