A Comparative Study On The Two English Versions Of Fu Sheng Liu Ji-From The Approach To Translation As Adaptation And Selection

Literary translation is generally believed to be an important part in cross-culture communication. This can partly explain the reason for translating literary works into different languages. Fu Sheng Liu Ji is an autobiography by Shen Fu, which records the happiness and sadness of his life, reflecting his comfortable and carefree attitude towards life. Being a favorite of many readers, the book has been translated into several foreign languages. In1935, it was Lin Yutang who first translated the book into English. Later, Leonard Pratt&Chiang Su-hui’s English version was published in the1980s. Ever since the two versions came into being, they have always been a hot topic to conduct studies on the translation of Fu Sheng Liu Ji in the field of translation studies. However, up to now, most articles or papers are following the traditional prescribing research paradigm, and very few articles or papers have probed in the two versions from a macro and describing perspective.Under the influence of global ecological trend, Professor Hu Gengshen put forward his An Approach to Translation as Adaptation and Selection in2004. It employs natural selection in Darwinian’s principle to the research of translation, and translation is defined as “a selecting activity of the translator’s adaptation to the translational eco-environment”(Hu,2004:219). It systematically interprets the process of translation in light of adaptation and selection, and probes translator’s role in translation and puts forward the principle of the multi-dimensional transformation. Hu constructs a highly theoretical framework of translation study and proposes a new look at the macro-translation theory.In view of the above, the present study attempts to carry out a comparative study on the two English versions of Fu Sheng Liu Ji under the guidance of the approach to translation as adaptation and selection. Within the framework, the two versions will be studied from two stages---the stage of adaptation and the stage of selection. On the stage of adaptation, the thesis tries to explore how Lin Yutang and Pratt&Chiang adapt to their translational eco-environment in terms of needs, and their own competence. And on the stage of selection, detailed analysis of Lin Yutang and Pratt&Chiang’s multi-dimensional transformation will be carried out mainly from the dimension of linguistic and cultural. Linguistic dimension focuses on translation of lexicon, syntax and rhetorical device. Cultural dimension concerns with the translation of lexicon related to culture. The study reveals that both the two versions embody the characteristics of their times respectively, which are the outcome of the translator’s adaptation and selection within the specific translational eco-environment. As to differences between the two versions, they are mainly because of their different purposes of translation.