On The English Translation Of Chinese Classics From The Perspective Of Eco-Translatology

To relish the essence of Chinese culture, reading Chinese classics is an unavoidable choice. Tao Te Ching is the most popular Chinese classic in western world which has been translated into many kinds of foreign languages. It has played an important role in making China known to the world. This essay will focus on one of the most popular versions of the English translation of Tao Te Ching-Arthur Waley’s translation. A great many scholars have carried such studies on it from different perspectives as linguistical and cultural studies. But few has used the newly emerging theory-Eco-Translatology to analyze. This thesis intends to investigate the reason why Arthur Waley’s version stands out among numerous English versions all this time from an eco-translatological perspective.The Eco-Translatology theory provides a comprehensive angle to translation studies.Hu Gengshen raises the concept of "translation as adaptation and selection". He systematically elaborates the nature of translation from the perspective of ecology and focuses on the crucial role of translator in the translating process. Hu also proposes a new notion of "translational eco-environment", which takes all the elements into account, such as social, historical, psychological and intercultural factors in the process of translation,and puts them into a systematic world. Moreover, the translating process is divided into two stages: the translational eco-environment selects the translator at the first stage, then the translator selects the target text at the second stage(Hu, 2003:284). In order to create an excellent target text, the translator has to make transformation from three dimensions:that is, linguistic, cultural and communicative transformation.In spite of some limitations, this thesis carries theoretical and practical significance.Firstly, Eco-Translatology can be implemented in application. Secondly, it provides a new perspective to the study of English versions of Chinese classics. At the same time, it can be taken as a case study to prove the feasibility of Eco-Translatology.