A Study Of A·W·Schlegel’s Philosophy Of Poetic Translation

August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767-1845) is an outstanding leader of early GermanRomanticism. He contributed a lot to the development of many fields, such as aestheticism,architecture, linguistics, literary criticism, and so on. Meanwhile, Schlegel gained himself theidentity of an influential translator and translation theorist. He insisted on translatingeverything‘, and advocated that translation should be both faithful and poetic‘. Histranslation philosophy has become one of the most important ideological resources of westerntranslation theory.This thesis, by the method of induction and deduction, makes a systematic study ofSchlegel‘s philosophy of poetic translation, with the purpose of revealing the essence andimplication of Schlegel‘s translation thought, and providing an evidence of his contribution towestern translation theory.This paper, at first, reviews Schlegel‘s life, academic achievements as well as hisachievements in translation. The second chapter makes a comprehensive and systematicdescription of Schlegel‘s philosophy of poetic translation with the purpose of exploring itsconnotations. In the third chapter, the paper depicts the sources where Schlegel‘s philosophyof poetic translation originates. Chapter four analyzes Schlegel‘s translation works under theguidance of his translation philosophy; meanwhile, indicates its limitations. At last, the papercomes to the conclusion that Schlegel‘s philosophy of poetic translation reveals the highestlevel of translation, namely, translating poetically. That is to say, the key point in translationdoesn‘t lie in the surface imitation of the original form and content, but in the reproduction ofthe original quintessence with artistic language, which could create a new poetic effect in thetranslation version.