The Translated Russian Literature And Modern Chinese Literature

The translation of foreign literature is an important factor for the modernization of Modern Chinese Literature, among which the impact of the translation of the Russian literature is influential. This impact includes not only the understanding of the responsibility of the writers and the intellectuals and the presupposition of the literature values and functions, but also the choices of the literary forms, literary trends and literary themes. However, this impact is not unidirectional as in the traditional pattern of"Stimulus-Response", nor is it a result of a subject's initiative ingestion. Rather, under the influence of the subjective will, the self struggles, communicates and converts and adapts with the other in a complicated way. The foreign culture as the other is a self-projection of culture, and it can only play a role inside the subjective culture. The contemporary translation theory holds that the cultural studies of the translated literature can best reveal the complex relationships between the self and the other in the translingual practice, the oversea literature and the local literature, and the literature and the political consciousness and etc. Therefore, in the study of the relationship of Chinese and Russian Literature, the focus should be on the study of the translated Russian literature.The study of the translated Russian literature is broad. In this article, the author chooses some essential aspects as a preliminary research. At first, as the translations of particular works and writers are the basis for the translated literature, the author chooses the works of Tolstoy, which are most translated in China. On the basis of the history of translated literature, the author describes the changes of Tolstoy's image in Chinese people's view in different periods and explains its reasons, expounds the different concerns and interpretations of the works of Tolstoy and the relationship of the translations of its literary criticisms and the left-wing criticisms. Furthermore, the author proposes that Chinese Culture and literature itself needed changes is the main reason that Chinese people pay attention to Tolstoy and his works continuously in more than one hundred years. Subjectivity is easily ignored in the traditional theory of influence and reception. The subjective conscious choice results in the optional objective reception, thus leading to a kind of misinterpretation. This kind of misinterpretation is not a simple mistake, but rather it is a meaningful choice under specific historical circumstances.Secondly, Realism, as a significant literary trend in the 20th century Chinese Literature, is formed and changed by the Russian literature in the process from Realism to Neo-realism and then to Socialist Realism. The development of the May Fourth New Culture Movement plays a crucial role in the revelation of Realism from many other literary trends. The slogan of the May Fourth Movement is"Science and Democracy". Under the influence of the idea that science is omnipotent, Realism, representing the spirit of science, gains great value and becomes the basic claims and goals of Chinese New Culture. Under the influence of the concept of democracy, Chinese New Culture advocates people's literature, civilian literature and social literature, whose central idea is to advocate humanitarianism. The translation of the Russian literature works plays a significant role in it. If the scientific aspect of Chinese New Culture originates from Naturalism in French literature, then its humanitarian aspect comes from Realism in Russian literature. The concept of"Science and Democracy"determines the perspectives that Chinese literature chooses, which emphasizes the literary social value rather than the pure literary aesthetic value. The controversy between science and metaphysics leads to the splitting among the Chinese intellectuals believing in scientific principle. Materialistic conception of history sublates the concept of Positivism in a more scientific attitude. The controversy of"Revolutionary Literature"promotes a large number of the translated works of Russian"New Literature"theory under the guidance of the concept of Materialism. The central concept of Realism also changes from a wide humanitarianism to a more distinctive class theory. Neo-realism has already begun to separate itself from the original Realism, but at that time the controversy is still on the literary aspects, while the Russian Socialist Realism is a totally political expression, even a party's ideological expression to serve for the political struggles. Since the 1930s and 1940s this theory has come into China. As a result Realism in political ideology plays a dominant role in the theory of Realism, and concurrently Instrumentalism with creative methods rises again and holds a dominant position.Thirdly, from a historical point of view, the connotation and denotation of the word"literature"are continuously changing and thus views on literary values show different tendencies for multiple historical and cultural factors. Therefore the idea of "literature"is not an intrinsic idea, but a constantly changing concept of"discourse practice"."The Party's Literature", an idea proposed by Lenin, is in a position of authority for decades in China. It is an appropriate case for the better understanding of the features of literature itself by reviewing the changing process of this theory from Russia to China. The idea of"the Party's Literature"has an inner correspondence with the idea of Chinese modern literature, which provides moral supports and serves for Politics and eventually becomes an instructive concept for several decades after the publication of Mao Zedong's Talks at Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art and becomes institutionalized. In the evaluation of"the Party's Literature", we should not derogate its loss of aesthetic quality, but we should understand that in the specific historical circumstances, under the influences of multiple forces, literature itself has become a result under the discipline of power and knowledge.Finally, in this article the author discusses all the political aspects of translation activities with"Nationalism"and"People's Character"as the centre. The establishment of a modern national state is a crucial concern for Chinese society. During this establishment the incessant focus is how to locate the relationship among the individuals, the society and the state and how to integrate the individuals into specific political groups. As a result there appear three tendencies, Nationalism, National Character and Class theory. In the ideological level"Nationalism""National Character"and"People's Character"become the key concepts in the theoretical criticism. In this chapter the author starts the discussion from the original meaning of and the inner relationship among these three concepts, and then expounds the complicated ideological, political and realistic relationships that these foreign words have made in corresponding, fighting and converting with Chinese local resources in the environment of modern China, especially in the fight and the conversion between the western national discourse and the Russian national discourse. The author endeavors to reveal the duality of the politics of translation: on the one hand it is disciplined by the modern politics and culture, on the other hand it is the place where the controversies occur and it is involved in the political ideological controversy in a special manner.