A Study Of Translation Strategies On Poems Of Mao Zedong Rhymed Versions With Annotations From The Perspective Of Three Beauty Theory

Taking Gu Zhengkun’s Poems of Mao Zedong Rhymed Version with Annotations(2010edition)as the research object,this thesis studies the translation strategies that Gu Zhengkun applied to achieve the goal of “the beauty of meaning,the beauty of sound and the beauty of form” from the perspective of “Three Beauty Theory” put forward by Xu Yuanchong.The study has found the following:First,the beauty of meaning sometimes not only depends on images,but the image combinations of a verse or the whole poem,which illustrates that a translator should pay attention to the expressions and choices of words and sentences.As for the translation of the beauty of meaning,namely,the translation of images,Gu Zhengkun adopts foreignization and domestication.From the perspective of the expression of words,phrases and sentences,Gu Zhengkun tends to adopt domestication,vividly expressing the beauty of meaning in original poems.As for the translation of images with rich connotation of Chinese culture,Gu Zhengkun is more likely to adopt foreignization,namely,literal translation or literal translation plus thick translation,not only keeping the surface meanings of the images but information of Chinses culture,which further facilitates the spread of Chinese culture.Second,as for the translation of aesthetic excellence in phonology of Mao Zedong’s poems,Gu Zhengkun also adopts both domestication and foreignization,but he takes a fancy of domestication,and thus translates most of the end rhymes of Mao Zedong’s poems into the rhyme modes that cater for the reading habits of target readers,namely,alternating rhyme and couplet rhyme,reducing their strangeness toward the translations and enhancing the translations’ beauty of sound.Third,as for the aesthetic excellence in morphology of Mao Zedong’s poems,Gu Zhengkun is inclined to make good use of domestication.He mainly adopts addition,sentence structure conversion and enjambment to translate Mao Zedong’s poems so as to faithfully convey the beauty of meaning,and thus the length of verses in Gu Zhengkun’s translations is twice than that of the original,but on the whole,his translations look roughly neat and orderly and resemble to the original,which shows his keen awareness of expressing the beauty of form.Moreover,the number of lines in his translations is kept the same with the original,and some rhetorical devices used in the original poems are remained as well,showing his awareness of foreignization.To sum up,it has been found that Gu Zhengkun does not simply choose domestication or foreignization,but flexibly takes advantage of these two translation strategies according to different translation purposes when he translates Mao Zedong’s poems.The translator can adopt either domestication or foreignization after he makes a comprehensive analysis of the various factors in the process of translation.On the whole,the awareness of foreignization is stronger than that of domestication in Gu Zhengkun’s version.Furthermore,this thesis also proves that Three Beauty Theory can be applied in poetry translation and has a strong directive function to the translation of poetry.