Translation Policy, Social System, and Ideology: A Study on the English Translation of Modern Chinese Fiction for America During the CWRAJ

This article explores translation policy on the English translations of modern Chinese fiction to American readers during China’s War of Resistance against Japan (1931–1945). The research findings show that translation policy may not be explicitly stated, but implicitly embodied in some political, diplomatic, and cultural policies made by the American and Chinese governments. Translation policy making as a social system is influenced by the political environment during the war. Different policy makers’ motives and policies change over time in reaction to each other with the course of the war, and the changing socio-political climate in China and the US had great effects on the English translations of Chinese fiction before the entry of the US into the war and after the US government became actively involved in translation projects. Moreover, the ideological preferences and political interests of the various actors shape actual translation practice—the selection of texts and actual choices in wording. This course of events affects the reception of these translations by the US public. In other words, the readership of these books grew after the Chinese government became allies in the war with the American government.

The Bible in Modern Chinese Fiction

This essay surveys existing scholarship on the appearance and use of the Bible in modern Chinese fiction, including chronological, biographical, and thematic studies, while offering its own approach to the Bible in fiction through the type and degree of literary engagement. This ranges from direct, sustained dialogue with the Bible, as in stories based on a particular biblical scene or pericope or the many semi-fictional Lives of Christ produced in the first half of the twentieth century, through to much more diffuse or passing references to biblical themes or allusions. The essay begins with the representation of the physical Bible in literature before considering the transcribed Bible, in direct citation of Bible passages in stories or novels, while the second part of the essay considers literary or thematic engagement.

Modern Chinese Fiction (1919–1949) in Russia: Early Translation, Publication and Research

The article provides an overview of early Russian translations and publication of modern Chinese fiction (1919-1949). The approaches to the early study of the works of prominent representatives of modern Chinese literature are examined and the reasons why Soviet society is interested in their heritage are identified. Since the 1920s, well-known works of renowned Chinese writers have been frequently translated into Russian mainly by young sinologists. Most of them had been to China and had developed a direct understanding of the development of modern Chinese literature, translating primarily from Chinese and using English translations for various reasons occasionally. The Chinese and Soviet cultural activists also played an important role in the spread of modern Chinese prose in the USSR. At the same time, a serious study of modern Chinese prose began, and until the end of the 1940s was actually at the initial stage, being mainly of a socio-political nature as the study was determined by the state of the ideological atmosphere in Soviet society. Early researchers paid the most attention to the works of Lu Xun, referring to his ideological outlook and artistic merits. Overall, the early translation and study of modern Chinese fiction revealed to the Soviet reader the ideological and social aspects of the works of modern novelists belonging to the left flank of Chinese literature, and laid the foundation for more extensive and in-depth research of modern Chinese literature during the next phase.

Erratum: Jasper, David. Seeking Christian Theology in Modern Chinese Fiction: An Exercise for Sino-Christian Theology. Religions 10 (2019): 422

The author wants to make the following corrections to the paper (Jasper 2019): [...]

Seeking Christian Theology in Modern Chinese Fiction: An Exercise for Sino-Christian Theology

The development of Christian theology in contemporary China can learn much from Chinese fiction beginning with Lu Xun and his dedication to writing for the spirit of the Chinese people. Increasingly, Chinese novelists have reflected the growth of spiritual life in the Chinese People’s Republic in spite of the burden placed on the Christian church and religious believers.

Nature and Critique of Modernity in Shen Congwen

Contemporary environmental crises have their origin in the anthropocentric view of humans as separable from and superior to the natural world. Anthropocentrism also marks the realist author of modern Chinese fiction. Departing from that human-centered view, Shen Congwen's work evinces a biological perspective and affirms an ecological understanding of life in which the writing self must trace its roots to and reciprocate with other organisms and all-encompassing nature. The animistic language of Shen's writing delves into the ecological and bodily foundation of beauty and arts. Shen's notion of the longue durée of biology and evolution debunks the transient zeitgeist of modern transformation and accelerations, propelled by the human domination of nature and alienation of the human body. Shen's portrayal of sexuality reasserts the reciprocity and entwinement of inner nature with outer nature.