Translation as image rewriting: the case of Chinese red novels

Following its founding in 1949, the People's Republic of China embarked on a large-scale endeavour to translate red novels into English. Remarkably, these translations often underwent rewritings, suggesting the state's considerable influence. Drawing on André Lefevere's rewriting theory, this article examines why and how these works were rewritten in English. It first offers an overview of the domestic and foreign contexts of red novel translation, and then presents how these novels were translated, including the involvement of translators in the translation process and the rewriting of characters' images. It is found that red novels were translated not only for cultural exchange but also for social-political and publicity reasons. To this end, the positive and negative characters of red novels are frequently modified, although following different paths: positive characters are generally improved or idealised for a more perfect representation, whereas negative characters are typically degraded or worsened to justify the struggle against them. Nonetheless, both trajectories ultimately serve the same purpose – to reshape the state's national image.