On Goldblatt’s C-e Translation Of Mi From ThePerspective Of Manipulation Theory

The distinguished Chinese writer Su Tong’s full-length novel Mi has attracted extensive attention since its publication.Its translation into English by the American translator Howard Goldblatt has also received wide acclaim in the West,which,to a certain extent,promotes the overseas dissemination of Chinese literary works.As a successfully translated literary work,Goldblatt’s English version of Mi is worthy of profound study.Meanwhile,numerous traces of manipulation in the translation remind the researcher of Andre Lefevere’s manipulation theory.Therefore,this thesis adopts the perspective of manipulation theory in its attempt to reveal the process of manipulation so as to derive experience from it.On such basis,two research questions are proposed:(1)What manipulations do Western society and the translator Howard Goldblatt perform on the C-E translation of Mi?(2)How do Western society’s and the translator’s manipulations manifest themselves in the English version of Mi?In adherence to the above research questions,this thesis takes manipulation theory as the analytical framework and adopts the methods of literature research and comparative textual analysis to provide a comprehensive analysis of Howard Goldblatt’s English version of Mi from three aspects: ideology,poetics and patronage.First,in terms of ideology,the researcher analyzes the “Orientalism” stereotype of China in Western society as well as Howard Goldblatt’s personal interest and preference,concluding that the manipulation of ideology is mainly reflected in the selection of Mi and its cultural translation.Second,in terms of poetics,the researcher explains the marginal position of Chinese literature in the Western literary polysystem and Howard Goldblatt’s translation poetics which prioritizes the acceptability of readers.Through argumentation at lexical,syntactic and textual level,the researcher finds that the phenomena of poetic rewriting exist ubiquitously in the English version of Mi.Last but not least,in terms of patronage,by collecting information,the researcher finds that the publishing houses of the English version of Mi are mainly commercial publishing houses,which are market-oriented and driven by commercial value.Through research,it is concluded that the manipulation of patronage has an impact on the selection of Mi and its paratexts.Via the systematic analysis of the process of manipulation,three main conclusions are drawn:(1)Three factors of manipulation manipulate the C-E translation of Mi through both Western society and the translator;(2)The translator Howard Goldblatt is both the manipulator and the manipulated,and will compromise to macro manipulation factors;(3)In the translation process,the translator gives full play to his creativity,takes target language readers into consideration,and skillfully handles the relationship between betrayal and faithfulness.