Translation And Rewriting Under The Influence Of Multiple Ideologies

The English novel The Harmony Silk Factory by Tash Aw,a Chinese Malaysian writer,is thought as a representative of Southeast literature in English.It embodies complicated and rich historical and political connotations.Its first Chinese version,named “Si Zhi Mi”(or “the Secret of Silk” literally)and translated by Wang Liyan,was published in Mainland China in 2008,while in the following year,Taiwan,China embraced the second Chinese version of the work seemingly by the same translator,called “He Xie Si Zhuang”(or “The Harmony Silk Factory” literally).By comparing and contrasting these two versions,we found the second version kept basically the same content as the first one,but re-processed some of the translation.By looking deeply into the translation,we noticed that the translation of The Harmony Silk Factory was manipulated by multiple ideologies.Under the joint influences,the two versions,though translated by the same translator,assumed their own characteristics respectively.Based on these findings,the paper applies the “rewriting” theory by Lefevere to observing the rewriting process of translation affected by multiple ideologies,including the strengthening of the anti-colonial demands according to the translator's personal ideology,the rewriting of relevant historical expressions and political discourse by the mainstream ideology in mainland China,and the reprocessing of the translation by the mainstream ideology in Taiwan,China.This paper differentiates and analyzes the multiple ideological factors affecting and manipulating the translation process of The Harmony Silk Factory.It not only explains and clarifies he relatively complicated translation phenomenon under discussion,but enriches and refines our understanding of the ideological factors,and thus plays a certain enlightening role in applying rewriting theory to investigating translation phenomena more effectively.