The history behind fairy tales: The Chinese translation and dissemination of western fairy tales in 1900--1937

Fairy tale is one of the bridges that western society went toward civilization as well as a classic work of cross-cultural dissemination. It is not only a beautiful and romantic literary style, but also a mirror that reflects and represents a social history. The translation of western fairy tale into China in the early 20th century was both an independent literary developing process and a result of interaction between fairy tale and social history.;This dissertation breaks through traditional research path by putting the translation and dissemination of western fairy tale into social historical frameworks, so as to analyze the cultural characteristics of fairy tale in specific social contexts. For this purpose, this dissertation takes the translation of western fairy tale into China as starting points. By exploring the process that western fairy tales were translated into China, the author reveals the social historical characteristics behind the translated versions. Further, connecting with specific historical background during that period, the author discusses how fairy tale was regarded as a tool of cultivating New People and a discourse of enlightenment. In another word, the last section gives attention to the signification of fairy tale in the early 20th China, and its influences on the movement of cultivating New People, Children's Literature Movement, Folk-literature Movement and the research field of fairy tale.;This dissertation consists of five chapters. On the basis of an introduction to the concise history of the collection and editions of western fairy tale, Chapter One explores the translation process of western fairy tale in the early 20th century of China. On the basis of exemplified translated versions, this chapter analyzes the basic features of these works from the perspective of translation methods and style. Besides, this chapter elaborates the features of the translation of western fairy tale into China during that period, taking Grimm's tales and Anderson's tales as sample cases.;Chapter Two elaborates the driving forces of the production and dissemination of fairy tale in specific cultural contexts. From a comparative perspective, this chapter begins with exploring the production of western fairy tale exemplified by classic Grimm's tales. Then, the author discusses the main forces or elements that pushed the translation process of western fairy tale into China. This discussion covers three aspects: translation frontier, publishing houses and pioneer researchers.;Following a brief social-historical analysis of the dissemination of western fairy tale, Chapter Three further analyzes historic driven forces of the translation of western fairy tale into China from two aspects: intellectual aspect and social structure. On intellectual aspect, this chapter discusses how different kinds of thoughts in the early 20th century of China stimulated the translation of western fairy tale into China; on social structure aspect, this chapter elaborates that the transformation of Chinese social structure in that period provided what kind of reality resources.;Chapter Four and Chapter Five explore the features of western fairy tale during the cross-cultural dissemination from a social and historical perspective. This discussion focuses on two sides: on the one hand, how western fairy tale responded to Chinese cultural and intellectual trends, and transformed into a foreign resource of Chinese cultural movement in the early 20th century. In another words, what kind of roles and functions that western fairy tales played during those movements such as cultivating New People and Children's Literature. On the other hand, this chapter elaborates how western fairy tale, as a modern western art, stimulated Chinese cultural thoughts and movements during that historical period. The aim is to reveal the inner connections between the translation of western fairy tales into China and New Literature Movement, Folk-literature Movement and the research of fairy tale in the early 20th century of China.;In conclusion, this research takes the translation and dissemination of western fairy tale in China as research objects, aims at bringing new insights and findings in the fields of dissemination process of western fairy tale in the early 20th century of China and the driven forces and effects of cross-cultural dissemination.;Keywords. fairy tale; Chinese translation; cross-cultural dissemination; social-historical analysis...