The Role of Translation in the Worlding of Poetics

Abstract

Following Wang Ning’s postulation that world poetics is “an open theoretical body that gains in translation and cross-cultural interpretation and can be constantly reconstructed,” I expound on the role of translation in the making of world poetics. I argue that the worlding of poetics manifests as a mode of circulating and reading literary theory and criticism by transcending the boundaries of languages and cultures. With reference to two polemical episodes in a Chinese literary context, I illustrate how world poetics serves as a platform for the cross-cultural engagement of literary theory; and conversely, how it is contingent on translation and cross-cultural interpretation.