Exotic Shift in Literary Translation: The Implications of Translators' Freedom for Translation Strategy, Production and Function

文學翻譯中的異國轉換：譯者自由度對翻譯策略、輸出與功能的影響

10.29786/STI.201210.0005

鄭永康(Carlos Tee)

譯者自由度 ； 文學翻譯 ； 異化翻譯 ； 翻譯品質 ； 翻譯規範 ； 翻譯策略 ； 比較文學 ； 玫瑰玫瑰我愛你 ； 王禎和 ； 葛浩文 ； 現代主義文學 ； exotic shift ； literary translation ； contemporary Chinese fiction ； Taiwanese fiction ； equivalence ； foreignization ； translator's freedom ； Wang Chen-ho ； Howard Goldblatt

翻譯學研究集刊

15輯（2012 / 10 / 01）

127 - 158

英文

本文透過王禎和《玫瑰玫瑰我愛你》現代主義小說英譯本來探討譯者自由度之相關翻譯學議題。該小說英譯版本、相關文獻、媒體採訪以及普遍評論內容充分顯示譯者葛浩文（Howard Goldblatt）所採取之翻譯策略定位已遠遠超出現有翻譯理論的範疇。葛浩文的翻譯策略—異國轉換—偏好過度異國化的手段，使他的譯本已跨出韋努蒂異化翻譯的定義。本文根據中英版本的比對結果闡述譯者自由度如何影響翻譯品質、規範、策略、功能等議題。文中亦以多元系統理論的角度針對譯者對讀者的責任、譯者的隱性以及譯文過度異化對比較文學之影響等概念進行更進一步的分析與探討。

This paper probes into the implications of translators' freedom by examining Howard Goldblatt's English translation of Wang Chen-ho's Modernist novel, Rose, Rose, I Love You. Analysis of Goldblatt's text, observation of his chosen approach in translation, a review of published media interviews, and correlation with critics' views on Goldblatt's renditions of Taiwanese and Chinese contemporary fiction, all reveal a translation strategy difficult to situate in the context of contemporary translation theories. In this paper, Goldblatt's chosen approach of making his translation sound overly exotic and foreign way beyond what the original text expresses or implies is termed exotic shift. In many of Goldblatt's translations of Chinese-language fiction, what strikes the observer is that some foreign items are exaggerated through addition in the translation, semantically, linguistically, tonally or by other means. The gain derived from such an operation eventually adds to the quaintness of the text. This phenomenon, analyzed from the perspective of Venuti's foreignization through intertextual comparison of Goldblatt's work with Wang's original, serves as basis in raising some questions on the implications of translators' freedom for translation quality, strategy, production and function, responsibility to the reader, the institution's role, translator's visibility, normativity, and significance to comparative literature. Goldblatt's exotic shift, and its implications for translation studies- both the theoretical and the applied- are examined from the Polysystemic point of view. Analysis of Goldblatt's target texts reveals a ”reader-oriented” approach, often chosen at the expense of the message in the source text, creating what he himself calls a ”tension between creativity and fidelity.” His declared purpose in doing so is to transform indifferent Chinese prose into more readable and marketable English versions. Yet an observable and necessary result of this approach is a conspicuous translator's presence and visibility. The ultimate question that arises then is: ”Are the translated works really adequate representations of Taiwanese or Chinese literature, or are readers in the West getting a distorted semblance of the real thing?” As the most prolific translator of Chinese-language fiction today, Howard Goldblatt, as well as his chosen method, has strong repercussions on how contemporary Chinese-language literature is perceived by Western readers today at a time of growing interest in things Chinese in anticipation of the imminent rise of the PRC as a world power.

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