Manipulation Of Ideology On Literary Translation From Late Qing To Early Republic Of China

Since the 1990s, translation studies has shifted from inter-linguistic studies to extra-linguistic studies, which clearly illustrates that translation is far more than a process of transferring words from one language to another, since many other factors are also involved in this process, including social background, culture and history. Lefevere, a leading character of translation studies, puts forward that translation is rewriting, manipulated by ideology, poetics and patronage. In recent years, the researches on ideology are increasing in home and abroad. Enlightened by this theory, the present thesis will discuss the influence and manipulation of ideology over literary translation in Late Qing Dynasty and Early Republic of China (1898-1919).In this period of time, China saw a tremendous uprising in translation activities. As to text selection, the translators and translation themes change. The prosperity of novel translation is a good example. The functions of novels vary correspondingly which is shifting from "entertainment" to "enlightenment". Once the texts to be translated are chosen, the next step is how to translate. As to translation strategy, the contemporary one is a kind of translation-narrating or cavalier translation which is hardly accepted by the traditional translation theory. Translators tend to interpolate, arbitrarily omit or even rewrite the original texts. How to explain changes in text selection and translation strategy? This thesis hopes to find an explanation for these changes by putting text in its political and historical background.This paper is divided into six chapters. The first chapter introduces the research background, question and methodology of the thesis. The second chapter summarizes the reviews on former researches, including the Chinese literary translation study and ideological manipulation study. The third chapter proceeds to explain some basic terms about manipulation school, such as manipulation and ideology. This chapter lays the basis for the following two chapters. The fourth and fifth chapters give a very detailed analysis respectively about the ideological manipulation on the literary translation of Late Qing Dynasty and Early Republic of China, by way of qualitative along with quantitative methodologies. The conclusion part re-emphasizes the theme of this paper and points out certain limitation as well as significance of the study.To sum up, the thesis tends to present a more comprehensive picture about text selection and translation strategy in this period from the perspective of ideology manipulation, thus the readers can have a clearer understanding about the translated literature of this period. It also indicates the cultural orientation in translation studies and makes clear that translation is not an innocent activity.