文化回译中的形象变异——以《大唐狄公案》中的中国传统法律形象为例

Image Disparities in Cultural Back-Translation—Taking Traditional Chinese Legal Images in “Judge Dee Mysteries” as an Example

摘要: 《大唐狄公案》是荷兰著名汉学家高罗佩根据我国公案小说与《狄公案》创作的英文公案小说。在英文文本中塑造了重判案逻辑与司法程序、追求财产平怨的中国传统法律形象。通过文化回译，该小说返回其文化语言的发祥地，译本中的中国传统法律形象也随之发生偏离与变异。本文以文化回译为视角，研究比对了该小说原文与译文中的判词，发现译者通过特定的翻译策略塑造了与原文不尽相同的中国传统法律形象。究其原因，主要是中英文本的法律文化背景及其历史发展轨迹不同。观察文化回译中的形象塑造，有助于了解与阐释海外文学中的中国形象，促进中国文学中相关形象的外译与传播。

Abstract: “Judge Dee Mysteries” is a series of English detective novels created by the renowned Dutch sinologist Robert van Gulik based on Chinese gong’an fiction and “Di Gong An”. It depicts the folk stories of the famous minister Di Renjie (Judge Dee) in Tang Dynasty and his subordinates investigating, solving, and judging cases, and portrays the image of traditional Chinese law, which emphasizes the logic of judging and judicial procedures, and the pursuit of peace and justice for property. The novel was a bestseller overseas, and then returned to its cultural and linguistic birthplace through cultural back-translation, and the image of traditional Chinese law in the translated version has also been deviated and mutated. This paper compares the judgements in the English and Chinese versions of the novel from the perspective of cultural back-translation, and finds that the translators have shaped the image of traditional Chinese law differently from the original text through specific translation strategies. The main reason for this is that the Chinese and English texts have different legal and cultural backgrounds and their historical development trajectories. Observing image construction in cultural back-translation helps to understand and interpret the image of China in overseas literature, and promotes the outward translation and dissemination of relevant images in Chinese literature.