A Study Of Yang Bi’s Literary Dialect Translation In Her Chinese Version Of Vanity Fair From The Perspective Of Translator Behavior Criticism

Yang Bi is a most distinguished translator in our country. Her Chinese version of Vanity Fair, gained great popularity since its publication in 1957, and has been serving as an exemplary work for literary translation. In recent decades, numerous studies on Yang Bi’s Vanity Fair have been carried out from various aspects such as language and culture, but studies from the point of literary dialect are relatively rare. Given that, this thesis, taking literary dialect in Vanity Fair as study object, under the guidance of Zhou Lingshun, theory of Translator Behavior Criticism evaluates and analyzes Yang Bi’s behavior as a translator as comprehensively and objectively as possible.In the spirit of Translator Behavior Criticism, by taking "Truth-seeking-Utility-attaining" Evaluative Model of Continuum towards Translator Behavior as the analysis tool, this thesis first views Yang Bi as a linguistic being from intra-translation perspective, exploring Yang Bi’s literary dialect translation methods and relevant effects. Second, Yang Bi is considered as a social being from extra-translation perspective. The rationality of her behavior of using Wu dialect in translation will be studied in this thesis, through which this thesis aims to provide a new critical perspective for literary dialect translation study, and seeks solutions to translation practice.Through analysis, this paper draws the following conclusions:first, as a linguistic being, Yang Bi employs three translation methods namely dialect for dialect, dialect for standard language, and use of colloquialisms to translate the literary dialect in the original, among which colloquialisms are used with high frequency, thus increasing the rationality of Yang Bi’s translation behavior, for it not only preserves the original style, but also meets the demands of translators and readers. Second, as a social being, Yang Bi’s use of Wu dialect, as a matter of fact, both seeks truth in original style and attains utility in readers’comprehension. Last but not least, the author points out that owing to literary dialect’s special social-marking functions and literary significance, standard language in the original can also be replaced by the target literary dialect, which can retains the overall style in the original to some extent. Yang Bi’s such behavior also provides some references for future translation practice.The thesis consists of five chapters:Chapter one goes to the general introduction of the thesis including the introduction of Vanity Fair and its Chinese versions, the research background, questions, significance as well as the structure of the thesis.Chapter two serves as the literature review. It first presents the previous studies on Yang Bi and her Vanity Fair in terms of literary dialect. Second, it reviews the researches of literary dialect and its translation both at home and abroad. Third, some terms in Translator Behavior Criticism are reviewed, among which "Truth-seeking-Utility-attaining" Evaluative Model of Continuum towards Translator Behavior serves as the main analysis tool in this thesis.Chapter three and Chapter four are the main body of the thesis. They analyze Yang Bi’s translation behavior from intra-and extra-translation perspectives respectively. And further evaluation and analysis on translation effects, motivations and so on will be carried out in the two chapters.Chapter five is the conclusion of the thesis. The main findings and limitations of the thesis are presented. What is more, the author puts forward some implications or suggestions for future study and practical translation.