Adaptation And Selection In The Translation Of Wolf Totem

Lang Tuteng, written by Jiang Rong, is famous for its unique culture flavor and ecological theme. It made a great stir since published in 2004 and topped China's bestseller for 16 consecutive months. It has been translated into more than 30 languages all over the world. Its English copyright was purchased by Penguin Press and Howard Goldblatt translated it into English. Since Wolf Totem was launched in 2008, it attracted western medias'attention. Great comments are given by The Guardian and National Geographic Traveler which acclaimed that "this is the best book this year" (2009). An Boshun, editor of Yangtze River Arts Press said Wolf Totem has a good sale record overseas (2008).This thesis intends to make an analysis of Goldblatt's translation process from the perspective of Eco-translatology, aiming to find out reasons why Wolf Totem could gain high popularity in the West, provide some implications to the output of Chinese literature and test the validity and explanatory force of Eco-translatology.Hu Gengshen published his monograph An Approach to Translation as Adaptation and Selection in 2004 and developed it into Eco-translatology in 2008. In 2010, Hu made a systematic statement on the First International Symposium on Eco-translatology held in Macao Polytechnic Institute. Cay Dollerup from University of Copenhagen acclaimed that "Eco-translatology is the first theory to be truly' original' in that it is conceived and has grown outside the European context" (2010).The first chapter is literature review, which includes a brief introduction to Goldblatt and his thoughts, current researches on Goldblatt and Wolf Totem, and a brief introduction to eco-translatology and adaptation and selection.The second chapter discusses main focuses of Eco-translatology, which first proposes the concept of translator-centeredness and defines translation as "translator's adaptation and selection activities in a translational eco-environment". Translator-centeredness, adaptation and selection in the translating process and multi-dimensional transformation will be discussed in details as they will be used to illustrate Goldblatt's translating process.Chapter three and four are the main body of this thesis. Chapter three analyses Goldblatt's adaptation to needs (including external needs and internal needs) and competence before he started to translate Lang Tut en g and answers why Goldblatt chose this work; Chapter four discusses Goldblatt's selection and transformation in his translating process from linguistic and cultural dimensions and answers how Goldblatt translated this work.Finally, there is a conclusion that Wolf Totem's great success can be attributed to Goldblatt's good adaptation and selection to his translational eco-environment from the perspective of translation. The limitations and deficiencies are also mentioned.