Different Models Of Translation Ethics Justifiably Adopted By Zhu Shenghao And Liang Shiqiu In Their Translations Of Romeo And Juliet

As time goes by, the focus of translation studies has shifted from philology to linguistics and then to culture. Then, some western scholars hold that the focus has welcomed "the return to ethics". Since translation is an activity participated by several parties, it certainly involves moral values and principles, which as a whole forms ethics.Scholars like Antoine Berman, Lawrence Venuti and Antony Pym are famous for their studies in translation ethics, while Chesterman’s elucidating of five current models of translation ethics has been regarded as representative. According to Chesterman, the five current models are: ethics of representation-to represent the source text, or the source author’s intention, accurately; ethics of service-to fulfill the aim of the translation as set by the client and accepted or negotiated by the translator; ethics of communication-to recognize the Other as a’subject’, with whom one can indeed communicate; norm-based ethics-to behave as one is expected in accordance with the norms; and ethics of commitment-another ethical model put forward later than the above four-to support the striving for excellence, the wanting to be a good translator. His concept crystallizes the existing ideas about translation ethics, thus providing us with a multi-dimensional perspective for studying diverse translation thoughts and practice. This thesis adopts these five models to analyze the translator’s translation ethics.The differences exist in the translator’s ethics result in different translations, for the translator’s ethics have an impact on the translator’s choices when translating. This thesis selects two famous translators-Zhu Shenghao and Liang Shiqiu to make a comparative study based on their translations of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The thesis aims to find out how they follow their own ethics and their differences in translation ethics as well as how these differences influence their translations by evaluating the two versions from the perspective of translation ethics.