Interpreting Of Poems—a Comparative Study Of Interpreting And Translating Poems Quoted By Premier Wen And Foreign Leaders

Interpreting is a highly demanding task that requires an interpreter to have a good command of two languages or even more. However, a bilinguist may not be qualified as an interpreter since interpreting is more than a mere conversion between two languages. It may tackle many culture-loaded hurdles in the context of cross-cultural communication; it may touch upon the issues of socialization and psychological quality; it demands a flexible application of various skills and a comprehensive storage of knowledge. In the process of interpreting, listening, comprehension, note taking and presentation are organically linked and equally important. Another crucial dimension of the successful interpreting lies in removing the culture-loaded hurdles. In cross-cultural communication and interpreting, culture-loaded expressions are troublemakers that may pose a big headache for interpreters. Poems interpreting may be the case. Chinese classical poems are loaded with unique cultural factors that may be very tough for interpreters to decipher from the source language to the target language in a quick response. It is a difficult mission that requires an interpreter having a very good command of cultural knowledge. Poems’interpreting is increasingly common and popular with Chinese Premier Wen as its spokesman. Premier Wen is a knowledgeable statesman with encyclopedic knowledge of Chinese classical poems. He prefers to give his responses in the form of poems, and thus poem interpreting during Premier Wen’s annual press conferences has become the topic of the author’s choice. The author will lay much greater emphasis on the comparative study of interpreting and translating poems quoted by Premier Wen. By drawing the comparison between the two, the author may derive something useful, like interpreting techniques, cross-cultural barriers and adaptation to the occasion, etc. With the purpose of enriching the study, the author will also analyze and compare both interpreting and translating techniques and relevant theoretical bases, and the subject will not just be confined to poems quoted by Premier Wen, but also those frequently quoted by foreign leaders in their speeches. Hopefully, the thesis will make certain contribution to the study of interpreting.