First Translation and Retranslation in the Historical, Social and Cultural Context: A case study of two Chinese versions of Tess of the DUrbervilles
Babel: Revue internationale de la traduction/International Journal of Translation, (2012)Abstract
In the history of Chinese literary translation, retranslation is a common phenomenon. Starting in the 1930s, retranslation has become more and more popular, accompanied by a boom in debates about retranslation. Retranslation, in the view of Zou Taofen, is not economical and instead translators should translate devote their attention to untranslated classics (Zou Taofen 1920:06–04). Contrary to this Mao Dun asserts that if we are really for consideration of the reader’s “economy”, it is necessary to criticize false and inferior translations, and so retranslation is a necessary remedy (Mao Dun 1937:5). Moreover, Lu Xun insists definitely that retranslation is inevitably linked to the evaluation of language use (Lu Xun 1998:275). Furthermore, in the 1950s, Mao Dun and Zhou Zuoreng reemphasized the value of retranslation (Mao Dun 1984; Zhou Zuoreng 1950-04-02); Zhou Zuoreng even indicates that the number of retranslations is proportional to cultural development