Theor App Lit EN 4

Abstract

Creative treason was put forward by Robert Escarpit in 1958.Bian Cheng is the masterpiece of Shen Congwen. Its English versions obtain widespread attention from home and abroad. However,scarce scholars study Bian Cheng from the perspective of creative treason. This thesis analyzes English versions of Bian Cheng by Shen Congwen to study creative treason.This paper briefly introduces creative treason, Bian Cheng and different English versions of Bian Cheng. Through analysis of some examples in different English versions of Bian Cheng, it concludes translation strategies of creative treason, such as domestication, free translation, mistranslation, omission and so on.Translation is a kind of re-creation of the translator. Different translators adopt different strategies of creative treason during translation, which aim to better represent essence of the original work and help spread Chinese literature.

Key Words

Key Words:Bian Cheng; literary translation; Creative treason

摘要

创造性叛逆是由罗伯特•埃斯卡皮于1958年提出的翻译理论。《边城》作为沈从文的代表作，其译本在国内外文学翻译界都备受关注，但却鲜少有学者从创造性叛逆视角对《边城》英译本进行研究。本文以沈从文《边城》英译本为例分析创造性叛逆。本论文简要介绍创造性叛逆翻译理论、《边城》以及其不同英译本。通过对《边城》不同英译本中的例子进行细致的分析，总结创造性叛逆的翻译策略，如归化、意译、误译、漏译等。翻译是译者的一种再创作活动，译者在翻译过程中采取不同的创造性叛逆策略，旨在更好地体现原文内涵，促进中国文学作品的传播。

关键词

关键词：《边城》；文学翻译；创造性叛逆

Chapter One Introduction

Perfect translation is not absolute conformity with the original form,but an integration between the original meaning and the translator's own creation.Such creation is known as creative treason which is of great significance in literary translation. This thesis,based on creative treason theory,analyzes English versions of Bian Cheng by Shen Congwen and attempts to conclude strategies of creative treason.

Research Background

For a long time,the study of translation in Chinese and western translation circles was confined to the study of the original work and the author, but it missed the importance of the real creator —the translator—and his special cultural status. Many translation theories, like “Faithfulness, Expressiveness and Elegance”,“Spirit Likeness”and“Sublimation Theory”, advocated absolute faithfulness to the original work. Translators were in a dilemma between obedience to the original author and flattery to the readers. The traditional translation theories also held that the value for translation was no match for the original work and translation was a kind of imitation lack of creativity. These ideas greatly restricted the development of translation and put translators in a dilemma between faithfulness and treason.

Robert Escarpit put the notion of creative treason in 1958,which injected literary translation with new strategies. Creative treason,as inevitable phenomenon during literary translation,is gaining more and more attention from translators and scholars.

The 20th century is known as the“Era of translation” (Newmark, 2001:3).Translation theories achieved unprecedented development.Increasing number of researchers began to explore translation from the perspective of culture,which enriched the essence of creative treason .Researches about creative treason greatly increases these years .It has become a necessary strategy during the process of literary translation.

Research Significance

Creative treason is extremely frequent in literary translation. In the process of literary translation, the translator's translation is often affected by bilingual differences, cultural context, social background and original style. Under the restriction of these objective conditions, the translator gives full play to his subjective initiative in translation activities and adds a lot of creative translation on the premise of respecting the original. This is the inevitability of creative treason in literary translation. For some certain purpose, translators often take stock of all the relevant factors affecting translation and choose one or more creative treason strategies. These strategies are not mutually exclusive but instead they often coexist in one translation version.

Bian Cheng, as a treasure of Chinese literature, has four English versions,each with its own characteristics and advantages. With the image of beautiful natural scenery, Bian Cheng is full of rich natural environment, folk customs, human feelings ,love and sadness.It is viewed as one of the most wonderful work in Chinese literature and is of great research value. Because it is rich in literary value and cultural information,different translators have different understandings in different historical and cultural backgrounds. So they use different translation strategies to meet the needs of their potential readers and purposes,thus many creative treason strategies appear in the process of translation.

Above all,it is of great value to investigate English versions Bian Cheng from the perspective of creative treason as many kinds of creative treason appear in these different translation versions.Through analysis,this research can help readers grasp a better understanding of creative treason and facilitate the spread of Bian Cheng.

Chapter Two Literature Review

Since the advent of creative treason,it has gained much attention from translators.More and more scholars begin to investigate literary translation from the perspective of creative treason.Bian Cheng, as the masterpiece of Shen Congwen, also gained much notice at home and abroad.Researches about creative treason and Bian Cheng emerge one after another in recent years.

