| In the 1970s,there emerged a “Cultural Turn” in the translation field.Researchers began to shift their focus on the study of translators.The hermeneutic translation theory breaks the tenet of “faithfulness” and emphasizes the process of interpretation during the translation.Most researchers use the hermeneutic theory to analyze the characteristics of the text and study translator's subjectivity in the process of translation.George Steiner has given a detailed account of the hermeneutic translation model and proposed “Fourfold Translation Motion”,while the translator's subjectivity can be reflected in every step.The essence of translator's subjectivity is reflected in its three characteristics,that are the initiative,restrictiveness and purposiveness,which run through the entire translation process.Therefore,it is feasible to study translator's subjectivity from the perspective of George Steiner's hermeneutic translation theory.The English version of Wolf Totem is translated by Mr.Howard Goldblatt,a famous American translator.The language and cultural information of the original work has been well explained in Howard Goldblatt's English version of Wolf Totem,which has fully reflected the exertion of translator's subjectivity.Therefore,the author chooses George Steiner's hermeneutic translation theory as a guidance to study Mr.Howard Goldblatt's translator's subjectivity displayed in his English version of Wolf Totem,mainly focusing on Steiner's “Fourfold Translation Motion”,namely trust,aggression,incorporation and compensation.Steiner argues that the translation process can be divided into four steps: trust,aggression,incorporation and compensation.The translator's subjectivity plays an important role in these four steps.Firstly,trust is the first step of Steiner's hermeneutic translation theory.Howard Goldblatt as the translator has profound knowledge of Chinese modern and contemporary literature.Based on the foundation,after reading the original work,he finds that the Wolf Totem is a work with high value and great significance,and is worthy of translation,so he eventually chooses it as his translation object.Secondly,due to limitations of the background,literary traditions and the linguistic characteristics of the original author,the translator Howard Goldblatt needs to invade the original work from the perspectives of his own consciousness,linguistic level and cultural level.In the process of aggression,Howard Goldblatt has fully exerted his translator's subjectivity mainly in four ways,namely,adjusting the structure of the source text,creative translation of the source sound,highlighting the foreignness of the source culture,and highlighting the foreignness of both the source language and the source culture.Thirdly,in the process of incorporation,Howard Goldblatt has also played a very important role in importing the meaning and form of the source text into the target text as much as possible.In terms of the form incorporation,Howard Goldblatt mainly imports the form of the source text by means of restoring the phonic features of the source text and reconstructing the sentence structure of the source text.And in terms of the meaning incorporation,Howard Goldblatt mainly uses two methods to import the meaning of the source text into the target text,namely,restoring the literal meaning of the source text and interpreting the cultural meaning of the source text.Finally,in the process of compensation,Howard Goldblatt mainly uses the following two methods to exert his translator's subjectivity and reconstruct the balance between the source text and the target text: compensating via interpretations within the text,and compensating via annotations at the end of the text.The author hopes to provide a certain theoretical and practical reference for the English translation of Chinese modern and contemporary works through the study of the thesis,ultimately contributing to the outspreading of the Chinese culture. |
PDF Full Text Request