Integrating Tradition With Modernity:renditions And The Reconstruction Of Chinese Literary Tradition,1973-1984

Renditions is the leading international journal of Chinese literature in English translation published by the Research Centre for Translation of The Chinese University of Hong Kong.It has been successfully introducing Chinese literature and culture to the world with excellence since 1973,and has earned its honor as "gateway to Chinese literature" from the international academia.However,previous studies on Renditions mainly dealt with sketchy description of the magazine and evaluative analysis of its translation,seldom touched on and probed into such crucial aspects as its cultural commitment and concept of literature.This thesis,therefore,sets out to address these deficiencies based on an in-depth study of Renditions at its fledgling stage(1973-1984)via putting it in its historical context and employing a wide variety of historical materials.By bringing into focus the magazine's proposition to integrate tradition with modernity/modernism in literature,this thesis carries out a close investigation of Renditions in terms of its social and poetic background,its major founding editor—Stephen C.Soong's view of literature,and its selection of materials for translation,with an aim to reveal the image of the Chinese literary tradition it intended to cast through translation.The major findings of the thesis are as follows:the selection of materials for translation of Renditions comforms to Stephen C.Soong's concept of literature.Since college days,Stephen C.Soong,as well as the literati's community he belonged to,had devoted themselves to the promotion of Chinese modern literature which was ushered in by the new literature movement in 1916,so as to accelerate the modernization of the Chinese literature,and,thereby,rejuvenate the Chinese culture.Inspired by Western modernist giants,such as T.S.Eliot,Paul Valéry,and Henry James,who clung to the tradition on their way to achieve literary innovation,Stephen C.Soong formed the concept of his ideal modern Chinese literature,which was to integrate the Chinese literary tradition with modernist literary techniques so as to reflect the reality as well as humanity with moral concern.This literature concept,later inherited by Renditions,adhered to the commitment to preserve and enrich the Chinese culture in modern academic environment held by The Chinese University of Hong Kong,the Institute of Chinese Studies,as well as the Hong Kong community in 1950s and 1960s.Meanwhile,this literature concept also met the demands of a group of modernist writers in Hong Kong and Tai Wan to preserve the Chinese literary tradition while learning from the West.Through selection and translation of both classical and contemporary Chinese literature,Renditions not only materialized Stephen C.Soong's concept of literature by exhibiting such works of Chinese literature to the world,but also established the legitimate position of such literature by tracing its development in the history of Chinese literature,thereby effectively constructed a different Chinese literary tradition for an international readership,which is full of literary innovation and concern for humanity.