Studies of Creative Treason Theory at Home and Abroad

Studies about creative treason theory originated from foreign countries.It was initiated by a French literary sociologist Robert Escarpit in his book The Sociology of Literature in 1958 and received wide attention from home and broad since its advent.Creative treason injected literary translation new vitality and new strategies which were widely employed in various classical works of literary translation.

The domestic research on creative treason theory can be divided into three stages: discovery stage, introduction stage and in-depth discussion stage.

Discovery stage:In 1987,Comparative Study of Eastern and Western Literature,edited by Institute of Foreign Languages and Literature in Shanghai International Studies University, pointed out that translation is a kind of "creative treason", which is manifested in the form of omission, addition and free translation;

Introduction stage:The first Chinese scholar who brought creative treason into China was Xie Tianzhen in 1992 and later he wrote some articles to further illustrate creative treason.

In-depth discussion stage:In this phase,there were other scholars who studied creative treason from various aspects.For example,In 2003, Yang Liu pointed out that creative misreading appeared in the form of addition, adaptation and even mistranslation, which showed his understanding of creative treason and summarized the strategies of creative treason;In 2003, Xu Jun published Creative Treason and Translation Subjectivity in Chinese Translators Journal and pointed out that translators were in a dilemma between faithfulness and treason.Through interpretation of creative treason, he tried to find the subjectivity of translators between the two poles.

But in summary,research for this important translation theory —creative treason—is not enough at all no matter among foreign scholars or native scholars.

Studies of Bian Cheng at Home and Abroad

Bian Cheng is the representative work of Shen Congwen, a famous writer in China. It expresses the author's deep nostalgia for his hometown, Feng Huang, which is located in the west of Hunan Province. It is an excellent novel which expresses the local mood in the history of Chinese literature. It is a beautiful and sad pastoral song. The work has been published for nearly 80 years, so has its research gone through such a long period. This novel deserves high academic value and research value.Scholars from home and abroad has made a series of researches about Bian Cheng.

Foreign scholars showed a great interest in Bian Cheng and made a lot of research on it.In 1998,Korean scholar Park Jae-bum published a paper about the writing prototype and expression skills of Bian Cheng in The Journal of the Research of Chinese Novels; In 2012, Korean scholar Li Kangren launched a thesis about the specific content of Bian Cheng in The Journal of North-East Asian Cultures, describing the border town as an imaginary village; In 2020, according to the research of the University of Macau, Science Letter discussed the translation of Bian Cheng on the basis of sociology.

Among domestic studies, comparative studies make up the most part.For example,Cao Jie analyzed three English versions of Bian Cheng from the perspective of translation aesthetics in 2017;Yan Jingsi analyzed two English versions of Bian Cheng from the perspective of translation shift in 2021. Domestic scholars are keen to make a comparative analysis of the English versions of Bian Cheng from a certain theoretical perspective. But few studies investigated Bian Cheng from the perspective of creative treason. Recently, only Huang Peiqi made a comparative study of two English versions of Bian Cheng from the perspective of creative treason in 2005, but it was 15 years ago.

Above all,it’s necessary to make a study about English versions of Bian Cheng from the perspective of creative treason.It can deepen understanding of creative treason and promote its spread among the literary translation circles.And it also provides a new kind of translation ideas of translation of Bian Cheng and better introduces Chinese literary works.

Chapter Three Brief Introduction of Creative Treason

Translation is a complicated process which isn’t equal to rigid correspondence.It is generally regarded both as an imitation and as a creation.In the past,translators paid more attention to achieve faithfulness to the original work. However,recently,we can find the fact that perfect translations,especially in the field of literary translation,do not completely stick to the original text,but a kind of re-creation at large through various strategies.It sounds like a treason to the original text,but actually a better expression of the essence of original work.This strategy is known as creative treason which has become one of the most significant features of literary translation.

Definition of Creative Treason

Creative treason is a notion of comparative literature, which was first proposed by Robert Escarpit, a French literary theorist. According to Escarpit,translation is kind of creative treason. That’s because in the process of translation,the original work is placed in another language system. The creativity of translation lies in that it gives the original work a brand new look and enables it to have a fresh communication with more readers. In that case,translation not only extends the life of the original text, but also endows it with a second life (Escarpit,1987:137).This translation theory is generally praised as “the most brilliant idea”of Escarpit.

