A Study On The Translation Of Wolf Totem From The Perspective Of Lefevere’s Manipulation Of Poetics

In the1970s, the culture turn emerged in the translation study field of Western world. Before the culture turn, translation scholars merely analyzed the difference between original texts and translated texts and tried to set up a paradigm for translators to follow. In this direction, they ignored the fact that translation had played an important role in the development of literature and the transmission of culture. Fortunately, Belgium-American comparative literature scholar and translation theorist Andre Lefevere contributed much to the establishment and development of cultural school. The rewriting theory he proposed elaborated the function of translation in literary system. The rewriting theory has won advocacy of the translation field but there are still a lot of arguments on the constraints controlling the rewriting. At present, the commonly-accepted view is that there are three constraints operating in rewriting, which are "patronage","poetics" and "ideology". However, Lefevere (2004) claimed that patronage influences translators’rewriting from three aspects, including ideology, economic and status. Based on this view, ideology is included in the patronage constraint. In fact, Lefevere divided the factors controlling rewriting into two groups----professionals inside literary systems and patronage outside the systems. Professionals are capable of influencing the rewriting act from poetics and ideology while patronage can only enforce their ideology on professionals to influence rewriting. This thesis focused on the study that how the rewriting of Wolf Totem is manipulated by poetics through the power of professionals and elaborated that this categorization of constraints are clearer and more comprehensive than "the three constraints" as it provides more systematic theoretical basis for translation study.Wolf Totem is a fairly influential Chinese contemporary literary work. In China, more than three million of copies were sold; the original was translated into more than30languages and published in110countries; in November2007, it won the first Man Asian Literary Prize; in2005, Penguin Books paid US$100,000for the worldwide English rights, setting a record for the highest amount ever paid for the translation rights to a Chinese book, and employed Howard Goldblatt, a well-known sinologist to translate the novel. Chinese literature, especially Chinese contemporary literature has always been neglected in Western countries. There are certain factors and occasional factors in the successes of Wolf Totem. This study analyzed the translated text of Wolf Totem from the perspective of rewriting and elaborated successful rewriting was able to accelerate the acceptance of literary works in another literary system. As a rising country, China relies on soft power to export culture. The successful rewriting of Wolf Totem will be an inspiring example in this field.