Translating Spencerism into Socialism: Yi Jiayue’s Translation of The Call of the Wild

ABSTRACT

Jack London’s work The Call of the Wild has been the subject of much critical inquiry for its Social Darwinian notions and socialist implications. The dual motifs were historically stimulated in their travel to China by Yi Jiayue (1899–1972) in 1919, which is largely understudied. This paper examines Yi Jiayue’s translation of The Call of the Wild and his reforming discourses thus derived. Through detailed historical and textual analysis, I argue that Yi identified London as a “juvenile Socialist”. The tension between Spencerism and Socialism in London’s work was epitomized in Yi’s rendering of “Spencerism” and “primitiveness”, which was further met in an extra-textual scenario when the translator championed a series of reforming practices on “family.” Yi’s translation of The Call of the Wild reveals that translation is more than just a transmission of messages, but rather a creative epistemic process potentially affecting the intellectuals’ agenda in cross-cultural settings.

KEYWORDS:

• Jack London
• The Call of the Wild
• Yi Jiayue
• Spencerism
• socialism

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1. Related study includes Lee, Shun-wai. The Young China Association, 1918–1925: a case study of Chinese intellectuals’ search for national regeneration and personal identity, MPhil thesis, HKU; and Chen (2010).

2. The Young China Association issued two publications serving its purpose: the northern branch in Beijing issued The Journal of the Young China Association [Shaonian Zhongguo], the Nanking branch issued The World of the Young [Shaonian Shijie]. The two publications aimed for different periodical tenets, with the former focusing on “cultural movement and pure science” and the latter emphasizing on “the facts, applied science, and social investigation.” See One-year Anniversary of The Young China Association. 1920. Beijing: Journal of The Young China Association, 25.

3. Yi admitted in his memoir that early socialist discussions were divided into different groups, respectively being Socialism, Marxism, and Guild socialism, etc. He later left this group due to the disagreement of the “leftism” and activist inclination arising later in this group. See Yi 1969.

4. Wagenknecht (1952).

5. Nuernberg (1995).

6. Linear history emerged in late Qing China as a “new historiography” from a response to the exigency of the times, which can be seen as an aftermath of the Social Darwinism prevalent since the call for individualism arose in nationalistic discourse. According to Luke S. K. Kwong, the linear perspective on history and time was looked at as a latter-day effort to combine both the interests in national salvation and historical theory. See Kwong (2001).

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Caiping Yan

Caiping Yan is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Translation, The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research interests lie in women’s studies and intellectual thoughts in late Qing and early republican China. She is currently working on her dissertation on the historical translation of “family problems” in 1920s China.