It is Professor Xie Tianzhen who brought the concept of "creative treason" to China. In his classical work—Medio-translatology—he defined creative treason as a kind of translator’s subjective effort with which the translator tries to approach and reproduce the original work with his own artistic creativity. So the definition of creative treason is that it is a kind of objective deviation from the original text because the translator wants to achieve a certain subjective desire in the process of translation.This definition fundamentally recognizes the importance of the literary translation career that the translator is engaged in and also affirms the value of translation work.(Xie Tianzhen,1999:137).

In summary, translation is to introduce a work into a new language and cultural environment and communicate with a new group of readers. The extent to which the form and style of the original work can be reproduced in front of the target language readers depends on the translator's artistic creation and personal ability.The appearance of "creativity" in translation is the result of the translator's subjective efforts to overcome the differences in history, culture and living experience between the source language and the target language. The inevitable objective deviation from the original work in the process is called "Creative Treason" in translation.

Significance of Creative Treason

Translation does not only coexist with the original, but ,to be more specifically, harmoniously coexists with the original. Translation does not only give the original a new look and a second life, it also brings the original into an unfamiliar environment that it must face. In order to survive, translation must make some modifications to the original, so as to give the original a new way to adapt to the new environment,which makes the translation seem rebellious.And this is the usefulness of creative treason.

In the process of translation, the translator will inevitably relate his personal experience, historical background and cultural background to the original text, thus turning translation into a recreation of the original text. At the same time, there are space-time differences and individual differences between the translator and the author, which will inevitably lead to treason. It is also because of the creative treason in literary translation that the target readers can get the same emotional resonance as the source readers, so that the translated works can be better accepted by the target readers. If the translator's creative translation successfully attracts readers, more readers will read the text, and more extensive and in-depth studies will appear. So it’s of great value of creative treason.

Chapter Four Brief Introduction of Bian Cheng

Creative treason is a common phenomenon in translation,especially in literary translation. In literary translation, the level of the translator's recreation has a great influence on the readers' reading feelings and understanding of the original. In recent years, studies on literary translation from the perspective of creative treason emerge one after another. Bian Cheng boasts high status in Chinese literature and enjoys invaluable research value. Based on English versions of Bian Cheng, this paper makes an in-depth study of creative treason translation theory.

Bian Cheng and its Author Shen Congwen

Shen Congwen, born in Feng Huang County, Hunan Province, is a famous Chinese writer and a researcher of historical relics. Shen Congwen's life is full of twists and turns and he makes great contribution to Chinese literature.His literary works such as Bian Cheng, Xiangxi and Congwen Autobiography have great influence at home and abroad. His works have been translated into the languages of more than 40 countries such as Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom and the former Soviet Union, and have been selected into university textbooks by more than 10 countries or regions such as the United States, Japan, South Korea and the United Kingdom. He has been nominated as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in literature for twice. In summary,Shen Congwen has an unshakable position in the history of Chinese literature.

Bian Cheng is Shen Congwen's representative work, which depicts the unique local conditions and customs of Chadong in 1930s, a border town between Sichuan and Hunan . It describes in detail the simple life of the ferry old man and his granddaughter Cuicui. At the same time, it also describes the love stories of the two sons of ShunShun ,the chairman of Zhangshui wharf ,who both fall in love with Cuicui. The novel shows us a quiet and self-sufficient life in the border town. The people in the border town are kind, temperate and honest. Because of the aesthetic art of Bian Cheng , it has a unique position in the history of modern Chinese literature and is praised as "the purest novel in the history of modern Chinese literature" and "the pinnacle of pastoral legend of modern Chinese literature”.It boasts great research value.

English Versions of Bian Cheng

Bian Cheng has been translated repeatedly by many translators at home and abroad.At present ,there are four English versions.According to chronological order,they are ranked as following:Green Jade by American translator Emily Hahn and Chinese translator Shing Mo-Lei in 1936,The Frontier City by Chinese translator Ching Ti and English translator Robert Payne in 1947,Border Town by Chinese translator Gladys Yang and Yang Xianyi in1962,Border Town by American translator Jeffrey Kinkley in 2009.

The four English versions of Bian Cheng span 73 years. They are published by different translators for different purposes in in different social and cultural environments with different styles and characteristics. According to different situations, translators adopt different translation strategies and methods for the language and culture with local characteristics of Western Hunan. The ultimate goal of translators is to let western readers understand China, spread Xiangxi culture with local characteristics, enhance readers' reading feelings and meet their "horizon of expectation". This is rare in the history of Chinese literary translation, which shows Bian Cheng’s literary status and value.

