A Report On The Translation Of Chapter Ten From The Aviator

Biography is a kind of narrative literature that features the balance between authenticity and literariness.Its author pays close attention to elements of language style,plot structures,character development and themes to make the story as compelling as possible to the readers.In biography translation,the translator should particularly pay more attention to its authenticity and literariness and choose proper translation's principle and theory.British translation theorist Peter Newmark put forward the theory of semantic and communicative translation,which provided approaches to biography translation practice.This report is based on the translation of Chapter 10 from the book The Aviator,written by Winston Groom.According to the theory of semantic and communicative translation,this target text is on one hand loyal to the source text and keeps the original features,on the other hand gives consideration to readers' understanding and reaction,hoping to accurately present the style and charm of the original.In a good biography translation,Chinese readers can not only be exposed to more historical,cultural and social information but also get chance to appreciate the aesthetic value of literature.However,currently,there are just a few studies focusing on the Chinese translation of foreign narrative non-fiction works.Thus,it is both necessary and important to conduct a study concerning this topic.The difficulties in translation involved the rendering of certain words and phrases,sentence patterns and language styles.The challenge in words and phrases was how to translate them accurately and at the same time how to clarify logical relationships of difficult long sentences,loyally conveying the original information;the difficulty in language styles was how to make the translated text as vivid and effective as the original.The thesis is focused on the solutions of these difficulties.The method of case study is used in the thesis.This report analyzed and dealt with relevant words and phrases,sentence patterns and language styles by adoptingthe theory of semantic and communicative translation.The author suggested that semantic translation be adopted to render the exact contextual meaning and language style of the original text while communicative translation be used to overcome those difficulties in translation caused by different syntactic structures,grammar rules and modes of expression between English and Chinese as well as the cultural differences between English and China so as to make the translated version more acceptable and appealing to Chinese readers.The study indicates that these two translation theories can be combined in translation practice and provide guidance on how to choose the appropriate strategy corresponding with different contexts.