| Tao Te Ching is a Taoist classic. It has been translated into many different languagesincluding more than one hundred English versions. This thesis is to take an eco-transtoloryapproach to study the English translation diversity of this Chinese classic.Professor Hu Gengshen of Tsinghua University put forward the theory ofeco-translatology. He said that the essence of translation is the translator’s selection toadapt the translational eco-environment. A “translational eco-environment” includes theworlds of the source text, the source and target languages, comprising the linguistic,communicative, cultural and social aspects of translating, as well as the author, the client,and the readers. The translator’s adaptation is selective, and at the same time, the selectionis also adaptive, embodying the nuclear concept of the theory—translator-centeredness.The translator mainly conducts transformation on the dimensions of linguistics, culture andcommunication in the process of translation (Hu,2004a:220).This thesis is going to analyze the diversity of English translation of Tao Te Chingbased on the theory of eco-translatology to find out the deep-rooted cause for thisphenomenon. The author chooses three English versions of Tao Te Ching translated indifferent periods and places by different people. This thesis analyzes the English versionsof James Legge, Arthur Waley and Gu Zhengkun from the perspective of eco-translatology.Firstly, it analyzes their translational eco-environments from the source texts and the aimsof the translators. Then It evaluates the three versions from threeaspects—multidimensional transformation, readers feedback and the translator quality.Finally, the above analysis shows that the differences of ecological environment andtranslators’ different adaptations and selections in the process of translating will inevitablylead to the generation of different translations. The eco-translatology explains the diversityof the English translation of Tao Te Ching very well. |
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