Introductory description

This module introduces students to literary encounters between China and the West in the twentieth century, using theories of translation. Students will learn how the Chinese translation of Western literatures in the first half of the twentieth century impacted on the development of modern Chinese literature; crucially, they will also learn about the influence of Chinese literature, via the conduit of translation, on other Western literatures, such as the translation of contemporary Chinese literature abroad. In this process, students will analyse how translation plays a role in transcultural negotiations, and will deepen their understanding of the cross-cultural literary encounters between China and the West.

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

Session 1: Introduction: Translation and Transcultural Encounters between China and the West
Session 2: The Translation of Joan Haste and Love as Virtuous Sentiment
Session 3: Translation and Adaptation of La Dame aux Camelias
Session 4: Translation of Ibsen’s Nora: the Dilemmas of the ‘New Woman’
Session 5:The Chinese Nobel Prize Winner: Mo Yan and his Translators
Session 6: Does ‘World Poetry’ really exist: Debates around the Translation of Bei Dao’s Poems

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• have a critical understanding of the facts and features of Chinese translation of foreign literatures in the first few decades of the twentieth century, and of English translation of contemporary Chinese literature.
• have a profound understanding of important theories of translation studies.
• be able to apply suitable theories of translation to the study of translation history and transculturalism.
• be able to present their analytical studies of translators or translated texts in a comparative analysis.

Indicative reading list

Session 1:
Huang Xuelei, ‘From East Lynne to Konggu Lan: Transcultural Tour, Trans-Medial Translation’, Transcultural Studies, 2 (2012), 48–84.
Itamar Even-Zohar, ‘Polysystem Studies’, Poetics Today, 1 (1990), 45–51.
Mark Gamsa, ‘Translation and Alleged Plagiarism of Russian Literature in Republican China’, Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews, 33 (2011), 151–171.

Session 2:
Jane Qian Liu, ‘Pseudowriting and Creating Channels for the Expression of Emotion’, in Transcultural Lyricism : Translation, Intertextuality, and the Rise of Emotion in Modern Chinese Love Fiction, 1899–1925 (Leiden: Brill, 2017), pp. 46-77.
Haiyan Lee, ‘Virtuous Sentiments’, in Revolution of the Heart: A Genealogy of Love in China, 1900–1950 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007), pp. 60-94.
H. Rider Haggard, Joan Haste (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895)

Session 3:
César Guarde-Paz, ‘A Translator in the Shadows of Early Republican China: Lin Shu’s Position in Modern Chinese Literature, an Overview’, Monumenta Serica: Journal of Oriental Studies, 63 (2015), 172-192.
Michael Gibbs Hill, ‘Broken Tools’, in Lin Shu, Inc.: Translation and the Making of Modern Chinese Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 25-49.
Leo Ou-fan Lee, ‘Lin Shu’, in The Romantic Generation of Modern Chinese Writers (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973), pp. 41-57.

Session 4:
Chengzhou He, ‘World Literature as Event: Ibsen and Modern Chinese Fiction’, Comparative Literature Studies, 1 (2017), 141-160.
Hu Ying, ‘Introduction: The Emerging New Woman and Her Significant Others’, in Tales of Translation: Composing the New Woman in China, 1899–1918 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2000), pp. 1- 20.
Lydia He Liu, ‘Narratives of Desire: Negotiating the Real and the Fantastic’, in Translingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity—China, 1900–1937 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), pp. 128-149.

Session 5:
Lucas Klein, ‘A Dissonance of Discourses: Literary Theory, Ideology, and Translation in Mo Yan and Chinese Literary Studies’, Comparative Literature Studies, 2016 (1), 170-197.
Liang Xiaohui, ‘Different Conceptual Blending with Different Cultural Frames: Goldblatt’s (Mis-)Construal of Mo Yan’s Metaphor in Big Breasts and Wide Hips’, Comparative Literature Studies, 2017 (4), 771-794.
Hua Jing, ‘On the Translatability of MoYan’s Novels and the C-E Translation’, International Journal of Comparative Literature and Translation Studies, 2020 (3), 12-18.

Session 6:
Stephen Owen, ‘ “World Poetry”: a review of Bei Dao’s The August Sleepwalker, trans. Bonnie McDougall’, New Republic, 1990 (19), 28-32.
Rey Chow, ‘Introduction: Leading Questions’, in Writing Diaspora: Tactics of Intervention in Contemporary Cultural Studies (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993), pp. 1-26.
David Damrosch, ‘Introduction’, in What is World Literature (Princeton University Press, 2003), pp. 1-38.

International

All modules delivered in SMLC are necessarily international. Students engage with themes and ideas from a culture other than that of the UK and employ their linguistic skills in the analysis of primary materials from a non-Anglophone context. Students will also be encouraged to draw on the experiences of visiting exchange students in the classroom and will frequently engage with theoretical and critical frameworks from across the world.

Subject specific skills

Students will develop the ability to analyse cross-cultural literary encounters using theories of translation. They will learn to critically engage with literary exchanges between China and the West.

Transferable skills

All SMLC culture modules demand critical and analytical engagement with artefacts from target-language cultures. In the course of independent study, class work and assessment students will develop the following skills: written and oral communication, creative and critical thinking, problem solving and analysis, time management and organisation, independent research in both English and their target language(s), intercultural understanding and the ability to mediate between languages and cultures, ICT literacy in both English and the target language(s), personal responsibility and the exercise of initiative.