| The masterpiece of critical realism"Fortress Besieged", or Wei Cheng《(围城》), by Qian Zhongshu caused a big sensation both at home and abroad. To a large extent, the glamour of the novel can be attributed to the use of numerous original and fresh culture-loaded words and expressions, which reflected, from different angles, the author's patriotism, profound philosophy of life as well as his view of values. As one of the prominent features of Fortress Besieged, culture-loaded words and expressions are the direct reflections of the uniqueness of the Chinese culture. However, how to translate these words and expressions faithfully has been one of the most difficult problems and major obstacles for the translators. As a result, it is of great significance for us to probe into the translation strategies that are applied to the translation of culture-loaded words and expressions.The author of the dissertation attempts to carry out the research on a theoretical basis of translation strategies combined with cultural translation theory. Cultural translation is a new realm of interest in the translation studies. It began to take shape in the western translation field in the 1990s. Susan Baassnett and Andre Lefevere proposed that the translation studies should take the"cultural turn", which means that translation is the communication between culture and culture, and translation equivalence is the equivalence of source language and target language on culture function. Therefore, translation is not merely a process of linguistic transformation, but a process of cultural transfer. This theory not only sheds light on translation studies but also leads translating theory into a new era. Besides, it offers new insight into the choice of translation strategies of the culture-loaded words and expressions.When translating culture-loaded words, translators often resort to two cultural translation strategies—domestication and foreignization. These two translation strategies are not contradictory, as many people think; instead, they are complementary and indispensible to each other. In order to retain the cultural features of the original novel, foreignization should be employed as much as possible. However, sometimes the translators may need to apply domestication, in order to better express the original flavors and ideas or avoid misunderstandings.After discussing the five categorizations of culture-loaded words and expressions, specific application of the translation strategies used in the translation of these words in Fortress Besieged, the authoress puts forward her suggestions on the translation strategies that should be adopted in the translation of culture-loaded words and expressions, that is, foreignization above domestication. The most important reason for us to consider this translation strategy is that when translating culture-loaded words or expressions, several cultural factors should be allowed for, such as the translator's purpose, translator's life and cultural attitude and readers'expectations. |
