Translator's Roles In The Light Of Intertextuality

The term, "intertextuality", was first put forward by the French literary theorist Julia Christeva. She thinks that any text results from the absorption and transformation of other texts, and she calls this textual characteristic intertextuality. In her opinion, any text is intertextual. Stressing the reference between different texts or within a given text, intertextuality theory claims that the understanding of a text presupposes the acquaintance of both references within this given text and references of this given text to other relevant texts. This method of understanding a text provides translators with a brand-new perspective for interpreting texts. Basil Hatim and Ian Mason soon realized the guiding significance of intertextuality in translation. Henceforth they introduced this theory to translation studies.Though translator's role was once overplayed, the important role the translator undertakes has regrettably been neglected for a long time in the traditional theories. The focus of traditional translation studies is on the comparison between the source text and the target text, on the intrinsic quality of translation, translation strategies and the criteria of translation. "Faithfulness" and "equivalence" are the essential standard in translation. Therefore, translation has been regarded as linguistic transform and the translator is assigned to a subordinate position. The employment of translator's subjectivity has been restrained. In recent years, with the emergence of new approaches to translation studies, the multi-roles that the translator plays in the whole translation process have become a heated subject of discussion.On the basis of the essence of theories of intertextuality, this thesis tries to clarify the notion of "literary intertexts", and then to explore at length the necessity and possibility to employ an intertextual dimension to guide the translation of literary intertexts before finally recasting the translator's role in correspondence with various constraints brought about by the complexity of literary intertexts.The thesis consists of five parts as follows:The first part is a brief introduction of current studies on intertextual theory, translation studies, and the role of the translator.The second part is Chapter One, which gives a general survey of various views on translation and the translator's status. Even though translator once overplayed its role in ancient Rome owing to its conquest and in China in philological period, traditional translation theories mainly maintain that a translation should be the equivalence of the source text; the translator should be a "servant" and an "invisible" man whose job is to passively reproduce the source text. Modern translation theories hold that the translator should be active and act as the cooperator of the author, and at the same time modern translation theories recognize and emphasize the translator's creativity.The third part, Chapter Two, first traces the origin and development of intertextual theory. Saussur and Bakhtin's impetus, Kristeva's coining of the term, Barthes, Bassnett, and Derrida's contributions to the theory are all briefly introduced. Then it argues that literary translating is a special intertextual activity. Considering from the viewpoint of "intertextuality", translation is a type of transforming activity intertextualized with language, text, culture, and thinking. Thus any translated text presents itself as a tissue in an immense network of complex, where the significance of each text unfolds through referring to each other. The nature of translation makes it possible and necessary to deem "intertextuality" a prominent perspective in translation studies.Chapter Three is the fourth and the key part of the whole thesis, in which the author discusses the three roles a translator plays, namely reader, interpreter and (re)writer. At first, a translator is the reader of the source text. He/she understands the source text on the basis of his/her intertextual knowledge and then interprets the source text. It is sure that the translator and the author have different intertextual knowledge, for they live in different eras, belong to different classes, come from different culture, live different lives and have done different readings. They are sure to have different intertextual association. And they will have different understandings and interpretations of the same text. By exploring the relationship between the source text and the target text, this chapter subverts the authority of the source text and puts forward the idea that the target text is merely a special intertext of the source text. Hence, the translator is doing a creative job on the basis of pretexts just as the author did or has done. The only thing special is that the source text must be considered as a pretext by the translator. This chapter also gives a brief account of what competence a translator should have and what strategies he/she should use in doing translation under the guidance of. At last, restrictions translator will meet in creating the target text are mentioned. It is advocated that we should see translator's role from of a wider perspective of intertextuality - the translated text and the source text, the author, and even the language are intertexts in a broad sense. Intertextuality transcends subjectivity that is limited within the field of consciousness.The conclusion constitutes the fifth and the last part of this thesis. It restates the viewpoint that the translator is by no means a servant of the author. The translator undertakes the responsibility of a reader, an interpreter and a (re)writer. The target text is a supplement of the source text. He/she shows his/her subjectivity in the process of translation. But we should also note that his/her subjectivity is under restrictions.