Western Theory in East Asian Contexts

Rezensionen / Stimmen

Leo Tak-hung Chan's latest book sets bold new parameters for translation studies by showing how this discipline needs to embed practices of adaptation and imitation at the core of its analysis. Taking this expanded field of translation studies as his point of departure, Chan presents richly intriguing case studies from East Asian writing - from free translations of Aesop's fables to adaptations of contemporary manga to imitations of James Joyce - to show how cultural producers in the Sinosphere have creatively remade their source texts in ways that challenge ascendant theories of translation from the global North. This study will be mandatory reading for scholars and students of translation studies everywhere. * Margaret Hillenbrand, Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, University of Oxford, UK * With a breathtakingly erudite range of examples drawn from trans-textual rewritings in East Asia of the past several centuries, Leo Chan's Western Theory in East Asian Contexts offers a very welcome non-European perspective on longstanding debates over the nature and boundaries of translation. Particularly valuable is its nuanced application to East Asian literatures of current theoretical work covering the spectrum of translation, adaptation, and imitation, inter alia. From contemporary Japanese anime and Taiwanese television dramas to literary classics like Ulysses, Aesop's Fables, and Water Margin, Chan repeatedly demonstrates how a holistic approach to the migration of texts across languages and national or cultural boundaries can yield insights that both corroborate and enrich recent theoretical advances in the field of translation studies. * Stephen Roddy, Professor of Modern and Classical Languages, University of San Francisco, USA *