Translation Criticism on LuXun’s Novel “My Old Home”

 Translation Criticism on LuXun’s Novel “My Old Home”

 王春芳

 上海政法学院 语言文化学院，上海 201701

      “My Old Home” was written in 1921, by LuXun, who was a great writer, thinker and revolutionary in old China. In this novel, LuXun described the complex feeling of the narrators returning home for the first time after 20 years. The beautiful hometown in the narrator’s memory became desolate and depressing. The former beautiful “Beancurd Beauty” has become sharp-tongued and “as thin as a compass”. Moreover, she had the habit of stealing. His close friend in his childhood “Jun-t’u” became an extremely poor peasant. A barrier between the narrator and Jun-t’u was inevitably formed. The novel reflects the fact that the countryside in old China went bankrupt, and the life of peasants was in great poverty but they were spiritually stupefied. The author expressed his sympathy toward their sufferings and hoped that they would be aware of their living state and strive for new life. The author also expressed his hope of eliminating the barrier between intellectuals and working class.

     The basic tune of “My Old Home” is depressing. The language in LuXun’s novels are concise but profound in meaning. He was one of the first writers who used modern Chinese in literature. He neither mechanically recorded colloquialism nor directly translated classic Chinese, but absorbed the excellent elements f colloquial and classic Chinese and then refined them into mature literary language. It is concise but expressive.

In LuXun’s novels, the environments are always cold , solemn and depressing. The fate of those characters are misery and wretched but they were spiritually stupefied, couldn’t realize what had caused their poverty. LuXun depicted really historical pictures and vivid characters to reveal the illness of the absurd society and try to attract people’s attention to change it.

“故乡”was translated by Mr. Yang Xianyi and his wife. Mr. Yang Xianyi is an outstanding translator in modern China. He and his wife have being cooperated for many years and have translated more than ten million words so far. Those works translated by them have been praised not only by common readers but also by professional translators.

Eugene Nida once pointed out: translating consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source-language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style. Judged by the criteria put forward by Nida, Mr. Yang’s translation version “My Old Home” is very successful.

The basic tune of the source text is sad. The sad feeling is expressed by the description of the overcast weather, desolate villages, decaying old home and wretched fate of two main characters. The translation version has fully conveyed this sad tune of the source text. For example, those words employed in the first two paragraphs, such as “bitter cold”, “overcast”, “cold wind”, “desolate”, and “depressing”, make readers feel sad and depressed. They establish a sad tune for the whole target text. The description of “broken stems of withered grass on the roof, trembling in the wind” continuously creates a sad environment for readers. After reading the whole translation version, the receptors of the target text can obtain the same feeling with the receptors of the source text. So Mr. Yang successfully conveyed the basic tune of the source text.

The artistic feature of LuXun’s novels is concise. The structure, the subject matter, the narration or the dialogue is concise and refined. The translation version preserves this prominent feature of the source text. The syntactic structures of the target text are relatively short. And the narration about the two characters’ change tightly attracts readers’ attention and strengthens readers’ sadness.

According to social semiotics theory, every sign has meaning. However, many signs in the source text are omitted in the target text. There are many ellipses in this novel. Though they are only dots, they are not useless. On the contrary, they are rich in meaning. For example, there is a dialogue about Jun-tu between the narrator and his mother in the source text:

“这好极！ 他—怎样？…….”

“他？……他境况也很不如意……”

In this dialogue, the ellipsis in the utterance of the narrator indicates that he had a lot of questions about Jun-tu. However, at that moment, he couldn’t say the words out immediately because he was very surprised at his mother’s mention of Jun-tu. He could only ask “他—怎样？” Those questions existing in his mind could only be ellipse. So the writer used ellipsis to substitute the words which were not spoken out. But in the translation version, the translator omitted this ellipsis, so the meaning conveyed by this sign is lost in translation version. 

The first ellipsis in the mother’s utterance indicates that she was hesitating about whether told her son Jun-tu’s situation or not. She knew clearly that her son was eager to know Jun-tu’s present state because they were close friends in their childhood. She worried that her son would become sad when she told him the truth, so she became hesitating at that moment. This ellipsis is also omitted in the translation version.

