Study on the Influence of Yu-kwangchung’s Translation on His Creation from the Perspective of the use of Function Words

Abstract

Yu-kwangchung is not only an outstanding writer, poet and critic, but also a translator with rich translation experience, proficient in Chinese and western literature. In his long-term literary creation and translation practice, he has formed his own unique translation theory. Meanwhile, his translation practice has influenced his literary creation style and provided the impetus for his literary creations. This paper attempts to take Yu-kwangchung’s works as an example to study the Influence of Yu-kwangchung’s Translation on His Creation from the Perspective of the use of Function Words. The influence of translation on the translator's own literary creation has been discussed at home and abroad, such as Arthur Waley, Yan Fu and Fu Lei. However, most of these discussions focus on the macro level and lack of microscopic analysis. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the influence of Yu-kwangchung’s translation on his own creation in order to add a more detailed case evidence for the impact of translation on literary creation. As mentioned above, he is an ideal sample for my research because he was a prolific writer and translator. The analysis in this paper is composed of three parts. The first one is Yu’s influence of translation upon his literary creation respectively the influence on the application of preposition. The second one is the influence on the application of conjunction, and the third is influence on the application of article. In addition, the influence of this kind of translation on creation may also change with the change of time, which is reflected in the fact that this influence become obviously weaker when it is far away from the time of translation works. Through comparative analysis, this paper concludes that Yu-kwangchung's translation has played a leading and inspiring role in his own literary creation, enriched the diversity of his literary works and improved the aesthetic value of his works. On the other hand, Yu-kwangchung graduated from the department of foreign languages of Taiwan university and served as the director of the Spanish department of Taiwan university from 1972, during which he translated a large number of foreign languages, including English and Spanish. During this period, his creation content was influenced by western literature, and then some western themes appeared, such as self-cut poems. The number of lines was also more flexible, a feature of western poetry that he applied to his own literary work. The influence of translation on Yu-kwangchung's own creation is clearly reflected in this paper, especially in the use of function words, because English is quite different from Chinese. From the perspective of cultural exchange, it is of profound significance to study this kind of influence, because it promotes the integration of different languages and cultures. According to the author, this case study is of great significance to the controversial issue of translation and creation, because the evidence has been strongly verified in Yu-kwangchung's translation and literary creation, More importantly, this paper makes some supplement to the research on the influence of translation upon literary creation in the micro field.