A Study On Translation Strategies In Ezra Pound’s Cathay From The Perspective Of Cannibalism

As the cultural turn appeared in the 1970s,translation is not only the transformation between two languages,but also related to society,politics and culture.In the early years of the 20th,Ezra Pound,a total Chinese illiteracy,studied and enlightened from the notes of Fenollosa,an Orientalist,then brought in lots of classical Chinese works to western society by translating The Great Digest,The Analects,The Unwobbling Pivot,and The Book of Poetry,etc.However,due to Pound’s knowing nothing of Chinese,his translation works won both appraisal and denial.Some translators even considered them as rewriting rather than translation.Cathay is a collection of classical Chinese poetry which was translated to English by Pound.At that time,Pound was the leader of Imagist Movement.He opposed to Victorian poetry for their flowery language,superfluous expressions,and over-emotional revelation.After having an intimate contact with Chinese culture,Pound was inspired by the unique charms of Chinese characters,which could be reflected by photograph,ideogram,and visual images.Cathay is least influenced by English archaic words and has the most modern language,for Pound omits sentence constitutes,ignores English grammar rules,and intimates the language features of Chinese poetry,which sweeps the old style and adds vitality for western poetries.However,Cathay is not loyal to literal meaning,but loyal to the rhythm and image of poetry.And about Pound’s translation theories in Cathay,he adopts mainly foreignization and partly domestication;furthermore,he over rewrites the Chinese classic for the benefit of his own poetic demand,which twists the original Chinese culture to western readers.Enlightened by the Brazilian Cannibalistic Transition Theory and taking it as a perspective,the writer tries to study Pound’s translation strategies in Cathay with theoretical description and case analysis.It mainly studies and solves the following three issues:first,the embodiment of Cannibalism in Cathay,second,the concrete Cannibalistic translation strategies in Cathay;third,the positive and negative effects of Cannibalistic Translation Theory on Chinese culture transmission.To begin with,Pound’s literary views,including his views on Victorian poetry,on Imagist poetry,and his literary bound with Fenollosa are introduced.Then,post-colonialism and Brazil Cannibalistic Translation Theory are showed,together with the four behavior of this theory:empowering act,nourishment act,act of affirmative play,act of blood transfusion;besides,the reasons for Pound’s adopting Cannibalism are explained.Next,the concrete embodiments of Cannibalism in Cathay are analyzed.Finally,the writer concludes the Cannibalistic translation strategies and influences of Cathay.The paper applies Cannibalistic Translation Theory to Pound’s Cathay,trying to provide a new kind of perspective for the study of post-colonialism and Pound’s translation.What’s more,the thought of "Empowering Act" in Cannibalism can give hint to translators about what source texts to choose in translation.Furthermore,the 19 poems in Cathay stands for the Chinese culture,language features,and Confucian thoughts,which not only have deep influence on Pound,but also play a vital role in advocating Chinese culture to western world.And Pound’s freely rewriting can enlighten people to hold some wise,objective and dialectical attitudes towards the true original culture hidden in translation.