Chapter Five On the Creative Treason in English Versions of Bian Cheng

The subjective and objective reasons, such as language differences,cultural differences,cultural purposes,intended readers,lead to the inevitable phenomenon of creative treason. Here through detailed analysis of examples in three English versions of Bian Cheng--The Frontier City by Ching Ti and Robert Payne , The Border Town by Gladys Yang and Yang Xianyi and the Border Town by Jeffrey Kinkley--this thesis mainly concludes two kinds of strategies:personalized translation and intended misinterpretation and omission.

Personalized Translation

In the practice of translation, we often notice that translation versions of the same work have different language styles and different ways of expression, although their major content are basically consistent with the original. It is not difficult to find that since translation, especially literary translation, is a kind of re-creation activity, the translator's own subjective style will inevitably be imposed on the original work, so that the translated work bears the features of the translator's personality.And this is the personalized translation produced by the personality of translation.This thesis mainly introduces three kinds of personalized translation:domestication, foreignization and free translation.

Domestication

In 1813, Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, ,a German philosopher, put forward two orientations of translation: one is to let the author remain peace as far as possible and guide the readers to approach the author; the other is to make readers stay in peace and lead the author to get close to readers(Schleiermacher,2010:143). Translator Lawrence Venuti was deeply inspired by it. In 1995, in Translator's Invisibility: A History of Translation, he first proposed"foreignization" and "domestication" to express the above methods.Venuti believed that domestication is to adopt an ethnocentric attitude, to make the foreign language text conform to the cultural values of the target language, and to bring the original author into the culture of the target language.Foreignization is a kind of nationalist pressure on these cultural values, accepting the language and cultural differences of foreign language texts, and bringing readers into foreign situations(Venuti,1995:20).

Domestication, in short, means that the target text moves closer to the target readers and replaces the source culture with the target culture, which is undoubtedly a kind of unfaithfulness and a kind of treason to the source culture because the translator tends to erase some cultural image in the original text to help the target readers to understand the original meaning.Domestication is a frequently used translation strategy, which is helpful for the target readers to have a deeper understanding of the deep meaning of the original text. It takes into account the acceptability of the target language readers, so the translation often fills the readers with a familiar and cordial feeling, reduces the difficulty of understanding when reading the work, and is easy to be accepted by the target language readers . On the basis of the overall understanding of the original, translators do not stick to the sentence structure of the original, but take the better understanding of target readers as their goal, which requires them to respect reader’s reading habits and feelings, capture the deep meaning contained in the surface language of the original text, abandon form to preserve meaning and convey the deep meaning of the original to target readers.In English versions of Bian Cheng,there also exists numerous phenomenon of domestication,which are used as creative treason to achieve better effect of expression.

(1)Original:老伯伯,你翠翠长得真标致,像个观音样子(Shen Congwen,1987)。 Translation:Old uncle, you know—Green Jade is very attractive.(Ching Ti & Robert Payne，1982) “观音”is an important religious image in Western Hunan and Chinese culture. In this translation, the image of “观音” with religious and cultural meaning is deleted by domestication strategy, and the hidden meaning of praising Cuicui's beautiful appearance with the image of “观音” is directly expressed by “attractive”(Gong Hong,2017: 156). This method is a kind of creative treason because it deletes the word“观音”which exists in the original text.This translation is more flexible, which can avoid the conflict of religious beliefs among Western readers, but it eliminates the essence of spreading Xiangxi culture by translation.This is translator's choice of creative treason to solve target readers' reading difficulties.

(2)Original:这是中寨王团总的, 值大钱七百吊(Shen Congwen,1987)! Translation:Old Captain Wang—that’s who it belongs to, and it costs him a pretty sum of seven hundred thousand large cash, I can tell you.(Ching Ti & Robert Payne,1982) During the period of the Republic of China, money was copper coins counted by hangings. One hanging was equal to 1000 copper coins, and each hanging was tied up with a rope. In the original sentence, "值大钱七百吊" means that seven million copper coins are strung into seven strings. In this version of translation, it uses creative treason and "值大钱七百吊" is directly translated into "seven hundred thousand and large cash", which makes the target language readers directly understand the amount of money. However, it loses the original unique features and fails to reflect the conversion method of coins in the period of the Republic of China.The domestication translation strategy is adopted.

We can conclude from the above instances that domestication is helpful for the target language readers to understand the literal meaning of the source language, the culture of the country and the author's inner activities in writing. However, due to the inevitable and groundless addition and deletion of the original text, domestication has a negative impact on the weakening of cultural information content.It definitely belongs to creative treason as it selectively delete deeper illustration of some cultural connotation and image to facilitate target reader's easier understanding.Ching Ti prefers to domestication and uses a lot of domestication translation in his version,which makes his version read more fluently without cultural barrier but it is not favorable for cross-cutural communication.

