The Publication of the Translation Versions of The Great Gatsby in Taiwan: A Paratexual Analysis

• Main Authors: WANG, YU-JU, 王玉如
• Other Authors: WU, YI-PING
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2019
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/73mt7v

碩士 === 國立高雄科技大學 === 應用英語系 === 107 === This study aims to explore the publication situation of The Great Gatsby through the paratextual analysis to better understand the relevance between the paratext and the publishers’ publication policy in Taiwan. Genette’s (1997) paratext theory are used as the theoretical framework to analyze and discuss the differences. Thirteen Chinese translation versions of The Great Gatsby published after 2005 are selected as the research material. Through collecting the cover design, web-based information, and the foreword, the researcher examines the differences among them. After contrasting and analyzing the paratext and the publisher’s publication policy, the relevance between them is presented in the study. As the results show, the cover designs are mostly male figures. As for the web-based information, the information provided after 2010 is getting abundant and detailed. With regard to the foreword, the number of the foreword written by the experts or scholars is much higher than the translator’s foreword. What’s more, the two types of the foreword both proposed the comments on translation of different versions, and the translator’s different translation strategies and wording, hoping the translator’s voice can be heard. Finally, based on the investigation, six main factors of how publishers select books are proposed: publisher’s style, translation books as main stream books, literary classics, cost, the hit of the movie, and a requirement to have a new translation version. In the relevance between the six factors and the three types of the paratext, the factor of being literary classics is the most related, followed by the factor of a requirement to have a new translation version. After that, the hit of movie is also one of the factor. The last related factor is publisher’s style. Until now, few translation works are investigated from the paratextual perspective. It is hoped that this study could provide a reference model for future research or at least pave the way to new research projects.