On Lin Yutang’s Translating Fu Sheng Liu Ji In The Context Of Eco-Translatology

The modern translation theory develops thrivingly and fruitfully, but is still somewhat unbalanced. Most translation theorists have been focusing on a micro level such as the nature, criteria, techniques and strategies of translation, but not enough on a macro level, and thus result in the lack of macroscopic translation theories in this domain. Moreover, in the past, attention of the translation theories at home was paid less to the translator-the most active factor involved in the translation process, than to the text. Apart from the notion of "Translator’s Subjectivity", Eco-translatology explained by Hu Gengshen is a new notion to give a top priority to translator and assert translator’s centeredness and dominance.This thesis makes a tentative study on Lin Yutang’s translating Fu Sheng Liu Ji based on Hu Gengshen’s Eco-translatology. Fu Sheng Liu Ji is an autobiographical novel written by Shen Fu, a scholar of the late Qing Dynasty, to make a description on the daily life of him and his wife, as well as his discussions covering the art of life, leisure time and amusement, landscape scenery, and his literary criticisms. This book is characterized by its sincere frankness, Hsingling features, and unconventional originality.Hu introduces for the first time the principles from Darwin’s Theory of Biological Evolution. Translation is defined by Hu from the translator’s perspective:"Translation is a selection activity of the translator’s adaptation to fit the translational eco-environment." This definition indicates that translation is the translator’s adaptation and selection. Either "adaptation" or "selection" in translation activity is made by the translator, namely, the translator’s adaptation is selective, and his or her selection is also adaptive. In terms of Hu’s theory, the translator’s adaptation and selection are operated on three aspects:needs, competence and translational eco-environment. It’s reasonable to draw the conclusion that this theory emphasizes on the translator’s dominance and centeredness in the translating process.The reason for the author of the thesis to choose Lin’s Six Chapters of a Floating Life as a case study is that his translation fits the translational eco-environment and is also regarded as a very successful work, which is highly praised and favored by the English readers. Furthermore, Mr. Lin Yutang, the translator, also enjoys great reputation both at home and abroad. Both the translator and the translation successfully survive in the translational eco-environment.In this thesis, the author tries to study the following two aspects:the reason why Lin selected Fu Sheng Liu Ji as the material for his translation, and the adaptation and selection process in Lin’s translating. After the study, the author finds out that firstly, Lin’s decision-making of translating was out of his adaptation and selection to the external and internal needs. Among them, the external needs include the Western world’s exploration of Chinese culture and curiosity to Chinese life, and the internal needs refer to Lin’s life philosophy and self-expression. Secondly, Lin must operate his adaptation and selection to his competence, which means Lin’s bilingual and bicultural competence and the fusion between him and the source text. Moreover, Lin adapted to and selected in the translational eco-environment successfully. The translator made the corresponding selection on the basis of the multi-dimensional adaptations to the translational eco-environment. The adaptation and selection on the linguistic, cultural, and communicative dimensions are discussed in this thesis.In a word, this thesis gives an overall description of Lin’s translating process of Fu Sheng Liu Ji, and thus is helpful for us to get a clearer understanding on the translator’s centeredness and dominance. On the other hand, it offers a case study to testify the feasibility of the application of Eco-translatology.One more thing necessary to be pointed out is that Hu’s Eco-translatology still remains controversial among the scholars, on which the author of this thesis is not entitled to make comments but, in view of the academic contending, to try explaining something about the role of the translator and the function of the translational eco-environment based on Lin’s translation of Six Chapters of a Floating Life for a tentative theoretical research.