Fiction Dialogue Translation

Dialogue is one of the key aspects in fiction, and maintenance of the original speech style of the fiction character is regarded as a paramount task for the translator. Therefore, this paper explores the issue of fiction dialogue translation, the translation of the speech style of fiction character in particular, in the light of Crystal and Davy's analytic framework of style and the markedness theory.In order to replace the impressionistic and sporadic approach with a systematic one in stylistic analysis, Crystal and Davy's model provides an elaborate and detailed framework for stylistic analysis. For my analytic goal, Crystal and Davy's model will be trimmed to two categories with six dimensions, namely, individuality, dialect, time, province, status and singularity. Four levels of analysis are examined in this paper: graphological, lexical, grammatical and semantic levels. So their model will provide a framework to allocate each intuitive selection of a linguistic feature to the stylistic dimension and to a particular level of analysis.In this paper the markedness theory is employed to facilitate the translation of the stylistic features organized in Crystal and Davy's model. The markedness theory is a linguistic theory first applied in phonology to describe phonemes standing in opposition to each other. In literary translation studies, the concept of markedness has been borrowed to differentiate the stylistically significant linguistic features (marked) from the common-core (unmarked). Since the transference of the speech style of the fiction character ultimately relies on the conveyance of each linguistic feature, the markedness theory is employed to highlight the linguistic features of stylistic significance identified and classifiedin Crystal and Davy's framework. The translator is expected to retain the markedness in the stylistic dimension(s) of Crystal and Davy's framework when translating the speech style of the fiction character.The examples in the discussion of the theoretical foundation are collected from a variety of classic fictions in the English literature. A case study of David Copperfield by Dickens is carried out. With the use of Crystal and Davy's framework of stylistic analysis and the markedness theory, the dialogues are examined to show how the novelist uses stylistic markedness to mould the speech style of the fiction character and how efficient the translations are. The speech style of the fiction character can be translated with the guidance of the two theories combined.