A Study On English Translations Of Bian Cheng From The Perspective Of Imagology

Shen Congwen and his masterpiece Bian Cheng enjoy a great reputation in Modern Chinese Literature.Its depiction of pastoral China plays a major part in constructing a nation-state.The translation of Bian Cheng began from the 1930s.The translating and re-translating of this work has witnessed changes in the nation's image in the English world for nearly one century.This research studies all of the four English translations of Bian Cheng,analyzing the images of China built in each period,discussing what have caused the differences and how the reader responds to it.This thesis is divided into six parts.First,an introduction of the whole research,stating study obj ectives and research methods,and conducting literature reviews.Chapter One is a brief introduction of Shen Congwen and Bian Cheng,together with its four English translations.Chapter Two,Chapter Three and Chapter Four form the main body of the research,giving a diachronic account of the variability of images in the four translations.The last chapter summarizes the respective images built in each translation and the causes of the variability of images.