翻譯與規範：陳柏蒼《湖濱散記》譯本中的梭羅再現

Abstract

《湖濱散記》為美國超越主義大家梭羅的作品，出版於一八五四年，共收錄十八篇他所撰寫的散文，其中描述他在華騰湖畔獨自住上兩年兩個月的生活點滴，也論及自立、簡約生活等超越主義思想。綜觀《湖濱散記》在臺灣的眾多譯本，由陳柏蒼所譯的一九九八年版本或是最為有趣的案例，但過去研究鮮少討論此譯本，即便有也多是點到為止。一方面來看，陳柏蒼的譯本跟原文相差極大，呈現出截然不同、甚至有所問題的梭羅形象，但另一方面來看，此譯本又為上百位當時的專家學者背書，儼然化身為「正宗」且「對等」的譯本，讓人容易信任其中內容。有鑑於此，本研究從翻譯規範之觀點，探討此譯本如何再現梭羅形象、翻譯過程的內外部因素，還有此譯本如何誤導不知情的研究者走上岔路。研究發現，陳譯本中的梭羅不但語調更具說教意味，其形象似乎也從十九世紀的思想大家轉化為二十世紀末的臺灣專家，時常提及臺灣社會關注的大小議題，並頻頻呼應社會解嚴後的情緒。研究也發現，臺灣有近四十篇碩博士論文引用陳譯本，其中有部分為陳譯本誤導，因而產出有待商榷的論述，甚至進一步影響後續的相關研究。

Walden is a collection of eighteen essays written by noted American transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau. Published in 1854, this book details Thoreau’s experience of living alone in a cabin near Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts, and reflects on transcendental themes such as self-reliance, the simplicity of life, and the need for people to experience the world on their own. Of the many Chinese translations of Walden in Taiwan, Chen Bocang’s version in 1998 has perhaps been the most interesting. On the one hand, his translation is one that consists of much deviation from the source text, thus presenting to readers a different, or even problematic, image of the transcendentalist, but, on the other hand, it has also been endorsed by more than a hundred well-known figures in Taiwan and may come across as a “verified” and “equivalent” version of Walden. Hence, this research seeks to discuss the problems that come with such a unique translation using a norm-based approach, including the representation of Thoreau in the translated text, the external and internal factors at play during the translation process, and how this translation has led unknowing researchers astray. Textual analysis suggests that Thoreau’s tone of voice in Chen’s translation has been shifted to sound more didactic, and that the transcendentalist seems more of a twenty-century Taiwanese than a nineteenth-century American, not only referencing issues that concerned Taiwan’s society at the time, but also echoing the post-martial law sentiments. It is also discovered that nearly forty academic theses and dissertations in Taiwan quoted Chen’s translation as a reference, and some of which were indeed misled by this particular translation, thus producing inherently problematic arguments that would later make their way into other relevant research.