A Study Of The Translation Of Nicknames In Shuihu Zhuan From The Perspective Of Relevance Theory

Sperber and Wilson’s Relevance Theory claims that language communication is anostensive-inferential process: the communicator makes the manifest to the audience hisintension and the audience makes inference about the communicator’s intention. Thesuccess of the communication depends on the desire to reach optimal relevance by both thecommunicator and the audience. As translation can be regarded as a special kind ofcommunication activity, relevance theory is powerful in explaining the nature of translation.According to relevance theory, translation is the dual ostensive-inferential process ofinterlingual interpretation, a kind of language communication among three participants: theoriginal writer, the translator, and the reader. The translator should comprehend the exactintention of the original writer and expectation of the target reader. The success oftranslation is based upon the achievement of optimal relevance of the original writer andthe target reader.Shuihu Zhuan is regarded as one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chineseliterature. It is well-received both at home and abroad. As one of the most distinguishedfeatures of Shuihu Zhuan, the nicknames of its characters have attracted the attention ofmany researchers. Through a detailed analysis of the four versions of Shuihu Zhuan, thisstudy is devoted to the translation of nicknames in Shuihu Zhuan from the perspective ofrelevance theory. For the success of communication between the source text and the targettext reader, the translator firstly needs to be a reader to infer the original writer’s intentionfrom the context, using his knowledge of the source language and culture. Then he takesthe role of a communicator to comprehend the context of the target reader based on hisunderstanding of the target language and culture. Finally, he can achieve the optimalrelevance between the original writer and the target reader by adopting different translationstrategies and accomplish the purpose of communication.