Aesthetic Approach To Poetry Translation

The classical Chinese poetry is known for its artistic conception, which occupies a position of significance in Chinese poetics. In some sense, it can be deemed as the essence of Chinese poetry. Artistic conception refers to the aesthetic space of imagination generated from a series of images characterized by the fusion of emotion and scenery, mutual promotion of Xu and Shi in the lyric poems. Because of the important position in Chinese poetry, the author of this thesis holds that it should be made as the starting point in English translation of Chinese poetry.After a detailed study of the difference between the two languages, the author argues that the informational-aesthetic principle should be followed in poetry translation so as to transfer the artistic conception. According to the informational principle, the translator should take three criteria into consideration: accuracy, redundancy and acceptability. Accuracy refers to the extent to which the translator understands and reproduces the various elements so as to transfer the original information without any distortion. Redundancy refers to the degree to which the translator regulates the two codes on condition of no distortion of the original information so as to achieve the so-called "dynamic equivalence". Acceptability refers to the degree to which the target language system accepts the original information, and the degree to which the target language readers accept the transformed information. The important thing is the aesthetic principle. The accuracy of information must stand up to the three criteria of aesthetic principle: artistic conception, emotion and style. If accuracy and artistic conception are in contradiction with each other, the information should be transformed.The first chapter emphasizes that aesthetic requirement is the eternal pursuit in poetry translation. The poem translated must be in possession of three beauties: beauty in sound, form and artistic conception. In addition, aesthetic standards of poetry translation are proposed for thecomparative study of the two versions of the poem Dai Bei Li Qiu Chuang Feng Yu XI. Chapter 2 discusses the difficulties of poetry translation and then proposes the informational-aesthetic principle, which is followed by the discussion of the relationship between aesthetic subject and object in poetry translation. Chapter 3 puts forward a proposal that artistic conception should be made as the starting point of poetry translation. Then a detailed analysis of artistic conception is made. Moreover, the author argues that the creativity of the translator is needed in poetry translation. Chapter 4 begins by a brief discussion of the relationship between the poem selected and the book Hong Lou Meng. Next, the analysis of the different translation ideology of the two translators (Yang Hsien-yi and David Hawkes) is made. Last part is the aesthetic approach to the two versions of the poem.According to the analysis above, the author concludes that the best faithfulness in poetry translation is the transference of the artistic conception, the emotion and style. Because of the radical differences between the two languages, the translator should follow the informational-aesthetic principle which calls for both accuracy of information and aesthetic effect. Therefore, a translator should bring into play his dynamic role and take the advantage of the TL instead of clinging to the surface structure of the source text. What's more, the poem translated should possess the linguistic and cultural features of the TL. The poem translated should be poetic and acceptable to the TL readers. In poetry translation, those that can be translated may not necessarily be translated, whereas those that need to be translated may not necessarily be translated in a direct way. All depend on whether it is beneficial to the transference of artistic conception.