A Report On The Translation Of An Excerpt From War Of The Whales: A True Story

The translation report is composed of four parts. Part One introduces test of the translation contract, Joshua Horwitz’s War of the Whales: A True Story, which aims to reveal the connection between sonar system of the U.S. navy and the mass stranding of whales and is of positive significance to improving people’s awareness of animal protection. Part Two is the description of the pre-translation preparation, which mainly includes studying the journalistic style and knowledge in whale protection, species of whales, names and places in the book and the U.S. navy to gain a well-ground understanding of the source test. Part Three is case analysis. After finishing the draft, the author analyzes vocabulary and syntax difficulties with specific examples, which involve the book title and chapter names, adjectives and onomatopoeia, causative verbs, long sentences and punctuation. And to get more accurate translation, various translation methods have been adopted, including conversion, addition, separation, restructuring and treatment to punctuation. Part four is conclusion. After the translation, the author realizes that, many problems can lead to poor translation efficiency and quality, such as lack of background knowledge on animal protection and sonar, less dictionary use including biographical dictionaries and geographical dictionaries, and less conversion of keywords in information retrieval process. To be a qualified translator, the author should work hard to gain a good command of both languages and profound knowledge of specialized fields for future translation.