Foreignization

Foreignization translation accepts the linguistic and cultural differences of foreign texts and brings readers into foreign situations. Creative treason requires that the translated text not only produces freshness and impact, but also has vigorous vitality. Foreignization translation well meets these two requirements. Foreignization retains the differences between the target language and the original language to the greatest extent. When the translated text is presented to the target language readers, the creative treason of translation is most completely represented. Translators, as messengers of different languages, also shoulder the mission of transmitting culture. In order to promote cultural interpretation and enrich language expression, translators often adopt the strategy of foreignization, which undoubtedly plays an important role in cultural transmission.

(3)Original:老伯伯,你翠翠长得真标致,像个观音样子(Shen Congwen,1987)。 Translation1:Uncle, your Emerald's grown into a fine girl, a regular Guan Yin.(Note*:The Goddess of Mercy) (Gladys Yang &Yang Xianyi,1981） Translation2:Elder Uncle, your Cuicui has grown quite beautiful.She’s a real Guan Yin*.”(Kinkley,2009)[notes]*:Guan Yin was the goddess of mercy, a beauty in Buddhist iconography. It has been concluded that Ching Ti uses domestication to avoid ambiguity of the original meaning and to help target readers to achieve better understanding.However, Gladys Yang and Kinkley adopt foreignization to achieve creative treason. They use typical foreignization translation which are creative treason strategies because explanatory materials are inserted. The translators use Pinyin to translate"观音" and add footnotes to explain the religious meaning of "观音" and praise Cuicui's beauty. This translation method is not only more faithful to the original, but also enables the target language readers to have a better understanding of the religious culture of Miao Nationality in Western Hunan.

（4）Original:悖时砍脑壳的(Shen Congwen,1987)! Translation:Dammed low-life!You’re headed for the executioner!(Kinkley,2009） The original is a dialect language of swearing in Sichuan Province, Chongqing Province and Hunan Province,signifying a curse of bad luck and bad results(Deng Gaofeng,2015:10). It is difficult for translators to directly translate such dialect because it may cause puzzles for the target readers.Kinkley adopts foreignization translation strategy to add an American dialect “Dammed low-life” which helps reserve the thick dialect flavor and transfer the basic meaning.Such addition is creative treason as the original has no words signifying the meaning of “Dammed low-life”,which benefits target readers to understand the original.

In summary,foreignization strategy is beneficial to preserve the cultural information content of the source language and the characteristics of the cultural background.It is apparently a kind of creative treason as translators often reserve the cultural connotation and explain it with his own expression. But foreignization strategy is also unsatisfactory in dealing with cultural transformation.Target readers are prone to be interrupted by unfamiliar cultural notions.Even foreignization often adds footnotes or explanation to help readers to better understand the deeper essence of the original article,it may be still not enough because culture is a complicated field.In that case,readers may feel more difficult to read translation version which adopts numerous foreignization.

From the above illustration, we can know that domestication and foreignization have their own characteristics, advantages and disadvantages. They are not absolutely superior or inferior in creative treason. In literary translation, domestication and foreignization are two coexisting translation strategies. On the surface, domestication and foreignization are contradictory and exclusive, but in essence they are complementary.In the process of the spreading literary works, both the acceptance of the translation works and the spread of the culture should be taken into account. Therefore,in literary translation, the translator should flexibly ensure the natural fluency of the translation while minimizing the loss of cultural connotation by appropriately taking advantage of domestication and foreignization.

Free Translation

Free translation means that the translator can not use the same form of expression as the original, but can only express the content and meaning of the original. In fact, Nida mentioned that literal translation is equivalent to "formal correspondence", while free translation is equivalent to "functional equivalence"(NIDA,1993).In other words, translation does not stick to the structure of the source language, but to the spirit or meaning of the source language (NIDA & Taber, 1982:5). Each country and nation has its own way of thinking and writing habits.When there is a contradiction between the thought of the original and the expression of the translation, it is not suitable to use literal translation method but should use free translation method. That is to say,when the meaning of the original text can not be translated directly,the translator should adjust the grammatical structure and carry out free translation to achieve the true meaning of the original text. Thus it can be seen that free translation is a kind of creative treason because the translator explains the original text in different forms instead of following the original blindly. For example, when some phrases and sentences are translated literally, readers may be confused and unable to understand their original meaning.At this time,the translator should make some changes to solve the problem.

