A Study Of Life And Death Are Wearing Me Out From The Perspective Of Rewriting Theory

Howard Goldblatt is a famous translator of contemporary Chinese literature and has translated nearly fifty works of Chinese fiction, including Mo Yan’s novels. Since the Chinese writer Mo Yan won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2012, Howard Goldblatt, the English translator of Mo Yan’s novels has also drawn public attention for his excellent translation. This study is different from traditional translation studies that focus on the linguistic level, but it examines the novel Life and Death are Wearing Me Out by using Andre Lefevere’s rewriting theory. This thesis explores Howard Goldblatt’s translation of Life and Death are Wearing Me Outfrom the perspective ofdescriptive translation studies.In Andre Lefevere’s view, translation is a rewriting of an original text and patronage, ideology as well as poetics are three constraints that influence translators’ rewritings. The study, thus, aims to demonstrate how the three constraint factors – patronage, ideology and poetics affect the translator’s translation of Life and Death are Wearing Me Out.The research approaches adopted in this thesis include the case study and text analysis to make a detailed analysis of Life and Death are Wearing Me Outand discover the influence of patronage, ideology and poetics on the translation.The study first reveals that translation is rewriting. Translators’ rewriting is influenced by three factors patronage, ideology and poetics. By doing so, the translated texts can be easily accepted by more readers in the target culture.Second, when translating, the translator should not only translate the meaning of the words, but also the intention of the author.Most importantly, when the two contradict with each other, the latter always wins out. Third, although patronage, ideology and poetics manipulate the translator’s translation, we cannot ignore the translator’s own subjectivity. It is because ideology consists of two parts: social ideology and individual ideology. Lastly, translation is not only a bilingual activity, but also a cross-cultural activity. During the translation process, the translator should translate the locutionarymeaning as well as illocutionary meaning of the text.Traditional translation studies concentrate on the language of the translation, while newly translation studies stress the cultural influence on the translation. In order to strengthen the “going out” of Chinese literature, it is necessary to explore the cultural impact on the translation.The importance of this study is to introduce more Chinese literature works to the world. However, Chinese and English are two different languages, so how to translate Chinese literary works into English successfully becomes a problem. Howard Goldblatt has translated nearly fifty Chinese works and his translation has achieved great success in the western world. Therefore, it is imperative to analyze Howard Goldblatt’s translation of Chinese novels and gain some enlightenment. Additionally, Lefevere’srewritingtheory can provide a novel perspective and thinking for future translation studies.