Translation Report On Two Short Stories In Tales Of A Traveller

This report reflects on the author’s translation practice of "The Devil and Tom Walker" and "The Story of the Bandit Chieftain", two short stories in Tales of a Traveller by the first American Man of Letters--Washington Irving (1783-1859). The author summarizes the writing style of the short stories and focuses on one of its most prominent features, the application of humor. Through analysis of the translation of humor in the draft version by the author herself and the revised version by her supervisor, the author summarizes the translatability and untranslatability, as well as the translation strategy and methods of three kinds of humor.This report consists of four chapters. The first chapter introduces the translation project, and the translation process. The second chapter presents the background information about Washington Irving and the writing style of Tales of a Traveller and expounds related humor theories. The third chapter analyzes the translation of humorous elements in both the draft and the revised version according to the classification of universal humor, cultural humor and linguistic humor and summarizes their translatability and untranslatability, as well as their translation strategy and methods. The fourth chapter summarizes the first three chapters and the findings.