A Study Of Translator's Subjectivity In The English Translation Of Love In A Fallen City

Translation,with its long and profound history,occupies a key role in promoting cultural,political and economic communications during the development of human history.Most scholars in translation field before 1970 mainly focused their researches on the equivalent conversion between two languages at lexical,grammatical and syntactical levels.Nevertheless,less attentions were paid to the translator,the bridge of two languages and cultures.With the appearance of “cultural turn” around 1970,researchers gradually began to study the pivotal role of the translator.Then,the translator was made visible from their previous state of “invisibility”.As a result,more and more scholars joined to investigate translator's subjectivity.Eileen Chang is an outstanding bilingual writer in contemporary China,but merely her The Golden Cangue was profusely studied by most scholars.Yet,the research value of her Love in a Fallen City was neglected somehow.Therefore,this thesis selects Love in a Fallen City as the case analysis,and studies translator's subjectivity with representative examples in the translated text.From the perspective of translator's subjectivity,this thesis explores its definition,development and connotations.The connotations include personal culture,translation purpose and translation strategy.Meanwhile,this thesis also studies factors that restrict the translator's subjectivity,including the SLT awareness and the readership's awareness.This thesis analyzes the manifestations of translator's subjectivity in the English translation of Love in a Fallen City from macro-level to micro-level,divided into four parts: selection of SLT,culture-loaded words,translator's aesthetic taste and creative treason.The conclusion can be drawn through the above study: on one hand,the translator,Kingsbury,has fully exerted her subjectivity by adopting the foreignization strategy during the translation activity.In so doing,her translation is able to be faithful to the source text,including the translation of names,idioms and color words.On the other hand,due to the cultural default,the translator has used the domestication strategy to achieve a fluent and smooth translated text,which is manifested in examples of creative treason.Hence,the translator,Kingsbury,is neither “transparent” nor “invisible” in the translated text.Instead,she has fully developed her creativity and subjectivity during the translation practice.