Analysis On Chinese Versions Of A Study In Scarlet From The Perspective Of Manipulation Theory

Since the1970s,"cultural turn" appeared in the West."Cultural turn" prefers to study translation from the perspective of culture, which is different from traditional translation studies. It suggests a new angle to study translation. On the basis of Itamar Even-Zohar’s Polysystem theory, Andre Lefevere proposed an important notion of regarding translation as rewriting, in his masterpiece, Translation, Rewriting and the Manipulation of Literary Fame, in which he points that three constraints, ideology, poetics and professionals, control the literary system.A Study in Scarlet is the first detective novel of Cannon Doyle. The character in the novel, Sherlock Holmes is famous all over the world. During the100years since it has been published, it has been translated into more than50kinds of language. William Somerset Maugham, British renowned novelist, once said in his essay published on Saturday Evening Post,"No detective stories have ever had the popularity of Conan Dolye’s and because of the invention of Sherlock Holmes I think it must be admitted that none have so well deserved it" At late Qing Dynasty, Holmes was first introduced into Chinese. From Late Qing Dynasty to now, the translation of Holmes has undergone4stages. The first one is at late Qing Dynasty when it was first introduced into China. The second one is the period after May Fourth Movement, when classical style of Chinese was abolished and vernacular Chinese was used.The third one is the period after Cultural Revolution, for it was a freer period for literature todevelopment. The fourth one is during the new century. As the first stories of SherlockHolmes Series, A Study in Scarlet was also translated several times. According to the differenthistory background of translation, the thesis attempts to choose two versions and make acomparative analysis. One is translated by Lin Shu, and published by the Commercial Press in1908. Another one is translated by Ding Zhonghua, and published by the Masses PublishingHouse in1981.Three questions are going to be discussed in this thesis: firstly, which factors influencethe process of translation; secondly, how these factors influence the translations; thirdly, thetwo versions have similarities as well as differences, but what causes these similarities anddifferences.By adopting qualitative and quantitative methods, the author makes a descriptiveanalysis on the two versions. After comparative analysis, the following conclusion can bemade. Firstly, ideology, poetics and patronage do influence the translation. Secondly,influenced by different ideologies, Lin Shu and Ding Zhonghua adopt different expressions intheir translations. Thirdly, owing to the different poetics, the translations of two writers areinfluenced on the lexical level, the level of syntax, and the environmental description andcharacter description. Lin Shu adopts the strategies of omission and abridgement in thetranslation of environmental and character description, and Ding Zhonghua tries to remainthese descriptions in his translation to achieve the same effect as the original. Fourthly, thepublishers who play an important role in deciding which kind of novels can be translated, tosome extent, do influence the translations.