(5)Original:老船夫随便为这可怜的孤雏拾取了一个近身的名字,叫做“翠翠”(Shen Congwen,1987)。 Translation1: He called her"Green Jade."(Ching Ti & Robert Payne,1982) Translation2: The old boatman gave the poor mite the name Emerald.(Gladys Yang &Yang Xianyi,1981） "翠翠" is the name of the heroine in the Bian Cheng. The Tea Cave Area in Western Hunan where she lives in is surrounded by green mountains and green waters,so grandpa (the old boatman) names her "翠翠". "翠" symbolizes the vitality of Tea Cave, and it also implies the tenacity of the girl in the mountain（Mei Qing,2018:157）.Both Translation1 and Translation 2 use free translation to explain the image further to target readers.These translation are creative treason as translators abandon the surface form of "翠翠" but explain the name with their own creativity. Ching Ti translates "翠翠" into "Green jade". Jade means "a kind of valuable green jewelry " in Chinese, which represents crystal clear and auspicious.It can be easily understood by people who know Chinese culture but most foreign readers who don't understand Chinese jade culture may be difficult to understand the meaning of "green jade". Gladys Yang translates it as "Emerald", which is interpreted as “precious green jewel”in Oxford Dictionary. From the perspective of language and culture translation, the meaning of "翠翠" is not fully embodied in "Emerald".So the conclusion can be made that although two versions both adopt free translation to achieve creative treason,they only understand the heroine name as a kind of precious jewel and may loss the essential connotation of the name. It seems that if the translation adopt transliteration to translate it as “CuiCui”,it can achieve better expression because this kind of translation not only reflects the beauty of the rhythm of the words, but also contains the meaning of the heroine name in the original work.

(6)Original:……这劲儿是一个黄花姑娘给他的(Shen Congwen,1987)! Translation1:...He knew the eyes of a pretty girl were on him.(Gladys Yang &Yang Xianyi,1981） Translation2:...He got it from a young maiden watching him from onshore! (Kinkley,2009) In these two translation,"黄花姑娘" is translated into “a pretty girl” and “a young maiden”,which are not restricted to the language form and adopt creative treason because they delete the meaning of “黄花”.Free translation is adopted to eliminate the strangeness of the original words, so that the target readers can easily understand its meaning.In this example,free translation acts as a successful appliance of creative treason strategy as it expresses the original meaning free from original form.

In summary,during translation, if there is no substitute equivalent or similar to original meaning, or literal translation will lead to great differences in the final meaning, in order to prevent the target readers from misinterpreting the original meaning of Chinese, the translator can only use free translation, which is a method of "dynamic equivalence" striving to get the meaning and forget the form. Although it loses the appearance of the original work, but from the perspective of different contexts, it still keeps the content of the original and adapts to the style of the original.But not all appliance of free translation are suitable.So free translation,as a strategy of creative treason,should be applied carefully to gain best expression.

Intentional Mistranslation and Omission

Mistranslation and omission can be divided into unintentional mistranslation and omission and intentional mistranslation and omission. Unintentional mistranslation and omission is mainly caused by the translator's carelessness during the process of translation, or his poor foreign language skills, or insufficient understanding about the source culture and target culture. Intentional mistranslation and omission refers to the translation which aims to cater to the national cultural interest and it greatly changes the original language expression and cultural image(Xie Tianzhen,1994:128). Intentional mistranslation and omission is a kind of creative treason and a conscious change made by the translator to the original text. To a large extent, this kind of translation is a kind of recreation.

Mistranslation

Translators in different historical periods have their own translation purposes and concepts when translating Bian Cheng, so the intentional mistranslation in each translation version must have its own background. Intentional mistranslation, in a sense, is also a kind of rewriting and re-creation for a specific purpose.

(7)Original:《边城》(Shen Congwen,1987) Translation:The Frontier City(Ching Ti & Robert Payne,1982)

The translation mode of The Frontier City by Ching Ti and Robert Payne is that Ching Ti completes the first draft because he is a Chinese, so he can understand the original text more accurately.And then Robert Payne polishes and finalizes the translation because he is a British, so he is more familiar with the target language. As a major translator, Ching Ti's cultural identity as a Chinese translator certainly is reflected in his translation.His translation purpose is:“In China you will find what Chinese people really are”.To that end, when translating ,he often discussed with Shen Congwen about the names of the people and place involved in this work. Ching Ti is Shen Congwen's friend and neighbor , which is an unique advantage of his translation in accurately understanding the original and being faithful to the original. Besides, as a Chinese translator, Ching Ti has full advantages in understanding the cultural images in Bianchneg.So sometimes he uses intentional mistranslations in his translation to achieve his translation purpose and perfect his translation(Deng Gaofeng,2019:49).

