Losses And Gains In Poetry Translation

In this thesis the author examine the poetry translation focusing on the aspects of translatability, criteria of poetry translation, and special attentions are paid on losses and gains after the poem has been translated. Translation is to reproduce the meaning and style of a source-language text in a target-language text in consideration of the organic structure-relevancy of its constituents on a basis of text fitness in a given text. Because of dramatic differences between languages or cultures, translators have to sacrifice something, such as rhymes, rhetorical devices, and the style of the original poem to obtaining its aesthetic value and its original beauty. This thesis starts from a debate on poetry translation. Whether there is possibility to translate poems bothers both translators and translation critics all the time. The author of this thesis holds the opinion that poetry is translatable despite various hardships and problems. Chapter II deals with three criteria of poetry translation. One is a principle of unity of form and content, just as Liu Zhongde put it that poetry translation calls for beauty of form, sound and content."Best words in best order"is what Xu Yuanchong has been always emphasizing through out his career as a poetry translator. And Huang Gaoxin put forward a theory of quantization, analyzing translated versions in a way that is more scientific. In chapter III, the author analyzes some of the losses in poetry translation. They are mainly divided into four groups: the loss of rhyme scheme, loss of figures of speech, loss of the musical quality and content losses. In the following chapters several methods of compensations have been discussed. The purpose of this part is to propose helpful ways to make up losses or damages and to try some useful methods to get a better translation. The last chapter explores gains during the process of poetry translation. From the view of communicative functions, translation may enrich the target language and help the source language accepted by people from other cultures.