On The Factors Influencing Translator's (In) Visibility

The translator's invisibility is a concept proposed by Lawrence Venuti as a criticism against the canon of fluent translating in Anglo-American countries which effaces the translator's role and the foreignness of the cultural other. He further advocates a translation strategy of resistance for translators to assert visibility for themselves as well as for the foreign culture.With a survey of its evolution and theoretical backgrounds, it is noted that the translator's (in)visibility is a relative and dynamic concept, whose realization is arguably influenced by multiple internal and external factors. A research question thereby arises:what are those underlying factors that influence the translator's (in)visibility? With a descriptive approach, the present study makes an attempt on this question. The translator's visibility is herein defined as in literary translation the degree to which the translator preserves the foreignness of the ST, and to which his/her own distinctive features are manifested. It is argued that the translator's (in)visibility can be realized in three stages throughout the translation process, namely, the translator's ST choice, representation of the ST, and the reader's perception. It is further noted that there are factors of three aspects that would affect the translator's (in)visibility, namely, the translator's subjectivity, the external constraints and the reader's subjective judgment. Around those three aspects, hypotheses are proposed on a multi-theoretical basis, regarding specific factors including 1).the translator's cultural orientation,2).life philosophy and aesthetic orientation,3).translation purpose, 4).translation thoughts and competence, and 5).the specific historical context of the target culture,6).the cultural and linguistic differences between the source and target languages and cultures, and finally,7).the reader's subjective factors.To verify those hypotheses, a comparative case study is conducted on two English translations of Shen Fu's Fu Sheng Liu Ji, one by Lin Yutang (1935) and the other by Leonard Pratt & Chiang Su-hui(1983). Specifically, the former is the focus of the present case study, and when applicable, comparison will be drawn from the latter to reinforce the argument. As shown in the case study, firstly, Lin's ST choice of FSLJ is motivated by his cultural orientation, life philosophy and aesthetic orientation. Secondly, through a comparative lens, it is found that different translation purposes of Lin's and Pratt&Chiang's are responsible for differences in their ST representation on several levels, from the overall composition, strategy deployment, to the depiction of a particular character. Moreover, Lin's unique set of translation thoughts combined with his bi-lingual and bi-cultural competence form his stylistic features, which make his rendering distinctive from the other translators'(Pratt&Chiang's). Thirdly, the textual differences of the two translations can be ascribed to the respective historical contexts of their production. Besides, the wide gap between the western and the traditional Chinese cultures and that between the modern English and classical Chinese assert themselves in both versions. Finally, it is illustrated that individual reader would have different interpretations of the same translated text due to their different knowledge, reading purposes and expectations, and historical backgrounds.As all those hypotheses prove to be theoretically grounded and empirically supported, those proposed underlying factors are verified, hence lending support to the argument that the translator's (in)visibility rests with the interplay between the translator's subjectivity and the external constraints, and varies with individual reader's perception.