Texts, translators and contexts, a historiographical study of the early English translations of the Chinese classic xiaoshuo Xiyouji, from the mid-nineteenth century to 1942

This historiographical research project is to apply a balanced methodology based on the theoretical considerations of both history oriented translation research (TRAHI) and Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS) discussed in chapter one, with particular emphasis on paratexts and archival materials. In the chapters that follow I will present a series of observations on the historiographical course followed by the early English translations of classical Chinese xiaoshuo Xiyouji from the mid-nineteenth century to 1942, surrounding this data with sufficient first-hand details. By focusing on the three research objects of translated texts, translators and contexts, I will explore translations as part of a historiography at the centre of the relevant activities in the translators’ biographies, publication backgrounds and socio-historical factors, aiming to contribute to not only the underresearched niche of the early English dissemination of Xiyouji, but also to the improvement of the current recognition and translation practices in Chinese classical xiaoshuo. In practice, these details have heretofore been discrete, even distantly separated, in the fields of Chinese Studies and Translation Studies, comparative literature, literary history and criticism, particularly in the English language background, where literary history and criticism were usually amalgamated only for research on European literature. My hope, by bridging the gaps between them, is to deepen the understanding of all relevant fields concerning topics of mutual concern. My overall argument of this research is, although the imprint of social milieu and other agents left different influences on textual presentations, the translator choices of translating and adapting Xiyouji in this early commercialised period, from the mid-nineteenth century to 1942, were recognised as highly individualistic.