Abstract: This article reexamines Goldblatt's remarks on the essence of translation. His remarks come from the problems he met and his corresponding measures in the complicated translating process. In order to look into the matter more precisely, this article puts forward a new approach distinguishing between “intra translation” and “extra-translation”, and the prototypical “translation” and “translation as a social activity”, which may throw some lights on the debate over a new orientation for translation at present.