Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction: Preliminary Reflections on the Translation of a Genre

Nicoletta Pesaro

PDF(400 KB)

Journal of Translation Studies ›› 2019, Vol. 3 ›› Issue (1) : 7-43.

Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction: Preliminary Reflections on the Translation of a Genre

Nicoletta Pesaro

Author information +

History +

Abstract

This paper deals with the rise of a new wave of Chinese science fiction over the last decades, attempting to draw a parallel to twentieth-century American science fiction. The paper explores the many similarities (as well as some differences) between these two phenomena, relying on both translation studies and genre studies. Drawing on a definition of genre as a “recurring response to recurring situations” (Miller 1984), the paper briefly examines historical, social, and literary conditions of the two countries, providing examples of the agents, the works, and the reasons that allow us to describe this process as a form of “inter-generic translation.” This study aims at providing an overview of the present discourse on Chinese science fiction in relation to the American experience, highlighting the potential for further and deeper developments of this kind of analysis.

Key words

Chinese science fiction / American science fiction / generic translation / appropriation / repetition of patterns

Cite this article

EndNote

Ris (Procite)

Bibtex

Download Citations

Nicoletta Pesaro. Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction: Preliminary Reflections on the Translation of a Genre[J]. Journal of Translation Studies. 2019, 3(1): 7-43

