On The Translation And Reception Of Hemingway's The Old Man And The Sea In China

Ernest Miller Hemingway (1899—1961) is a renowned American novelist. As the spokesman of "The Lost Generation" which prevailed in Europe and America in the 1920s, Hemingway related his life with wars. He experienced World War I, an unprecedented disaster for the whole world, and joined in the Spanish Civil War, which began in the year of 1936. A lot of his works like The Sun Also Rises (1926), A Farewell to Arms (1929) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940) were reflections of his own experiences. Then, after ten years of silence, Hemingway wrote in 1952 the novelette The Old Man and the Sea, which was considered to be his best work in his literary career. The novelette proved to be a great success after it was published. Moreover, it helped Hemingway to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 and the Nobel Prize in 1954. After that, the novelette was reprinted for numerous times and was translated into almost all major languages throughout the world. It now is regarded as a classic work that enjoys a great popularity all over the world. The novelette mainly describes three days' fishing activities of the old man alone on the sea. Though simple in plot, the novelette has profound connotations. Comments on the novelette vary greatly as some regard it as a tragedy, some a praise for the personality, some a symbolic novelette and still some an optimistic one. Nevertheless, it is widely acknowledged that the novelette embodies the value of a person in the sentence like "Man is not made for defeat". Furthermore, the writer's efficient writing skills embodied in his character depiction with full emotions, profound psychological descriptions and concise recounting style left readers deep impression.The first Chinese version of the novelette was translated by Zhang Ailing (张 爱玲) and was published in Hong Kong in 1955. In mainland China, the first version appeared in 1957 with Hai Guan (海观) as its translator and the New Literature and Arts Publishing House in Shanghai as its publisher. However, in the...