Compensation Strategies In Translation Of Alliteration

Alliteration, a common and popular figure of speech, has a long-term history among all English rhetorical devices, which can be traced back to the earliest epic Beowulf, in which there are a large number of alliterative uses. However, it experiences climactic and declining periods and as time goes on, it is now popularly used in news, advertisements and other genres of writing which require highly musical effect, for English alliteration is one of the figures of sound that can produce some special musical effect. It follows naturally that how to translate alliteration becomes a matter not only of necessity but of significance. However, the previous research of alliteration is not systematic, so this thesis is from a new perspective to elicit the discussion of the translation strategies of alliteration.The thesis is mainly based on the theory of compensation strategies with the classification of phonological compensation and structural compensation to study how to translate alliteration, which aims to improve the translation methods of alliteration to make up for the loss in translation. Taking the theory of equivalence, skopos theory, limits of translatability, aesthetic need, compensation strategies as the theoretical basis, the thesis explores the translation of alliteration.In translation, absolute translation is only an ideal. Due to the unique features of alliteration, the charms of alliteration cannot be rendered completely, which involves limits of translatability and therefore demands more translation efforts to solve the problem. In addition, purpose is of uttermost importance in the process of translation, which determines the action of translators. When translators cannot render the charms of alliteration fully, they will have a certain purpose to adopt some special translation methods to make up for the loss of alliteration. These special methods in this thesis refer to compensation strategies.Specifically speaking, as for compensation strategies in the translation of alliteration, they are mainly divided into two parts from different perspectives of compensation: phonological compensation and structural compensation, along with which many translation methods are put forward in order to promote the translation of alliteration. Phonological compensation aims to create the similar sound effect to compensate from the perspective of sound while structural compensation is mainly balance–oriented to compensate from the perspective of structure. However, when phonological compensation and structural compensation are both acceptable in the translation of alliteration, phonological compensation should be preferable. Because alliteration is one of the figures of sound, phonological compensation in the translation of alliteration is the direct acoustic compensation, but structural compensation involves the transition from acoustic beauty to visual beauty.Overall, based on the theory of equivalence, skopos theory, limits of translatability, aesthetic need, compensation strategies, the thesis discusses translation strategies of alliteration from different perspectives, and provides an explanatory theoretical basis for choosing translation strategies of alliteration, which complements and refines the previous studies on this aspect and contributes to the translation research of alliteration. In addition, research on it can be much instructive and conducive to the research of other figures of speech.