The translation of the name of Bian Cheng is "The Frontier City" which refers to "city", but actually it deviates from the meaning of Chadong, a small town at the junction of Hunan and Sichuan(originally "town") where the story takes place. It is obviously an intentional mistranslation and a kind of creative treason. The translator strives to build the image of Chadong as a city with normal administrative system in China(Xie Jiangnan、Liu Hongtao,2015:112).

(8)Original:"掌水码头的", "掌水码头的龙头大哥" ,"船总"(Shen Congwen,1987) Translation:wharf master(Gladys Yang &Yang Xianyi,1981）

Gladys Yang, a British translator whose native language is English, has lived in China for a long time with her husband, Mr. Yang Xianyi, and worked in official translation agencies. She translates Bian Cheng out of the political need of "external publicity". Because it is a translation activity led by national institutions, she is bound to pay more attention to the internal political and cultural purposes of the source country than to the aesthetic taste and acceptance habits of the target readers(Xie Jiangnan&Liu Hongtao,2015:113). Due to the background of the times, when dealing with the political, military, religious and other language expressions of the "old society", she takes some intentional mistranslation out of ideological considerations. 

In the original work, when introducing shunshun's identity, three different names are used: "掌水码头的", "掌水码头的龙头大哥" and "船总". In fact, these appellations all indicate that shunshun was the local leader of the folk organizations popular in Sichuan, Guizhou and Western Hunan during the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China. However, Gladys Yang translates these three names as "wharf master",which is obviously an intentional mistranslation due to ideological considerations.So it belongs to creative treason as it blur the definite translation of these name.It tries to beautify shunshun's identity in translation(Yang Jie,2019:126).

Lefevere once regarded translation as "rewriting"(Han Ziman&Liu Fang, 2005:100). Translation is a kind of rewriting of the original text(Lefevere,2004). Actually,rewriting is a kind of recreation and mistranslation which is not unfaithfulness to the original text but the translator's effort to achieve his personal translation purpose.It seems like unfaithfulness but actually a higher level of faithfulness.

Omission

Omission method means that words that do not conform to the thinking habits and language expressions of the target language are not translated in order to avoid redundancy. The translator sometimes uses the omission to omit the images that may cause confusion to the target language readers or achieve some translation purposes.The omission method is a selective translation made by the translator after consideration, which is a kind of creative treason.

(9)Original:"梁山好汉" 、 "狗咬吕洞宾"(Shen Congwen,1987) Translation:不译(Ching Ti & Robert Payne,1982) In order to meet the reading expectations of foreign readers at that time, Ching Ti pays more attention to the story plot of the work and the acceptability of the translation to foreign readers, so he omits some puns and historical allusions in the original because he thinks that western readers may not interested in it(Xu Huimin, 2010:223). So the complex Chinese proverbs such as "梁山好汉" and "狗咬吕洞宾" are directly omitted in the translation.These are creative treason because it omit content in the original work.

(10)Original:..... 便使人想起小说故事上梁红玉老鹤河时水战擂鼓，牛皋水擒杨幺时也是水战擂鼓(Shen Congwen,1987)。 Translation:...reminds you of some epic river battle of old.(Gladys Yang &Yang Xianyi,1981） “梁红玉”and “牛皋”are classic characters in the Chinese popular novel Yue Fei Zhuan. The original text describes the intensity and noise of the Dragon Boat Race in the border city through the water battle scenes in these two ancient legends. Gladys Yang does not focus on the specific content, but aims to emphasize the intense stimulation of dragon boat race. Therefore, he omits the images that may cause the confusion to the target readers, and simply translates it as “some epic river battle of old”so as to facilitate the readers' reading and understanding.This belongs to creative treason because Gladys Yang delete some certain cultural connotation.

Omission is a kind of creative treason.It does not mean that translator can delete anything casually but instead he omits something not necessary or something not helpful for readers’ understanding after consideration.It is a little like mistranslation,both of which are strategies adopted by the translator to achieve specialized purpose.Although some content are deleted,it does not damage readers’ overall understanding of the original text and leads readers to read the text in the direction that the translator expects.

Above are some strategies of creative treason in English versions of Bian Cheng.There are also some other methods which are not noticed there.But no matter what kind of ways translators choose,they all aim to better translate the original article.The content of the original text and the translator’s own creation together make up the unique translation of the translator.Translation is a re-creation with its own and different strategies making for different style of re-creation.

