A Comparative Study On The Two English Versions Of Bian Cheng From The Perspective Of Translation Aesthetics

Bian Cheng, as the masterpiece of Shen Congwen, is an excellent short story to express localism in the history of Chinese literary. Shen Congwen depicts the distinctive local conditions and customs in west Hunan province as well as Cuicui's love strategy, which praised the kind humanity and clear spirit. The story which reposes Shen Congwen's aesthetic thoughts, highlights the beauty of landscape, folk customs and humanity in the world of west Hunan province. It attracts the readers with its pure artistic charming and then establishes its privileged position in the history of Chinese modern literary. Moreover, till now the story has been translated into more than ten languages, and there appears two English versions:one is translated by Ching Ti and Robert Payne in 1947, the other version is translated by Gladys Yang in 1981. Besides, Yi Lin Press has published another bilingual edition with parallel texts in 2009, which will be one of the research objects of this paper.Bian Cheng, as a lucid and melancholy pastoral song, contains rich aesthetic values. So the successful representation of the aesthetic effect of the original text is the key that whether the translation can have a lasting viability in the circumstance of target language. As for the study of Bian Cheng, the domestic and overseas scholars have achieved a certain degree, but there is few who studies it from the perspective of translation aesthetics. So this paper attempts to have a comprehensive analysis from the brand-new viewpoint of aesthetics.The intermarriage of translation and aesthetics makes in heaven. Taking translation aesthetic theory as the theory basis, this paper attempts to make a comparison between the two English versions from two aspects of formal system(involves in word, lexis, syntax and paragraphs) and non-formal system(involves in imagery and artistic conception), to figure out how can the aesthetic objects and subjects achieve the harmony to reproduce the aesthetic effects. And it is the first time that this thesis tries to make an analysis on the symbolism of water, smog as well as the vegetation imagery. After having done the analysis, the author found that both of the two translators have done a good job in representing the aesthetic values of the original text. Though Gladys Yang did better, there still exists some parts need to be reconsidered. At last, the author proposes some suggestions on how to improve the translators'translation ability from the perspective of translation aesthetics.It has been confirmed that this paper, which conducts research from the perspective of translation aesthetics, is a meaningful taste. It shows that the application of aesthetic theory to translation practice is a distinctive feature in Chinese translation theory. It also demonstrates that aesthetic theory is an operative instrument to literary translation.