An Exploration into Unnatural Narrative-Based Literary Translation Criticism: A Case Study of Yang Xianyi's and Julia Lovell's Translations of Old Tales Retold and A Madman’s Diary

The unnatural narrative features in Lu Xun's novels have long been unnoticed by academia in the framework of realism. In some of his works, the transformation of time across different eras, the unbounded space, the biologically impossible characters, and the persecution-induced psychological deformation demonstrate innovative narrative features which transcend the realism and violate natural parameters. The study attempts to introduce the Unnatural Narrative into literary translation criticism, analyze the elements of anti-mimesis in Old Tales Retold and A Madman’s Diary from four aspects: Unnatural Time, Unnatural Space, Unnatural Characters, Unnatural Minds and their English translations, aiming to manifest the value of the poetics of Unnatural Narrative, which have not been fully explored and expressed in literary translation. Furthermore, this paper also aims to provide a reference for the approaches of interlingual transmission of Unnatural Narrative in Chinese literature.