Presenting Otherness:A Probe Into The English Translation Of Wang Anyi's Changhen Ge From The Perspective Of Defamiliarization Theory

Literary translation is different from other types of translations for its artistic and aesthetic values.A successful literary translation has much to do with whether the literariness and artistry of the original work have been retained and delivered.According to the Russian Formalism,literariness,as the intrinsic nature of literary works,is reflected through diverse devices of defamiliarization intentionally used by authors.The task of literature is to arouse readers' interest to perceive the language itself which offers them a sense of freshness and strangeness.Hence,it's of great significance and necessity for translators to notice the defamiliarized elements in the original work and deal with them properly in the translating process.Changhen ge,which stands out as Wang Anyi's crowning literary achievement,has established the author as one of the most distinguished writers in the modern Chinese literary scene since its publication in 1995.When its English translation by Michael Berry and Susan Chan Egan came out in 2008,this novel attracted readers' concern outside China and some mainstream media and critics in the west spoke highly of it.Given the fact that Chinese literature remains marginalized for a long time in the world literature,western readers' recognition and appreciation of The Song of Everlasting Sorrow to a great extent reflect the success of this English translation version.Based on the previous studies and analyses on this novel,the author of the thesis assumes that reproducing defamiliarization effects in the target text through faithfully presenting heterogeneous cultural and literary features of the source text to the western readers serves as the most important reason for its being well received abroad.This thesis makes a detailed analysis on the defamiliarized elements in Changhen ge and their reproduction in the English version.The author of this thesis classifies the corresponding relations between defamiliarization and its reproduction into three types to discuss accordingly how translators deal with different situations.Two findings are concluded after analyzing many representative examples.For one thing,it is translators' responsibility to reproduce diverse defamiliarized features on language expressions and narrative style in the translation,so as to faithfully convey the otherness in Chinese literature to the English readers and thus satisfy their expectation of seeking for discrepancy.For another,translators have to take the readability into account rather than merely deliver every device of defamiliarization into the target language.Appropriate and proper adjustment and adaptation are necessary to ensure the translation acceptable and understandable.The discussion on Changhen ge and its translation through the perspective of defamiliarization theory also provides some implications for the "going out" of Chinese literature.