A Report On The Translation Of Life Among The Chinese (Chapter 17-18) And Journeys In North China (Chapter 7-8)

This report is a review on the translation of Chapter 17 and Chapter 18 of Life Among the Chinese, written by R.S. Maclay, reorganized by Wu Xian, published in 2008, and Chapter 7 and 8, an important part of Journeys in North China, written by Alexander Williamson, reorganized by Li Guoqing, published in 2008. Life Among the Chinese mainly descries China in the eyes of Christian missionary, the perspective of the book covers more than missionary work and narrates the geography, history, diplomacy, religions, government agencies, laws, spiritual state of Chinese people, local condition and etc extensively. Journeys in North China mainly describes what Alexander Williamson had seen and heard and basic information of China's nature and culture, however, his attitude towards China is debatable, he had played the role as the pioneer of invader and collected some information initiatively which helps imperialist countries to invade China. All these facts are mentioned in the book.The part of author's translation of Life Among the Chinese mainly describes China's religious condition at that time, mental state of Chinese people and treaties formed with China. The part of author's translation of Journeys in North China mainly introduces the geography, history and natural and social situation.While there are numerous western works about China, but works that had been translated are very few. However, if these works can be translated and introduced to the public, it will be a great help to academic world and people who is interested. The purposes of author are to translate the original text written by the westerner into Chinese accurately, help the Chinese observe China in foreigner's eyes and look at China's culture and history from different perspectives, and provide with abundant data for related study. In the course of translation, the author employs foreignization, and tries to retain the information and linguistic features of the source text. Therefore, the author takes Skopos Theory as guidance. The core concept of Skopos Theory is to take the purpose of translating as the leading factor and determines the translation strategies and methods accordingly.Under the guidance of the Skopos Theory, combining with literal examples and difficulties in the translation process, the author adopts various methods such as literal translation, free translation, division and turning passive voice into active voice. The report consists of five parts. Part one is the introduction of the original text, including the source of the original text and the linguistic features of source text. Part two states the preparation the author did for the translation. Part three expatiates on the theories that the source text based on. The forth chapter is the core of the report, this part analyzes some important examples and difficulties the author encountered during translating. First of all, the author classifies these examples into words, sentences and paragraphs, then analyzing these examples. The analysis covers the consistency of the text, translation of culture-loaded words, conversion of the characteristic of certain words, and the translation of the whole text. The last part draws the conclusion of the enlightenments and experience the author gained from the translation process, and points out the problems unsolved.