On Translating Lu Xun's Works Into English-From Perspective Of Aesthetics

As an influential litterateur, educator and thinker in modern China, Lu Xun(鲁迅,1881-1936)is honored as the"Father of the modern Chinese literature". His works have influenced the Chinese readers generation after generation because of their unique language style and profound thoughts which are rich in aesthetic value. A Madman's Diary, the first baihua (written in vernacular) short story, laid the foundation for the movement of modern Chinese fiction. The two collections of short stories, Call to Arms and Wandering even represent the highest achievements of the short story creation at that time. Therefore, the study of Lu Xun's works has gone beyond the national border and become a unique international, cultural phenomenon. However, the translation activities of Lu Xun's works is still relatively limited, which in return hinders the study of the translating of Lu Xun's works.In order to convey the aesthetic value of Lu Xun's works to the foreign readers, one of the major problems in the process of translating is to find a theoretic framework as guidance in the translation activities. Since the introduction of aesthetic thoughts into translation theories, the integration of the two has greatly pushed forward the development of translation theories. The thoughts of translation aesthetics proposed by Professor Liu Miqing(刘宓庆)in his work, An Introduction to Translation Aesthetics, enable the modern Chinese translation aesthetics to make a major step forward by applying traditional Chinese aesthetic thoughts to the actual practice of translation activities.By adopting the aesthetic thoughts proposed by Professor Liu as the theoretical guiding framework, this thesis analyzes the aesthetic constituents of Lu Xun's works as the translation aesthetic object (TAO) and discusses the active and passive roles of the translator as the translation aesthetic subject (TAS) in the process of translation, followed by a further discussion of aesthetic representation in the translating process of Lu Xun's works.