The second ellipsis in the mother’s utterance indicates that she could not find enough words to describe Jun-tu’s situation at that moment, so when she said “他境况也很不如意”, she stopped. Maybe she would continue to talk about Jun-tu’s living state, however, she was interrupted by those people who came to take furniture. Because this ellipsis is omitted in it is lost. Some other ellipses in the source text confront the same fate with the three ellipses illustrated in the preceding paragraphs. Though they are not as important as those characters, they have their own meaning and function. So it is not suitable to omit them in the translation version.

Some interjections in the source text are also omitted in the target text. For example, when Mrs. Yang suddenly came to the narrator, she said, “哈！这模样了！胡子这么长了！” The combination of the interjection “哈” and the exclamation mark is very short, indicating that Mrs. Yang was laughing at the narrator’s appearance. It vividly draws the mean character of Mrs. Yang. If the writer used “哈哈哈……”, readers might think that Mrs. Yang is a kind-hearted woman. From this hypothesis, we can know that “哈！” is not useless in the novel. It carries rich meaning though it is very short and hasty. So it is not proper to omit it in the translation version.

Not only some ellipses and interjections are omitted, the translator also omits some sentences in his translation version. For example, the utterance “你现在有三房姨太太， 出门便是八抬的大轿” said by Mrs. Yang is omitted in the target text. Though the utterance is only a rumor, it has its own meaning and function. It illustrates how incredible the rumor about the narrator is. Because of these rumors, people in the narrator’s hometown believed the rumor that the narrator was very rich, so he would not need those old furniture and they could take it casually. The story took place after “The Revolution” in 1911. At that time, the Qing Dynasty was overthrown by revolutionaries. But from Mrs. Yang’s utterance, we can know that the people living in the small town still believed those feudal systems. They thought the narrator “出门便是八抬的大轿” , which only existed in feudal society. From this fantastic rumor, we can know that the revolution in 1911 did not touch common people at all. Old system was overthrown, but the viewpoint in common people’s mind did not change. It is important to reveal the subject matter of the novel. So it is necessary to translate it in the target text.

Mr. LuXun was a great writer. One outstanding feature in his works is concise. He advocated to eliminate unnecessary words and preserve those words which are important to convey his intention. So every sign in his works has meaning. It is not proper to eliminate any signs in the translation version.

Besides, those problems illustrated in the above paragraphs, there are some other inadequate translation. For example, when the narrator introduced Jun-tu, he said, “我认识他时， 也不过十多岁.” The translation of this sentence is “when I first met him he was just over ten.” It is obvious that the subject of this sentence is “he”. However, from the context, we can conclude that the subject of that sentence must be “I” instead of “he”. Firstly, the writer has introduced Jun-tu’s age in the preceding paragraph, it is not necessary to introduce again. Secondly, all the later sentences in the same paragraph with “我认识他时， 也不过十多岁” are used to describe the living state of the narrator’s family. So the described object must be the narrator himself instead of Jun-tu. So it is wrong that the translator regards “he” as the subject of the sentence.

Some words used in the translation version are not so satisfying either. For example, Mr. Yang translated the Chinese character “别” in the sentence “我这次是专为了别他而来的” into “saying goodbye”. We know that the narrator and his family would leave his hometown forever and would not come back any more, so he must feel sad. So the phrase “saying goodbye” is not satisfying. Firstly, it cannot convey the deep feeling of the narrator. Secondly, “saying goodbye” means that he would come home again. Obviously, it is wrong. Thirdly, “saying goodbye” is an informal phrase. The basic tune of the whole novel is sad, so the employment of this phrase seems ridiculous.

The translation of those phrases “辛苦辗转而生活”, “辛苦麻木而生活”, and “辛苦恣睢而生活” are not satisfying either. The three phrases fully illustrates Mr. LuXun’s style. They are condensed in meaning but concise in expression. However, the translation of them are loose and wordy.

Though the version is very successful, it cannot be regarded as perfect translation because of some obviously weak points in it.

参考文献：

1. 狂人日记（鲁迅小说全集），鲁迅， 万卷出版社， 2019年8月
2. Selected Stories of Lu Xun, 鲁迅小说选 汉英对照， 杨宪益、戴乃迭，外文出版社，2004年5月