On The Motivation Of Mistranslation In Lin Shu's Fiction Translation From The Perspective Of Translation Ethics

Lin Shu's fiction translation (林译小说) has always been a controversial subject throughout the history of Chinese translation studies. That is because Lin Shu's fiction translation was very popular among Chinese readers at that time on one hand, and there is much intentional mistranslation in it such as abridgement, supplement, adaptation and deletion on the other hand. Such unique phenomenon could not be explained within the framework of traditional translation theories. However, translation ethics can offer an objective and justifiable answer for it.Translation studies has experienced the period of"faithful"translation ethics, the period of the fall of translation ethics brought about by the Cultural Turn, and the present period of"return to ethics". After Antoine Berman, the French translation theorist, translator and philosopher, formally proposed the concept"translation ethics"in 1981, many scholars both at home and abroad have made intensive study of translation ethics. Translation Ethics focuses on the translator's moral choice, value judgment and interpersonal relationship in the process of translation activities. In a word, it is concerned with the question of"how translators should translate". Andrew Chesterman, the scholar from the University of Helsinki, elaborated translation ethics in terms of dividing it into four models, which makes the study of translation ethics quite operative and effective.Taking the four-model-approach to translation ethics as the theoretical framework, this thesis attempts to make a case study of analyzing the intentional mistranslation in the Chinese version of Uncle Tom's Cabin translated by Lin Shu and Wei Yi. Based on the history background of the Late-Qing Dynasty, Lin Shu's political viewpoints, the translation purpose of this Chinese version and the readership of this Chinese version, Lin Shu and Wei Yi translated this novel from the standpoints of Chinese readers and Chinese culture, i.e. they considered that the ethics of service and the norm-based ethics outweighed the ethics of representation and the ethics of communication. In this respect, this Chinese version is faithful to Chinese readers and Chinese culture. In addition, translation ethics centers on the question of"faithfulness"in essence and different models of translation ethics refer to the different targets to which the translator is faithful. Once Lin Shu and Wei Yi have complied with the ethics of service and the norm-based ethics, they should spare no efforts to intentionally adopt the corresponding translation strategies. Therefore, the intentional mistranslation in this Chinese version is a kind of translation strategy adopted by translators for the sake of following one or several models of translation ethics.Through analyzing the intentional mistranslation of this Chinese version, this thesis proposes the theoretical enlightenments of mistranslation in Lin Shu's fiction translation under translation ethics: the unavoidability of intentional mistranslation; the"faithfulness"in intentional mistranslation and intentional mistranslation as a translation strategy. In turn, this thesis also makes some theoretical contributions to the theory of translation ethics itself. Translation ethics is a dynamic concept influenced by specific period and space. At the same time, translation ethics is also a multi-dimensional concept. However, no matter which model of translation ethics the translator is faithful to, he should abide by professional ethics. That leads to a fifth possible model proposed by Chesterman, an ethics of commitment.