References

Agar, Michael (2006). “Culture: Can You Take It Anywhere?” International Journal of Qualitative Methods 5 (2) June: 1–12.
Augé, Marc (2014). Future. London; New York: Verso.
Bawarshi, Anis S.,Mary Jo Reiff (2010). Genre: An Introduction to History, Theory, Research, and Pedagogy West Lafayette: Parlor Press An Introduction to History, Theory, Research, and Pedagogy. West Lafayette: Parlor Press.
Blair, David (2017). “New Golden Age. Rapid Rise of China’s Science Fiction Reflects the Dynamism of its Culture and Economy.” China Daily, Global edition (Dec) 22: 5-7.
Bröcking, Ulrich, Gregor Dobler,Nicola Spakowski (eds.) (2016). Multiple Futures—Africa, China, Europe. Leipzig: Leièziger Universitätsverlag.
Canavan, Jerry,Eric Carl Link (eds.) (2015). The Cambridge Companion of American Science Fiction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Casanova, Pascale (2004). The World Republic of Letters. Trans. by M. B. Debevoise. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
— (2010). “Consecration and Accumulation of Literary Capital: Translation as Unequal Exchange.” In Critical Concepts: Translation Studies, ed. by Mona Baker, 285-303. London: Routledge.
Chatterjee, Chandrani (2009). Translation Reconsidered: Culture, Genre and the “Colonial Encounter” in Nineteenth Century Bengal. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Cheung, Rachel (2017). “Science Fiction’s New Golden Age in China, What It Says About Social Evolution and the Future, and the Stories Writers Want World to See.” South China Morning Post, May 14.
Costello, Matthew J.(2015). “U.S. Superpower and Superpowered Americans in Science Fiction and Comic Books.” In The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, ed. by Gerry Canavan and Eric Carl Link, 125-138. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Dolla, Varaprasad S.(2015). Science and Technology in Contemporary China: Interrogating Policies and Progress. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Estok S.,W. Kim (eds.) (2013). East Asian Ecocriticisms: A Critical Reader. New York: Palgrave Macmilian.
Even-Zohar, Itamar (1990). Polysystems Studies. Poetics Today 11 (1).
Fishelov, David (1993). Metaphors of Genre: The Role of Analogies in Genre Theory. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Gernsback, Hugo (1926). “The Lure of Scientifiction.” Amazing Stories 1 (3) June. https://manifold.umn.edu/read/the-perversity-of-things-hugo- gernsback-on-media-tinkering-and-scientifiction/section/f006a58b-1cb7-4471-a0f3-7f118982ec05. Accessed 25 November 2018.
Harris-Fain, Darren (2015). “Dangerous Visions. New Wave and Post-New Wave Science Fiction.” In The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, ed. by Gerry Canavan and Eric Carl Link, 31-43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Isaacson, Nathaniel (2017). Celestial Empire: The Emergence of Chinese Science Fiction. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press.
Jones, Derek (2001). Censorship: A World Encyclopedia. London and New York: Routledge.
Kinkley, Jeffrey (2015). Visions of Dystopia in China’s New Historical Novels. New York: Columbia University Press.
Lee, Claire Seungeun (2018). Soft Power Made in China. The Dilemmas of Online and Offline Media and Transnational Audiences. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Lee, Paul S. (2016). “The Rise of China and its Contest for Discursive Power.” Global Media and China 1(1-2): 102-120. https://doi.org/10.1177/2059436416650549. Accessed 26 May 2018.
Li, Guangyi (2015). “Shiliaoxue shiye zhong de Zhongguo kehuan yanjiu” 史料學視野中的中國科幻研究 [Research on Chinese science fiction from the perspective of historical materials]. Qinghua daxue xuebao 清華大學學報 30(4): 131-141.
Li, Yongjie (2015). “Academics Explore Sci-fi’s Soft Power Potential.” Chinese Social Sciences Today. http://www.csstoday.com/Item/1968.aspx. Accessed 26 May 2018.
Liu, Cixin (2016). “The Worst of All Possible Universes and the Best of All Possible Earths: Three-Body and Chinese Science Fiction.” In Invisible Planets: An Anthology of Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction, trans. and ed. by Ken Liu, 361-367. London: Head Zeus.
Liu, Zhaoxin (2017). “China Has Upper Hand in Development of Genre.” China Daily (Dec) 22-28: 8.
Luce, Henry R. (1941). “The American Century.”Life (Feb) 17: 61-65.
Miller, Caroline R. (1984). “Genre as Social Action.”Quarterly Journal of Speech 70: 151-176.
Milton, John,Paul Bandia (eds.) (2009). Agents of Translation. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Miskimmon, Alister, Ben O’Loughlin,Laura Roselle (2014). Strategic Narratives: Communication Power and the New World Order. New York and Oxon: Routledge.
Pohl, Frederik (1997). “The Politics of Prophecy.” In Political Science Fiction, ed. by Donald M. Hassler and Clyde Wilcock, 7-17. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.
Qian, Jiang (2013). “Translation and the Development of Science Fiction in Twentieth-Century China.”Science Fiction Studies 40(1): 116-132.
Rieder, John (2010). “On Defining SF, or Not: Genre Theory, DF, and History.” Science Fiction Studies 37 (2) July: 191-209.
Roberts, Adam (2016). The History of Science Fiction. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Saunders, Robert (2015). “Imperial Imaginaries: Employing Science Fiction to Talk about Geopolitics.” E-International Relations, June 8. https://www.e-ir.info/2015/06/11/imperial-imaginaries-employing-science-fiction-to- talk-about-geopolitics/. Accessed 26 May 2018.
Song, Mingwei (2013). “Variations on Utopia in Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction.”Science Fiction Studies 40(1): 86-102.
— (2015). “After 1989: The New Wave of Chinese Science Fiction.”Chinese Perspectives 1: 7-13.
Thieret, Adrian (2015). “Society and Utopia in Liu Cixin.”China Perspectives 1: 33-39.
Tymn, Marshall B. (1985). “Science Fiction: A Brief History and Review of Criticism.”American Studies International 23(1): 41-66.
Venuti, Lawrence (2008). The Translator’s Invisibility. A History of Translation. London and New York: Routledge.
Wagner, Rudolf (1985). “Lobby Literature: The Archaeology and Present Functions of Science Fiction in the People’s Republic of China.” In After Mao: Chinese Literature and Society 1978-1981, ed. by Jeffrey Kinkley, 17-62. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Wald, Priscilla (2015). “Science, Technology and Environment.” In The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, ed. by Gerry Canavan and Eric Carl Link, 179-193. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Wang, Quangen (2010). Xiandai Zhongguo kehuan wenxue zhuchao 現代中國科幻文學主潮 [Main currents of modern Chinese science fiction literature]. Chongqing: Chongqing chubanshe.
Westfahl, Gary (2015). “The Mightiest Machine: The Development of American Science Fiction from the 1920s to the 1960s.” In The Cambridge Companion to American Science Fiction, ed. by Gerry Canavan and Eric Carl Link, 17-30. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Westfahl, Gary,R.D. Mullen (1994). “An Exchange: Hugo Gernsback and His Impact on Modern Science Fiction.” Trans. by Andrea Lingenfelter. Science Fiction Studies 21 (2) July: 273-283.
Wu, Yan (2013). “ ‘Great Wall Planet’: Introducing Chinese Science Fiction.”Science Fiction Studies 40(1): 1-14.
Wu, Yan,Yao Jianbin (2018). “A Very Brief History of Chinese Science Fiction.” Trans. by Andrea Lingenfelter.Chinese Literature Today 7(1): 44-53.
Yao, Minji,Stanley Chu (2017). “Science Fiction Going Mainstream in China.” Shanghai Daily, 26 August. https://www.shine.cn/archive/feature/Science-fiction-going-mainstream-in-China/shdaily.shtml. Accessed 25 May 2018.
Zhang, Yiwu 張頤武 (2016). “Leixing xiaoshuo de dangxiaxing” 類型小說的當下性 [The immediacy of genre fiction]. Shanhua 山花 15: 119-121.