A Comparative Study On Two English Versions Of Biancheng From The Perspective Of Dynamic Adaptation

Biancheng, as the masterpiece of Shen Congwen (a contemporary novelist, essayist, researcheron historical relics and the representative figure of the Beijing School novelists), constitutes anexcellent medium-length novel devoted to depicting country flavors. With its unique artistic charmand picturesque depiction of country flavors, the novel has attracted the attention of many overseasreader and has been translated to dozens of foreign languages and selected to be included in universitytextbooks of more than ten countries including United States of America, UK and Japan, thus greatlyfacilitating cultural exchanges between China and the west. Given this, the domestic translation fieldis yet to conduct more studies on translation of the works of Shen Congwen.With the adaptation theory of Verschueren as the theoretical frame, the thesis aims to introducethe theory to studies of the English translation of the novel while making significant explorations ofthe adaptation frame of literary translation. Published in 1981, the first translation—The Border Townthe thesis refers to is translated by Yang Hsienyi and Gladys Margaret Tayler. Yilin Publishing Housepublished the bilingual version of Biancheng in 2009, a version which will be one of the researchsubjects in this thesis. The second translation—BORDER TOWN is translated by Jeffrey C. Kinkleyand published by Harper Collins Publishers. As the latter is printed in United States of America andnewly published, there emerge no studies on it at the current stage in mainland, China. Explorationsand studies on the latter will be one of the innovations of this thesis.The thesis first elaborates on the application of the adaptation theory in translation studies andstudies on English translation of Biancheng, focuses on several concepts from the theory, points outthat the theory is the theoretical foundation of the thesis and stresses classification of contexts. Then,the thesis carries out systematic and detailed comparison and evaluation analysis on the two translatedversions (cohesion, stylistic features, plot setting, emotional coloring, name, appellation, social mind,proverbs, space-time coreference, etc) in terms of linguistic context (intratextual cohesion, intertextualrestriction, linear sequence and extralinguistic context) mental world, social world and physical worldas well as empirical analyses on the frame of dynamic context adaptation, explores application ofcontext in literary translation and points out dynamic influence context exerts on language output andparaphrasing.By comparing the two English versions of Biancheng, the author holds it that the reason why the two versions achieve their respective success despite that they adopt different translation methods liesin the fact that they both adapt to the context. Literary translation is an excellent way ofcommunication, to achieve better translation effect and attain the due communicational objective; thetranslator needs to take into consideration various contextual factors so as to make different choicesand adaptations. In the process of translation, the translator should not only make his or her translationsuited to the context of the source language but also take into account language features of the targetlanguage to correctly evaluate mentality, social contact, physical world and receptiveness of thereaders of the target language to reshape the similar context in the target language for them. Theprocess of literary translation is actually a process of dynamic choice-making and adaptation.It can be told from comparison that translation is a complicated ongoing process of choosing,when translators adapt translation to the structural and context of the source language based onspecific context and communicative purposes. Therefore, due to that there is no benchmark forliterature translation, it is necessary for literature text to be retranslated by taking into considerationssuch factors as time, society, history, and cultural context. Adaption theory can offer translators withnew angel for a depth study of translating, apart from a strong explanatory power. This thesis aims ishoped that this thesis can be of some help to studies on translation of the works of Shen Congwen andsome reference to translation of literary works.