Impacts Of Ideology On The Text Selection Of Fiction Translation From The Late Qing Dynasty To Early Republic Of China(1896-1916)

Andre Lefevere once put forward the theory of translation as rewriting in the early 20th century. He considered ideology and poetics as the two most important factors that manipulate the translation. At the same time, the poetics works within the parameters made by ideology. This theory brought a brand new angle for Chinese scholars to study the translation, especially the study on translation history.Looking at the translation history of China, we will find that the ideology plays an important role whether in the choice of translated works or the adoption of translation strategy, such as the Buddhist translation, the technological translation in the late Ming Dynasty and the applied science translation after the Opium War, all of which were strongly influenced by the social circumstances and the main ideological trend at that time.From the Late Qing Dynasty to Early Republic of China, the translation of fiction flourished, and the fiction market grew quickly. Chen Pingyuan, a well-known scholar focuses on the study of Chinese literature history for long years, regarded this period as "the beginning of the Chinese modern literature". This paper will study the selection of translated fiction texts from Late Qing to Early Republic of China (1896-1916) by the theory of Ideology Manipulation put forward by Andre Levefere.The constant invasion of foreign powers and the several compromises of corrupted and incompetent Qing government made China a chaos. The failure of Sino-Japanese War forced Chinese intellectuals to seek for a better way to save our nation from the suffering. Various ideological trends erupted with the happening of big events, such as the Weixin ideology, the revolutionary ideology, the constitutional ideology, the thought of saving nation by science and education, the social Darwinism, etc. Translated fictions also stepped into the stage as a political tool to broadcast their political ideals. The reformers wanted to arose the mass’ patriotism and fighting spirit by these fictions.This thesis contains six parts. The first part introduces the research background, questions, methodology and the framework of this thesis. The second part summaries the previous studies of former researchers both on the Chinese literary translation during this period and the relationship between culture, ideology and the translation. The third part main introduces the rewriting theory put forward by Andre Levefere, and the term "ideology". The forth part gives a general survey of the fiction translation at this time, and introduces three main types of translated fictions. The fifth part puts an emphasis on the various ideological trends during this period, points out three ideologies that impact these translations and analyzes the relationship between them. The sixth part is a conclusion of the whole thesis.In conclusion, it is very obvious that the ideologies existed during this period had a great impact on the text selection of translated fictions. The reformers recognized the urgence to raise people’s awareness and the importance of fictions to the common people, so they were trying to improve the status of fictions, and regarded them as their tool to educate and enlighten mass.All the fictions were covered with a layer of pan-politicalization.