A Study On Ideology Behind Omissions Of The Simplified Chinese Version Of A History Of Modern Chinese Fiction

Since first published by the Yale University Press in 1961, Hsia Chih-tsing's A History of Modern Chinese Fiction has created a great sensation in Western world. David Roy, the professor of Chinese literature in Chicago University, thought that the publication of A History of Modern Chinese Fiction was"an event of first importance"because it was the first serious English work merely researching modern Chinese fiction and, more amazingly, it was"the best study of its subject available in any language"(夏志清复旦大学出版社11). In 1979, Union Press in Hong Kong published its Fantizi (the original complex form of a simplified Chinese character) version translated by Joseph S. M. Lau and other scholars; in 1991 and 2001, Taiwan Zhuanji Literature Press (台湾传记文学社) and the Chinese University Press also published its Chinese versions respectively; in 2005, Fudan University Press published the simplified Chinese version edited by Chen Zishan. However, the mainland-based translated version, compared with the former three Chinese versions, suffered a lot of omissions, shifts and additions. Focusing on omissions in chapter 5, 13, 18 of the simplified Chinese version and based on AndréLefevere's rewriting theory and political environment in socialist China, the present thesis is trying to analyze and elucidate the political ideology behind omissions in the mainland-based version.Since the cultural turn in 1970s, the study of translation practice"has moved away from looking at translation as linguistic phenomenon to looking at translation as culture phenomena"(Gentzler 186)."Translation is, of course, a rewriting of an original text. All rewritings, whatever their intention, reflect a certain ideology and a poetics and as much manipulate literature to function in a given society in a given way"(Lefevere iii). Based on the above theory, this thesis will be further classified into four chapters to explore ideological reasons behind omissions. The first chapter will revolve around omissions of statements about literary groups. Literary groups once played a significant role in political movements in China. However, Hsia's criticism was not in line with Chinese ideology, and thus the strategy of omission was used by the editor. The second chapter will center on statements about Lu Hsün and Hu Feng, two figures involved in the battle of slogans. Due to different ideologies, their images in the original text were not in compliance with those in China. The third chapter will focus on omissions related to Communist fiction at the second stage as well as the ideological reasons behind them. Chapter Four will discuss other omissions, such as statements about Kuomintang, and ideological reasons behind them.Based on the above translation theories and political conditions in socialist China, the present thesis will not only present a series of omissions, such as omissions of content about literary groups, the battle of slogans, communist fiction from 1937 to 1956 and omissions of other content, but also carefully discuss the relationship between political ideology and those omissions, thus further demonstrating the point that translation is never finished in a vacuum. It is hoped that this thesis can provide a case study on descriptive translation and thus promote the development of translation studies, especially the development of medio-translatoloty. It is also hoped that this thesis would arouse many scholars'interest in studying translation versions of A History of Modern Chinese Fiction from various perspectives. Finally, it is hoped that this thesis would enrich research on ideology and promote the development of comparative literature in China.