From The Hermeneutic Point Of View Of Literary Translation Translator Subjectivity

The traditional translation theories focused mainly on the transformation of source and target languages and the static comparison between the source text (ST) and the target text (TT), and considered "fidelity" and "equivalence" as an infallible principle to judge a translated text while neglecting the active participation of the translator in the translation process for long. With the "cultural turn" in translation studies during the 1970s and 80s, translation studies have entered a new stage of development and experienced the transformation from language to culture to humans. The translator, the most active element in the translation process, has attracted more and more attention of translation theorists who have expounded the subjectivity of translators from different angles.Hermeneutics is the theory of understanding and interpreting the textual meaning, whose development has gone through three periods: classical, general and modern hermeneutics (including ontological and philosophical hermeneutics). The three key concepts of philosophical hermeneutics not only exert a significant impact on some basic issues in traditional translation theory, but also provide a new perspective for the study of the translator's subjectivity.Based on the main concepts of philosophical hermeneutics, the thesis attempts to examine the manifestation and the restriction of the translator's subjectivity in the process of literary translation. Furthermore, two Chinese versions of Tess are analyzed in light of the hermeneutic fourfold motion put forward by George Steiner with the purpose of further illustrating the significance of philosophical hermeneutics for translation criticism and practice.