| ABSTRACT: The formation of Modernism and Modernist literature took place in a cultural climate that was characterized by an unprecedented collaboration between painters, sculptors, writers, musicians and critics. Within this multifaceted movement, William Carlos Williams was a typical poet who was famous for his imagery poems and visual arts in his poetry.To explore the artistic value of William’s poetry, this thesis resorts to the theory of Reception Aesthetics, which was put forward by Hans Robert Jauss in1967. As a special literature genre, poetry presents more challenges to translation. The application of Reception Aesthetics to poetry translation inspires readers and translators in many aspects. Since there are two important pairs in the theory of Reception Aesthetics: indeterminacies and concretization, horizon of expectations and fusion of horizons, this thesis will analyze the original poems and the translation process in the light of the theory mentioned above respectively. The aim of comparative study is not to evaluate the quality of the translation, but to dissect what is chosen to be translated, why translators handle the information in this way and how the translation process goes on.The thesis consists of five parts. In the first part, Williams and studies about the poet and his poetry are introduced briefly. In the second part, Williams’most typical poetry, imagery poems, is elaborated in detail, as well as the different artistic effects between Chinese and Western images. The third part focuses on the Reception Aesthetics theory and its application to comparative study. The enlightenment of this theory on roles of readers and translators are discussed in the fourth part. The last part points out some limitations of the study. The comparative study from the perspective of Reception Aesthetics will result not only in our attention to study the great poet Williams, but also in our exploration and innovation in poetry translation. |
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