Foregrounding In Literary Works And Its Translation

Based on the theory of Stylistics and the concept of foregrounding in Stylistics, adopting a descriptive and comparative approach, the current study compares the two Chinese versions of Gone with the Wind in dealing with the translation of foregrounding. It aims to explore the optimal approaches to foregrounding and stylistic representation in literary translation. The two Chinese versions referred to in this thesis are Fu Donghua’s in 1940 (actually the 1979 edition) and Li Meihua’s in 2000 (actually the 2008 edition). The original version referred to here is the 2009 edition published by Tsinghua University Press.Originating from painting, foregrounding has become an essential concept in stylistics. Thanks to its freshness and novelty, foregrounding is often used in literary works. Foregrounding can be classified into qualitative foregrounding and quantitative foregrounding, also known as deviation and overregularity respectively. Deviation means violation of the standard of the language. Overregularity, quite on the contrary, refers to conscious frequent use of certain linguistic items, which usually is embodied in parallelism or repetition. Leech proposes 8 kinds of deviation in language:lexical deviation, grammatical deviation, phonological deviation, graphological deviation, semantic deviation, dialectal deviation, deviation of register, and deviation of historical period (Leech,1969:42-51); whereas Levin holds that deviation can be observed at the phonological, graphological, lexical, syntactic and semantic levels (Levin,1963). Combining the two classifications, this thesis covers five of them (lexical deviation, grammatical deviation, phonological deviation, and semantic deviation) that are most widely applied in Gone with the Wind.Since very few comparative studies on Chinese versions of Gone with the Wind are conducted to study foregrounding translation from the perspective of stylistics, this thesis intends to complete the blank in the study on foregrounding translation. It’s hoped that this case comparative study will shed illuminating light on deeper future study in the field of foregrounding translation.The thesis falls into five chapters. To begin with, it gives a brief introduction to the background, purpose and significance of the study and also the structure of the whole thesis. Then literature review is carried out on stylistics theory and the concept of foregrounding in stylistics, and previous studies on Gone with the Wind and its main Chinese versions. Next comes the body part:analysis and appreciation of foregrounding in Gone with the Wind in Chapter 3 and comparative analysis of foregrounding translation in its two Chinese versions in Chapter 4. And the last part is conclusion, which summarizes the previous chapters, points out the limitations of this study and provides some illumination for further study on foregrounding translation.