Ideology in English Translating of Mao Zedong’s Poetry

This study holds, the English translation of Mao Zedong's poetry is ideological in nature and much of its "deformation" can be explained through an ideological viewpoint. We clarifies the conceptual connotation and boundary of translation ideology, focuses on the role of ideology in translation studies, examines the translation relationship network constructed by ideology from the social and individual levels, and strengthen the feasibility of ideology in translation studies.

Within the framework of rewriting theory, this study takes five different types of rewriting of Mao Zedong's poetry in English, namely translation, anthology, biography, academic paper and informal publication, and examines how these text types assimilate or present "the other" of Mao Zedong's poetry in English, together with their image constructions of Mao Zedong and the Chinese revolution. Both rewritings and rewriters have the power to manipulate literature and culture. National policies and social changes will affect the network constructed by ideology, and be reflected in translation activities; At the same time, by studying the coordinating role of rewriters in the process of two cultural contacts, we can restore the power relationship involved in the rewriting process and uncover the mechanism of multi text translation manipulating culture.

In the past eight decades, various translation activities in China and the West have shown different interactive relations with the political and social changes in the country or region, and the mainstream poetics at various stages. The English translation of Mao Zedong's poetry is carried according to the political needs or literary concerns of the translation launcher. Translation activities in the SL society are dyed with the color of official supervision, whose organization and text performance often shoulder the task of national narration. As to the translators' spontaneous translations in the TL society, although on the surface they are motivated individually, yet when the TL country adopts a turn of attitude to the ST country, the driving force of national ideology surfaces from the translation. At this time, the individual cognition of translation members with translators included, would be combined with the emerging new social norms to jointly complete the transformation of translation in social changes. Meanwhile, in the period when the attitude of the target country remains unchanged, the translation activities and translated works would serve the mainstream ideology.