On The Subjectivity Of The Translator

The thesis is devoted to a systematic study of the translator's subjectivity in literary translation. In traditional translation theories, translator's subjectivity is seldom discussed and suffers from invisibility caused by the strong sense of self- centeredness of Chinese culture and the traditional translation views. Serious and renewed studies over this problem did not appear on any considerable scale until 1980s when bsignificant shift of focus in the literary field was introduced to translation studies. With the "cultural turn" in translation studies, proper and increasing attention has been paid to the cultural identity and subject status of the translator.The paper, based on a survey of the previous studies on translation, and of the retrospect of the "cultural turn" in translation, addresses the subjectivity of the translator and explores the connotation, characteristics and manifestation of the subjectivity of the translator in an attempt to further the research on the subjectivity in translation.Six chapters are included in this paper. Chapter One is a brief introduction of the significance of studying this topic and basic structure of this paper. Chapter Two starts with a brief survey of the marginalized cultural status of the translator, and analyzes two main reasons that result in the low status of the translator. In Chapter Three, a tentative effort is made to explain the connotation of the translator's subjectivity. Chapter Four is the main body of the paper. The characteristics of the translator's subjectivity are elaborated from three aspects to further explain the connotation: every translator has his own subjective intention in the purposeful activity —translation. But the subjectivity of the translator is not arbitrary, which must be restricted by all kinds of subjective and objective factors. The translator must give full play to his creativity so as to achieve the translation ends. Furthermore, in light of several theories such as Hermeneutics, Cultural Translation theory, the subjectivity of the translator is further explored through analyzing its manifestation in the translation process, in the translator's cultural consciousness and orientation, in the translator's awareness of the readers, in the intertextual relationship between the target text and source text, the target text and target literature, and in the inter-subjectivity of translation between the translator, the author and the reader. In Chapter Five, the author puts forward two suggestions: that the translators' consciousness of creativity shall be integrated with their self-restraint; that translation criteria and principles shall be further understood in hope of promoting thedevelopment of translation practice and studies. Chapter Six is a brief retrospective summary of the main idea discussed in the foregoing parts.