Chapter Six Conclusion

Three versions of Bian Cheng all use numerous creative treason strategies in the process of translation.They may use different strategies when dealing with the original text,but their choice of creative treason all contribute to better translation.The translator is the subject of creative treason, and the translated work is the extension of the original life. After the translator's in-depth understanding and re-creation, whether the original author's ideas can be accurately conveyed to the readers, the translator plays a very important role in dealing with the cultural connotation and grasping the original.

Through detailed analysis of English versions of Bian Cheng,it can been seen that three translators all represent translator’s subjectivity and creative treason during the process of literary translation to express the essence of the original text.Their strategies of creative treason share similarities and differences.All translations capture a basically right understanding of the original culture and use numerous strategies to show these cultures to target readers.But there are still improper uses of creative treason which fail to illustrate the cultural connotation and make the translation deviate from the author’s original purpose. So the creative treason should be employed appropriately to benefit the spread of Chinese literature.

References

[1]Amold, M. On Translating Homer. New York: AMS Press Inc, 1971.

[1]Amold, M.(1971) On Translating Homer. New York: AMS Press Inc.--Zhou Qing (talk) 13:54, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

[2]Barnstone, W. The Poetics of Translation--Hisory, Theory, Practice. New haven and London: Yale University Press,1993.

[3] Bassnett, S. & Lefevere, A. Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation.Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Education Press, 2001.

[4] Bell, R.Translation and translating: Theory and Practice. Beijing: Foreingn LanguageTeaching and Research Press, 2001.

[5]Gladys Yang. The Border Town and Other Stories. Beijing: Panda Books, 1981.

[6]Kinkley, J.C.The Border Town.New York:Harper Collins Publishers, 2009.

[7]Lefevere,A.Translation,Rewriting,and the Manipulation of Literary Fame.上海:上海外语教育出版社,2004.

[8]Newmark,P.Approaches to Translation. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2001.

[9]Nida, E.A.&Charles R.Taber.The Theory and Practice of Translation.Leiden:Brill,1982:5.

[10]Nida, E.A.Language,Culture And Translating.Shanghai:Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press,1993.

[11]Shen Congwen.The Chinese Earth.New York:Columbia University Press, 1982.

[12]Venuti, L.The Translator's Invisibility:A History of Translation.London and New York:Routledge, 1995.

[13]埃斯卡皮.文学社会学[M].合肥:安徽文艺出版社,1987.

[13]埃斯卡皮.(1987）文学社会学[M].合肥:安徽文艺出版社.--Zhou Qing (talk) 13:57, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

[14]陈丽莉.翻译的异化和归化[J].中国科技翻译,1999(2).

[15]邓高峰.《边城》英译中的误译研究——从描述翻译研究的视角[J].英语广场，2019.

[16]邓高峰.《边城》英译比较研究：湘西文化对外传播视角[J].英语广场，2015.

[17]方梦之.翻译新论与实践[M].青岛:青岛出版社,1999.

[18]龚红.归化与异化理论下《边城》三种英译本的对比研究[J].海外英语，2017.

[19]韩子满, 刘芳.描述翻译研究的成就与不足[J].外语学刊, 2005 .

[20]梅晴.译者主体性视角下《边城》三个英译本的比较研究[J].兰州教育学院学报,2018.

[21]沈从文.边城[M].北京:人民文学出版社,1987.

[22]孙致礼.翻译与叛逆[J].中国翻译.2001(04).

[23]施莱尔马赫.论翻译的不同方法[A].勒菲弗尔.翻译、历史与文化论集[C].上海:上海外语教育出版社, 2010.

[24]夏思奇.解析《边城》三个英译本中的归化与异化翻译[J].校园英语，2017.

[25]谢江南, 刘洪涛.沈从文《边城》四个英译本中的文化与政治[J].中国现代文学研究丛刊, 2015 .

[26]谢天振.误译:不同文化的误解与误释[J].中国比较文学, 1994 .

[27]谢天振.译介学[M].上海:上海外语教育出版社,1999.

[28]徐敏慧.沈从文小说英译述评[J].外语教学与研究, 2010 .

[29]许钧.“创造性叛逆”和翻译主体性的确立[J].中国翻译.2003(01).[30]许钧.翻译思考录[M].武汉:湖北教育出版社,1998.

[30]杨洁.从改写理论看《边城》英译的“不忠实”[J].文学教育，2019.

[31]查明建、田雨.论译者主体性——从译者文化地位的边缘化谈起[J].中国翻译,2003(01).

[32]张增健.从“戴着脚镣跳舞”谈起——浅议英汉翻译中的词句处理[J].中国翻译.1998.

[33]周领顺.译者行为批评[M].上海:商务印书馆,2014.