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1.2.1.1 Case Study or Contrastive Study
The total of the theses I have found related to the Chinese translation of The Catcher in the Rye is 43, among which, many focused on the contrastive study of Shi Xianrong’s and Sun Zhongxu’s versions, only three except. Zheng Na’s research(2014) took Sun Zhongxu’s version as a case study. She studied the vulgar language in his translation of the novel from the perspective of “ Faithfulness, Expressiveness, Closeness”(Zheng Na, 2014). While the other two took Shi Xianrong’s version as a case study. Wang Xuebing’s research(2012) focused on the translation ethics and found that “basically Shi’s version obeys the ethics of representation and properly combines with other aspects of translation ethics”(Wang Xuebing, 2012). Li Kaihua(2008) studied the manipulation of ideology in the translation of “Beat Generation” literature in China. The Catcher in the Rye is said to be the early representative work of “Beat Generation” literature. He analyzed the historical background of three periods after the 1960s and found out misinterpretations in Shi’s version. And the conclusion was reached that ideology, poetics and patronage manipulated literary translation and the researchers should not neglect the subjectivity initiatives of the translations.
However, 93% of the researches I have found took Shi Xianrong’s and Sun Zhongxu’s versions as a contrastive study. None of them has used other Chinese versions. And I have found that the two Chinese versions occupy the largest collection among different Chinese versions of The Catcher in the Rye in the library. There is no doubt that the two versions are the most representative. I also take these two versions as a contrastive study. Shi Xianrong was a professional translator and has worked on British and American literature for many years. The Catcher in the Rye is an American literature work written by J.D. Salinger, an American writer. It was set in the period of post World War Two and Holden Caulfield is considered as a representative of “Beat Generation”(Zhou Cuixia, 2014). Therefore, Shi Xianrong’s version is authoritative. While Sun Zhongxu was an amateur translator, his translation works have been widely accepted. It is said that The Catcher in the Rye had a significant impact on him and it was this novel that led him to the work of translation. In addition, his version of the novel has had more than 100,000 copies so far. The two Chinese versions of Yilin Press have aroused most attention. Shi Xianrong and Sun Zhongxu lived in different times and had different styles of translation. Therefore, there have been existing a hot debate on which version was translated better, Shi Xianrong’s or Sun Zhongxu’s.
1.2.1.2 Linguistic perspectives or External Factors
The previous studies focused on different aspects. Some focused on the translation of the language in the novel. Others focused on the external factors that influenced the effect of translation.
The language, as is mentioned above, is an obvious feature of the novel. The language has three characteristics, vulgarization, full of slang and fuzzification.(Li Dan, 2014) Holden’s language is full of curse and sex.(Wei Huiliang, 2011) Wei Huiliang(2011) studied Holden’s language and the translation strategies of the two versions from Andre Lefevere’s four aspects of translation, ideology, poetics, universe of discourse and language. He reached a conclusion that Shi Xianrong’s version was more conservative than Sun Zhongxu’s version in ideology. As for poetics, the theme of Shi’s version was to reflect the problem of “Beat Generation” in post WWІІ, while Sun Zhongxu expressed that the youths in China were cared by all society, from the government to their parents. And during the translation, Shi Xianrong preferrd the strategy of foreigization and was faithful to the language of the novel itself, while Sun Zhongxu adopted domestication-oriented strategy and used the expression similar to Chinese expression. Besides, in the process of translation, many factors influenced the effect of translation, among which, ideology is main and essential. Andre Lefevere’s three manipulation factors are ideology, poetics and patronage. Poetics and patronage only have the function of influencing ideology.(Zhang Xiaolin & Wang Aihua, 2009) Therefore, ideology depends on the effect and it includes national ideology, patronage ideology and individual ideology. Among them, national ideology is the most important.(Zhao Xiangbo, 2006) During the 1960s, the works for translation were mainly from the former Soviet. Therefore, only few translators were interested in the translation of western works. So only Shi Xianrong translated The Catcher in the Rye, an American novel. However, after China carried out the policy of reform and open, western works began to caught on. More and more people have showed interest in the translation of western works. The Catcher in the Rye has more than ten versions, most of which were created after 1976. Patronage ideology influences the translation motivation and translation strategy. During the 1960s and 1980s, there was a restricted circulation publication of “Yellow Cover Book”. The Catcher in the Rye was one of them and the open distribution was in 1983. Therefore, Shi Xianrong’s version of The Catcher in the Rye was published in 1983, although he completed it in 1963. And other versions of the novel were also completed and published after 1983.