On C-E Translation Of Allusions In Richard B. Mather’s Translated Version Of Shi Shuo Xin Yu From The Perspective Of Venuti’s Resistant Translation Theory

As one of the splendid cultural resources of China,Chinese classics are extensive,profound and possessed of high literary value as well as abundant social and cultural connotations.How can Chinese classics and Chinese classical culture go globally: in one aspect,to enhance a deeper understanding of China and Chinese culture;in another aspect,to improve China’s cultural soft power and to improve China’s status and influence on world’s literature and cultural arena? All are urgent issues needing to be solved in the rise of Chinese culture.Indeed,translating Chinese classics is an excellent vehicle for spreading Chinese culture,deepening communication with other countries and enhancing China’s soft power.As the “Encyclopedia of Wei-Jin Culture”,Shi Shuo Xin Yu has mainly recorded the witty conversations and anecdotes of celebrities and gentlemen of the Wei and the Jin dynasties.Abundant in words and fluent in writing,Shi Shuo Xin Yu has vividly reproduced the spiritual outlook of the people living in these two dynasties.It can be seen from the whole book that the frequently-used Chinese allusions have helped to depict the characters and deepen the themes of this novel.However,being concise in expression and rich in meaning,Chinese allusions contain profound connotations with national features,which has led to the difficulty in translation.Therefore,how to translate Chinese linguistic and cultural characteristics contained in Chinese allusions in a better way has become an issue faced by translators.When studying the complete English version of Shi Shuo Xin Yu by Richard B.Mather,the author has found that the translator Mather has the tendency to adopt the strategy of foreignizaiton and the method of literal translation,retaining some of the Chinese linguistic and cultural foreignness in his translated version,but there are also some mistranslations of the literal meaning and cultural connotation of some Chinese allusions,and some losses of the literal meaning and cultural connotation of other Chinese allusions.The author believes that the theory of resistant translation introduced by the American Italian scholar Lawrence Venuti has a guiding significance for the translation of Chinese classics.The core of the theory lies in: opposing fluency of the translated text and opposing translators’ invisibility;it aims at preserving and highlighting the linguistic and cultural differences of the source language in the translated text,in order to challenge the dominant Anglo-American culture and prevent the hegemonic Anglo-American culture from falsifying texts of disadvantaged cultures.Therefore,the author has chosen Venuti’s resistant translation as the guiding theory to study the proper and improper translation of allusions in Richard B.Mather’s English version Shi Shuo Xin Yu.The thesis holds the belief that: on one hand,the proper translation of allusions translated by Mather is demonstrated in two aspects: one is highlighting the cultural foreignness of the source text,and the other is highlighting both the linguistic and cultural foreignness of the source text.On the other hand,there are two kinds of problems in the improper translation of allusions: firstly,mistranslating the literal meaning and cultural connotation of the source text;secondly,losing the literal meaning and cultural connotation of the source text.In the end,this thesis proposes a further solution to rectify the improper translation of Chinese allusions in Richard B.Mather’s English version,thereby retaining and highlighting the foreignness of the source allusions to the greatest extent,which can help to reproduce the spiritual and social features of the Wei and the Jin dynasties in this book and to carry forward the spirit of the Chinese nation.This thesis helps to explore how to reproduce the unique linguistic and cultural connotation of Chinese allusions in Chinese classics in a better way,so as to highlight the foreignness contained in the Chinese classics much better,thus providing some theoretical and practical reference to the translation of allusions with Chinese linguistic and cultural foreignness.Hence,this thesis can help to promote the visibility of Chinese classical heterogeneous culture among other cultures around the world,and ultimately to challenge the dominant hegemonic Anglo-American culture.