Intuitive reception of the Chinese translation of Emily Dickinson’s literary heritage

ABSTRACT

Exploring the common complexities and challenges of translating poetry from English into Chinese is one of the most pressing topics within contemporary Chinese and Western translation studies. This study aims to present the translation history of works by Emily Dickinson, examine the related research in China, and to analyse the translation potential of transferring three characteristics of the original work: hermeticism, intertextuality and prosody. The study is based on a comparative-literary analysis of Emily Dickinson’s translations of four verses, namely 1725, 31, 258, 269 and the translations of the contemporary Chinese translator Jiang Feng. The study found that Jiang Feng’s Chinese translation exhibits eight main features: 1) syntactic modification; 2) addition; 3) replacement of specific words with those that are broader in semantic sense; 4) compliance with punctuation similarity rules; 5) omission; 6) presence of translator’s notes; 7) transmission of the key idea, but partial neglect of form and rhyme; 8) replacement of words with cultural indicators that are inherent to the Chinese language. This study provides sinologist translators with further potential for research.

KEYWORDS:

• Literary and translation processes
• poetry
• self-expression
• translation methods
• translation potential

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes on contributors

Lei Yanyan

Lei Yanyan lectures in the School of Foreign Languages, Hechi University (Hechi 546300, China), specializing in English and American literature, English education and teaching. She has published over 50 academic papers and done research projects at different levels. The representative works of academic papers published in Chinese core journals International searchable journals focus on females in the classical works of English and American literature from the perspective of ecological feminism, aiming to arousing females’ consciousness of independence and shift perception to rationality.

Wang Ting

Wang Ting lectures in the School of Foreign Languages, Hechi University (Hechi 546300, China), specializing in English and American literature. Email: [email protected]. She has published nine papers; among them, several articles concern on Willa Cather’s novels from the perspective of ecological feminism, centering on “women and nature” with the purpose of awaking people’s awareness of environmental protection and the independence of women.